Ohio bill would allow students to be scientifically wrong due to religion
So if this <i>WERE</i> the case, I&#x27;d be against it. But, this is clickbait journalism at its finest. If we read the actual text of the law:<p>&gt; No school district board of education, As Passed by the House governing authority of a community school established under Chapter 3314. of the Revised Code, governing body of a STEM school established under Chapter 3326. of the Revised Code, or board of trustees of a college-preparatory boarding school established under Chapter 3328. of the Revised Code shall prohibit a student from engaging in religious expression in the completion of homework, artwork, or other written or oral assignments. Assignment grades and scores shall be calculated using ordinary academic standards of substance and relevance, including any legitimate pedagogical concerns, and shall not penalize or reward a student based on the religious content of a student&#x27;s work.<p>This suggests, that, you may not <i>penalize</i> <i></i>OR REWARD<i></i> a student because their work contains religious references. However, the work is still to be marked <i></i>using ordinary academic standards of substance and relevance<i></i>.<p>So if a student said that &quot;The world was created 6000 years ago&quot; on a science test, then they are still marked wrong. If they said &quot;I believe the world was created 6000 years ago, but scientists say that it is 4.543 billion years old&quot; then the student should be marked right for providing the correct answer, and their religious view should not be considered or weighted.<p>Further, if a student was making a moral argument about a character in a novel for an English paper, if they referenced morality as coming from god, they shouldn&#x27;t be penalized for that if the paper still is a strong well formed academic work that assesses the themes in the book.<p>The other sections of this bill actually do a lot to protect the individual rights of anyone religious (whether Christian or otherwise) and atheists, by disallowing school boards to prevent you from practicing your beliefs and requiring that they allow time for prayer, meditation or reflection, as well as allowing students to opt-out of any such activity without repercussion.<p>This law is being constantly painted as some draconian attempt to allow wrong-answers based on religious belief, and it simply doesn&#x27;t even come close to doing that.