Don’t Require The Teaching of Intelligent Design
All of the major pro-intelligent design organizations oppose any efforts to require the teaching of intelligent design by school districts or state boards of education. The mainstream ID movement agrees that attempts to mandate teaching about intelligent design only politicize the theory and will hinder fair and open discussion of the merits of the theory among scientists and within the scientific community.  

Teach More About Evolution
Instead of mandating intelligent design, the major pro-ID organizations seek to increase the coverage of evolution in textbooks by teaching students about both scientific strengths and weaknesses of evolution.  Most school districts today teach only a one-sided version of evolution which presents only the facts which supposedly support the theory.  But most pro-ID organizations think evolution should be taught as a scientific theory that is open to critical scrutiny, not as a sacred dogma that can't be questioned. 

Protect Academic Freedom
Although pro-ID organizations do not advocate requiring the teaching of intelligent design in public schools, they also believe there is nothing unconstitutional about voluntarily discussing the scientific theory of design in the classroom. Pro-ID organizations oppose efforts to persecute individual teachers who may wish to discuss the scientific debate over design in an objective and pedagogically appropriate manner.  For more on academic freedom issues click here.

The Theory of Intelligent Design: A briefing packet for educators to help them understand the debate between Darwinian evolution and intelligent design (Download color version | Download B&W version)

Click here for a short video explaining these policy recommendations.

Click here to read a summary of the legal standards relating to the teaching of evolution in public schools.

Click here to learn about how Discovery Institute supports academic freedom.

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1. Discovery Institute's Science Education Policy
2. David K. DeWolf, John G. West, and Casey Luskin“Intelligent Design will Survive Kitzmiller v. Dover,” 68 Montana Law Review 7 (Winter, 2007).
3. Traipsing Into Evolution: Intelligent Design and the Kitzmiller v. Dover ruling, by David K. DeWolf, John G. West, Casey Luskin, and Jonathan Witt
4. Francis J. Beckwith, “Law, Darwinism, and Public Education; The Establishment Clause and the Challenge of Intelligent Design,” (Rowman & Littlefled, 2003)
5. Francis Beckwith, “A Liberty Not Fully Evolved? The Case of Rodney Levake and the Right of Public School Teachers to Criticize Darwinism,” 39(4) San Diego Law Review 1311 (Fall, 2002).
6. David K. DeWolf, Stephen C. Meyer, Mark Edward DeForrest, “Teaching the Origins Controversy: Science, Or Religion, Or Speech?” 2000 Utah Law Review 39
7. H. Wayne House, "Darwinism and the Law: Can Non-Naturalistic Scientific Theories Survive Constitutional Challenge" 13 Regent University Law Review 355 (Spring 2001).
8. Francis Beckwith, "Science and Religion Twenty Years After McLean v. Arkansas: Evolution, Public Education, and the New Challenge of Intelligent Design." 26.2 Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy 455-499 (Spring 2003).
9. Francis Beckwith, “Public Education, Religious Establishment, and the Challenge of Intelligent Design." 17.2 Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics, & Public Policy 461-519 (2003).
10. Francis Beckwith, "The Court of Disbelief: The Constitution's Article VI Religious Test Prohibition and the Judiciary's Religious Motive Analysis." 33.2&3 Hastings Constitutional Law Quarterly 337-360 (Winter and Spring 2006).
11. Casey Luskin, "Alternative Viewpoints about Biological Origins as Taught in Public Schools," 47 Journal of Church and State 583 (Summer, 2005). “Contact Casey Luskin for reprints.”