HIST 3053 Spring 2008
Paper #2 Topic
Deadline: Friday April 18 at 4:00 PM
You have a choice of topics for this paper. Please select Option A or Option B, below. Submit the paper as an attachment to an e-mail, with the subject line: Perspectives Paper #3, followed by your full name).
Option A: Preparing for an Election
Imagine that there are two candidates for the position of State Superintendent of Public Instruction, an elected post in Oklahoma, and that these candidates are Clarence Darrow and William Jennings Bryan. . You have been asked to give a talk to a community group. They want to know how these candidates stand on certain issues. They also want to know which candidate you favor, and why.
Using the materials provided in The Scopes Trial: A Brief History With Documents, prepare an essay for this purpose. In particular, identify the views of Darrow and Bryan with respect to:
1. the purposes of public education (particularly at the high school level),
2. the proper locus of control (e.g., parents, teachers, local community);
3. the role of experts in education.
Then tell us which candidate we should support, and why you think so. (Don’t waffle or suggest that they are really saying the same things. They disagree.)
Your essay should be in the range of three to six pages, typed, double-spaced, 12-point font. Be sure to make direct references to the views of Bryan and Darrow as stated in the primary sources (provide page numbers for each reference). The introduction is very useful, but is no substitute for the documents themselves. A paper that simply rehashes the introduction won’t be adequate.
The course should provide everything you need. The use of other materials of any kind is strongly discouraged because it will require extra time and will divert you from the primary sources. If you do consult any other materials, provide a works-consulted page with full bibliographic data.
The quality of your presentation (e.g., appearance, grammar, word selection, punctuation) is important. Take pride in your work and express yourself as precisely as you can. And remember that the paper you submit mist be entirely your own work.
Something to keep in mind: the focus here is on views about education, not on Darwin or the Scopes Trial or the Tennessee law. You may have strongly-held convictions on one or more of these matters, but those views should not be reflected in the paper. If they creep into your draft, cut them out. We are trying to get at educational issues that are broader than the place of Darwinian evolutionary biology in the curriculum.
Option B: Getting Alternatives
to Darwin into the Classroom
A group of parents and community leaders in your Oklahoma town have decided that alternatives to Darwinian evolutionary biology should be included in science classes. Because you have unique expertise acquired as a student in Famous Trials, the group has asked you to serve as a consultant. What they want first is a brief analysis of the kinds of challenges they may face in convincing the School Board to introduce such a requirement. You should prepare a report in the range of three to six pages, typed, double-spaced, 12-point font, that provides an overview of the issues and identifies the most significant barriers they will encounter. Make use of appropriate materials from The Scopes Trial: A Brief History With Documents and Contentious Curricula: Afrocentrism and Creationism. If the book you read for your review is relevant, feel free to make us of it, too.
Note: for the purposes of this assignment, your own opinion as to whether such a policy should be introduced as irrelevant. You are a hired gun! All that the group wants from you is a well-informed analysis of the challenges they will face. If you think they cannot possibly succeed, you may wish to say so at the end, but your main job is to provide the information they have asked for.