Recently Elected Dover, Pennsylvania School Board Rescinds Disclaimer of Evolution. (January 6, 2006)

    On January 3 the newly constituted school board of Dover Pennsylvania voted unanimously to repeal a directive requiring students to be informed about Intelligent Design (ID) as an alternative to evolution.

The vote implements sweeping and bluntly worded decision by U.S. Middle District Court Judge John Jones III, which is widely accepted as a warning to schools and school boards around the US that ID is not science.

The month before the ruling, Dover citizens voted eight pro-ID members off the board and replaced them with a slate from Dover CARES, a group set up to counter the old board's policy. Nevertheless the Dover community is still closely divided over ID--the new board got  in with 51% of the vote, but Sheilah Harkness, president of the ousted school board, told Science she doesn't know of any organized resistance to the court decision.

According to ScienceNow, "The most immediate concern of community members is how to foot the bill for the trial. The plaintiffs--11 Dover parents--are entitled to recover legal costs, which total more than $1 million, from the school board. Now, lawyers for the board are negotiating with the plaintiffs' lawyers, the American Civil Liberties Union, and the Philadelphia law firm of Pepper Hamilton. As for Dover's experience with a 21^st century Scopes trial, most residents seem to agree with new board member Rob McIlvaine, who said: 'I just want to forget about it.'"