What do you teach about evolution?

None of our elementary (Level A) courses bring up age of the earth questions or talk about evolutionary principles, but they all consistently speak about the Creator of the universe.

However, as students get older we believe there is a time students need to be equipped with a general understanding of the theory of evolution and various age of the earth questions because they'll encounter these topics throughout their lives. They need to learn to think critically about these topics when they encounter them in the world.

In high school Experience Biology (Level C), we address the topic of evolution very directly in the following ways:

1) Students will know exactly where we stand: we are very skeptical of evolutionary theory. We explain, scientifically, why we think the theory doesn’t hold water—at least not the way it is typically explained and defended.

2) Students will also know there is room for diversity on this issue among Christians. We are all at different places in our understanding of both Scripture and all the nuances of evolutionary theory. Christians can disagree passionately on this issue and still call each other brothers in the Lord.

3) Most importantly, students will learn to ask hard theological questions raised by an evolutionary worldview. Evolution isn’t merely a scientific issue. It prompts us to ask important theological questions. But rather than just give students the answers to these questions, we challenge them to think about these questions themselves—especially in their conversations with other Christians on the subject.

And of course, we strongly encourage parents to dialog with their students about this topic.

In middle school Earth Science (Level B), we address the various theories behind the age of the earth. We know there are Christian scientists in both old earth and young earth camps who disagree passionately on this topic. While we do not give students the answer to this question, we give them the framework to begin to understand the differences and think critically about each position—and we encourage parents to join in on this discussion with their students.