Tag: science education

Science education faces a grave challenge in our current social and political moment. In this “post-truth” era, the currency of empirical fact loses value to emotion and personal belief, and this growing social phenomenon is capitalized on and wielded by politicians and other influential people as a tool of propaganda. The internet spreads and monetizes

In early August, news broke that Pennsylvania had laid out its plan to comply with the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA). Parents, teachers and community members were overjoyed; headlines ecstatically proclaimed new guidelines under ESSA meant less time spent on standardized testing in schools.[1] These articles state, and the ESSA report confirms (Pennsylvania Department of

Most of us have been there: it’s your freshman year and you’re in a crowded lecture hall, a completely anonymous face in a sea of 300 students.  At about three minutes past class time, a professor enters the room with a notebook full of faded pages and begins to talk.  He’s talking about science; it’s