Complaint Against Science Standards Filed in Federal Court
(Topeka, KS) On September 26 Citizens for Objective Public Education, Inc. (COPE) filed suit in federal court against the Kansas State Board of Education and the Kansas State Department of Education to enjoin implementation of science standards designed for all students in the US.
The Complaint was filed in Topeka, Kansas, in the U.S. District Court for the District of Kansas. Other plaintiffs in the suit include eight families with children enrolled in Kansas public schools and a family that represents Kansas taxpayers.
The Complaint and additional information may be found on COPE’s website: www.COPEinc.org.
The Complaint alleges that the Kansas Board’s adoption on June 11, 2013, of A Framework for K-12 Science Education and the Next Generation Science Standards (the F&S) “will have the effect of causing Kansas public schools to establish and endorse a non-theistic religious worldview” in violation of the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution.
In May and June, 2013, COPE urged the Kansas Board to reject the Standards for the reasons set forth in its analyses dated June 1, 2012 and January 29, 2013. However, the Board and the Department of Education declined to discuss or investigate the concerns expressed in the analyses.
The Complaint claims that the Standards lead students to ask “ultimate religious questions” like “where do we come from?” Rather than objectively inform children about these questions in an age-appropriate manner, the F&S lead them “to answer the questions with only