As Josh Youngkin points out, thanks to folks like Censor of the Year nominee* Zack Kopplin, an article at Slate has been making the rounds with the false claim that "thousands of schools…are teaching creationism with taxpayer money." Josh delivers an amusing rebuke to author Chris Kirk, who’s clearly out of his depth.

Now I see that Slate has tried to make matters right by amending its headline, but still gets things wrong. Now it says:

Map: Publicly Funded Schools That Are Allowed to Teach Creationism.

An accompanying correction explains:

This article’s headlines originally suggested that thousands of public schools in Louisiana and Tennessee are teaching creationism. While those schools are permitted to teach creationism, it is unclear how many are actually teaching it, and the headlines have been updated to reflect this.

As Josh says, though, the relevant academic freedom statues in Louisiana and Tennessee expressly do not sanction teaching religious doctrines, such as creationism.

Hmm, here’s a suggestion for Slate. Since teaching creationism in public schools is unconstitutional all across these fifty states, an accurate headline might read:

Map: Public Schools That Are NOT Allowed to Teach Creationism.

The map would then show an image of the U.S. with every public school in every state indicated by a colored dot.

* I don’t think I’m giving anything away when I say that Mr. Kopplin has been nominated for Censor of the Year, a prize recognizing outstanding efforts in the area of thwarting free speech about evolution. That doesn’t mean he’ll win. Be sure to send your further nominations by tomorrow, January 29, to editor@evolutionnews.org.

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