Evolution education and even some personal networking.

I just recently found out that being a student of U.T. grants me access to long list of peer-reviewed science journals. This makes me happy, since I always hate getting a log-in screen when I try to pull up the full text of some interesting abstract. I don't get everything (I really wanted Nature, for instance), but among the many I have access to are Blackwell Synergy (including Evolution & Development, and Evolution), Science, SpringerLink, and Wiley InterScience.

Did I mention how cool this is?

Anyway, I was cruising around Evolution the other day and stumbled on a piece entitled "Making evolution relevant and exciting to biology students". As I am a biology student interested in evolution, I thought I might take a look at what this article had to say.

I was also surprised to see that the author, David Hillis, is a biology professor at my university.

As to his article, David laments the fact that the coverage of evolution in Texas high school textbooks has received attacks from anti-evolution members of the Texas Board of Education. He calls for a defense of evolution education from academic biologists in our state, and he took the matter into his own hands for the 2003 hearings. David and his son Erec reviewed the evolution coverage in all the prospective textbooks, and recommended their use in Texas high schools at two hearings, with which the B.O.E. eventually complied.

From his readings, David saw many ways the evolution coverage in these books could be expanded and improved. He devised a "Top 10 wish list" that offers both a critique of existing texts, as well as suggestions for future editions of these books. David is a particularly good candidate for this list, not only because of his education and profession, but also because he will be a coauthor for the 8th edition of Life: The Science of Biology, wherein he will attempt to better the chapters dealing with evolution.

Obviously concerned with science education, David asks for general feedback on his list, as well as suggestions for additional issues. Here's the list (keep in mind these are directed at high school students):

1. Demonstrate that evolutionary research is current and ongoing.

Textbooks should obviously give their due to Darwin and his insights, but evolutionary science has accumulated almost 150 years of additional knowledge since On the Origin of Species was first published, and so textbooks should stress that evolutionary biology is a vibrant and current field of research.

2. Clarify that evolution is not a synonym for natural selection.

David found that textbooks give natural selection the vast majority of discussion, with drift rarely getting more than a mention. The neutral theory of evolution should be explained and expounded on, since NS is not the only game in town. By focusing the vast majority of the discussion on NS, textbooks reinforce the false notion that everything is due to adaptation.

3. Use fresh examples.

David's words on this:

I thought if I read one more description of peppered moth evolution I would scream.

Enough said.

4.Show how evolution is relevant to human lives.

Dr. Egnor might not agree with this, but I bet Abbie would. Textbooks could integrate aspects of agriculture and human diseases to show how they are relevant to evolutionary principles. A good example would be the positive selection for alleles that confer resistance to malaria in sub-Saharan Africa, despite the "sickle" effect they have on red blood cells.

5. Use examples of evolutionary biology from popular media.

David suggests that the popularity of forensics t.v. shows gives a good opportunity to show how the techniques used to solve crimes via DNA sequences is the same as what's used to determine phylogenetic relationships. Sean Carroll makes this same connection in The Making of the Fittest: DNA and the Ultimate Forensic Record of Evolution, a book I cannot recommend enough.

6. Include experimental evolution.

Why aren't more authors including examples of in vitro evolution in their books? Experimental evolution, especially at the molecular level, is a major part of current evolution research, and the findings of these scientists should not be left out of textbooks.


7. Integrate evolution throughout the book.

Given that all of modern biology rests on evolution, every chapter needs to be solidly connected, in some way, to evolutionary principles. For example, following the genetics coverage, we should invite students to critically examine how the fundamentals of gene regulation ties into mutation to result in novel expression patterns. Evolution should be reinforced throughout every biology textbook.


8. Emphasize “tree-thinking.”

Because, if for nothing else, to rid the world of "Oh yeah? Then why are there still monkeys?!" A strictly anagenetic mind frame is incompatible with evolutionary biology, and yet its frequency in the laity is depressingly high. Students should be exposed to phylogenetic trees to keep the "ladder of life" thinking at bay. A similar effort needs to be exerted to explain that evolution does not entail a steady increase in genetic or morphological complexity. I have one small addition to this 8th "wish", and it is that textbooks should stress that metazoan phyla are not the only thing evolutionary biologists study, and so cleanly branching phylogenies do not hold up well for microorganisms like bacteria. Horizontal gene transfer is a major aspect of microbial activity and evolution, and so the “tree of life” is beginning to
look more like the “interlocking web of life”, at least when considering microorganisms.


9. Emphasize the diversity of life, not memorization of scientific
names.

David feels the use of Latin nomenclature should be limited, along with the memorization of where particular animals fall in taxonomic ranks. Certainly the hierarchical ordering of organisms is an important part of biology education, but we need not burden students with any more rote memorization than necessary. There's not quicker way to make biology seem boring.


10. Emphasize the great magnitude of evolutionary time.

From the fossilized remains of stromatolites, we know life has been around for billions of years, and so textbooks should stress the sheer amount of evolutionary change that fits into this time frame. David also writes:

I think we do a disservice to students when we speak of “microevolution”
and “macroevolution,” as if they are fundamentally different processes, rather than simply different time frames.

If nothing else, the vast amount of evidence in support of macroevolution should be presented, although I don't have a problem with textbooks drawing a distinction between within and across species evolution, provided it's emphasized that there's no imaginary genetic ceiling preventing microevolution from resulting in macro.

David concludes with:

In summary, textbooks need to make the coverage of evolution exciting, current, and relevant. We have great material to present, and most students are excited to learn how the living world came to be and howit continues to change. In addition, not all instructors are likely to be well educated in evolutionary biology, so strong textbooks help develop better instructors as well as better-educated students.
...
As the users of textbooks, we are in a position to demand that the coverage of evolutionary biology in these books capture the importance of evolution to biology as a whole. So make your voice heard to textbook authors, publishers, colleagues who teach introductory biology, curriculum committees, and boards of education: demand
better coverage of evolution in textbooks

Since David also asks for feedback on his list, as well as additional issues people feel textbooks should address, I emailed him saying:

As a biology student at U.T. who has a particular interest in evolution, I sincerely hope your "top 10 wish list" will resonate with textbook publishers and that your suggestions and critiques find their way into later editions of these books.

I also offered to testify on behalf of pro-evolution textbooks at upcoming B.O.E. meetings, if David thought my words would be useful (he felt his high-school son Erec's testimony carried more weight than his own).

I also sent him some additions to the list that, to my mind, would integrate well with evolution education. Principles coming from evo devo research should garner a good percentage of evolution coverage, and I also suggested that human phylogeny, as gleaned from studies in comparative genomics, ought to be covered.

David responded to my feedback with gratitude, and once he returns from his trip to China, he'd like to meet me to discuss my thoughts and additional ideas on the subject.

Also, he'd like for me to review Life: The Science of Biology (he'll be coauthoring the next edition) and give him my thoughts on the book's current material.

How cool is that?

David also asked me if I've done any research in evolutionary biology and if I would be interested in getting involved in a few projects. How cool is that? Of course I'd love to get started on my own research, so I'm definitely interested in any suggestions David has for me.

He also thinks my testimony at upcoming Texas B.O.E. meetings would be useful, so hopefully we can talk about that when we meet.

I really didn't expect for David to give me much more than a thanks for my feedback, so I'm more than happy with his generous offers and I'm looking forward to sitting down with him in the near future.