Darwin's Evolving Legacy: Celebrating Ideas That Shape Our World

Dr. Barbara Forrest, a leading expert on the intelligent design movement, will speak at SMU in November on "Why Texans Shouldn't Let Creationists Mess With Science Education." Her lecture and the teacher's workshop that precedes it will serve as preview events to SMU's upcoming yearlong series Darwin's Evolving Legacy: Celebrating Ideas That Shape Our World.

When Charles Darwin published On the Origin of Species in 1859, the way we view the world and our place in it changed with the turn of a page.   Throughout 2009, SMU will celebrate the 150th anniversary of this seminal book and the 200th birthday of the extraordinary man who wrote it through a series of lectures, exhibits and presentations.

Forrest's free lecture is scheduled for 6 p.m. Nov. 11 in the Hughes-Trigg Student Center Ballroom and parking will be available on Bishop Boulevard. The lecture follows an afternoon workshop presented by SMU faculty for Dallas-area teachers, "Teaching Evolution in Texas Schools."  Both the lecture and the workshop are sponsored by SMU's Annette Caldwell Simmons School of Education and Human Development, Center for Teaching Excellence, and departments of Anthropology, Biology and Philosophy within Dedman College of Humanities and Sciences. Forrest's lecture is co-sponsored by the Texas Freedom Network Education Fund.

Forrest is co-author of Creationism's Trojan Horse: The Wedge of Intelligent Design.
She served as an expert witness in the 2005 landmark federal legal battle over intelligent design, Kitzmiller et al. v. Dover Area School District. The plaintiffs in that case successfully defeated a school district policy that required a presentation of intelligent design as an alternative to evolution, arguing that intelligent design is a form of creationism and teaching it is prohibited under the constitutional separation of church and state.

The "Teaching Evolution" workshop for Dallas area teachers is scheduled for 1-5:30 p.m. Nov. 11 on the lower level of the Hughes-Trigg Student Center.  Teachers are eligible to earn continuing education credit through participation. The free program will include:

• Central points in evolution instruction
• Identifying misconceptions and pseudoscience
• Strategies for objective and rational inquiry

Registration for the teacher workshop is available online at http://smu.edu/cte/

Seating is limited for Dr. Forrest's lecture, and reservations are available at http://www.tfn.org/site/PageServer?pagename=Barbara_Forrest_2008

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