Title: The Teaching of Evolution | NSTA
Headings: The Teaching of Evolution
The Teaching of Evolution
Introduction
Declarations
Within this context, NSTA recommends that
NSTA Offers the Following Background Information:
The Nature of Science and Scientific Theories
Evolution as a Unifying Concept
Creationism and Other Non-Scientific Views
Legal Issues
References
Additional Resources

Content: However, the professional responsibility of science teachers and curriculum specialists to provide students with quality science education should not be compromised by censorship, pseudoscience, inconsistencies, faulty scholarship, political influences, or unconstitutional mandates. Science textbooks should emphasize evolution as a unifying concept. Publishers should not be required or volunteer to include disclaimers in textbooks that distort or misrepresent the methodology of science and the current body of knowledge concerning the nature and study of evolution. —Adopted by the NSTA Board of Directors, July 2013
NSTA Offers the Following Background Information: The Nature of Science and Scientific Theories
Science is a method of testing natural explanations for natural objects and events. Phenomena that can be observed or measured are amenable to scientific investigation. Science also is based on the observation that the universe operates according to regularities that can be discovered and understood through scientific investigations. Explanations that are not consistent with empirical evidence or that cannot be tested empirically are not a part of science. As a result, explanations of natural phenomena that are not derived from evidence but from myths, personal beliefs, religious values, philosophical axioms, and superstitions are not scientific. Furthermore, because science is limited to explaining natural phenomena through testing based on the use of empirical evidence, it cannot provide religious or ultimate explanations.