[5] State Senator Ben Nevers said the law is intended to allow educators to create an environment that "(promotes) critical thinking skills, logical analysis, and open and objective discussions of scientific theories such as evolution, the origins of life, global warming, and human cloning.
"[9] Leshner stated the bill would, "unleash an assault against scientific integrity, leaving students confused about science and unprepared to excel in a modern workforce.
"[10] In 2010, high school student Zack Kopplin launched a high-profile campaign sponsored by Louisiana State Senator Karen Carter Peterson to repeal the law.
Kopplin's campaign has been endorsed by 78 Nobel laureates, the New Orleans City Council, and more than a dozen scientific and educational associations.
[11] Bills to repeal the LSEA have failed to advance past the Senate Education committee five years in a row from 2011 through 2015.
[12][13] The LSEA allows teachers in public schools to use supplemental materials in the science classroom that are critical of established scientific theories "including, but not limited to, evolution, the origins of life, global warming and human cloning.
[6] "They (the Louisiana Family Forum) believe that scientific data related to creationism should be discussed when dealing with Darwin's theory.
[16][17] Gene Mills, president of the Louisiana Family Forum, states that the bill is necessary to allow teachers to "critically present" evidence and "quit choosing sides when it comes to teaching students this controversial subject matter.
"[14] Critics of the bill suggest that it is intended as an end-run around the federal ban on the teaching of creationism in public schools, and say that the sole purpose of the law is to provide legal cover to educators who want to include fundamentalist scriptural interpretations other than the science curriculum in relation to the teaching of evolution, in contravention of court rulings in cases such as Edwards v. Aguillard and Kitzmiller v. Dover,[6][14][18][19][20][21] something opposed by the scientific community.
[14] On June 3, 2008, The American Institute of Biological Sciences sent a letter to House Speaker Jim Tucker opposing SB 733.
After hearing two proponents in addition to Senator Nevers and approximately twenty opponents, the Education committee voted in favor of the legislation.
[38][39] The New Orleans Convention and Visitors Bureau estimated that losing the conference caused an economic loss to Louisiana of at least $2.7 million.
[39] Prominent critic of the Louisiana Science Education Act Zack Kopplin has stated that the law "leaves our students at a disadvantage when competing for jobs in the global economy.
[citation needed] The Louisiana Science Education Act has been characterized as a creationism law, because it singles out specific scientific theories, which happen to be politically controversial, for teachers to "critique and review" using "supplemental materials."
The initial draft would have explicitly prohibited teaching religion under the guise of 'critical thinking' and using creationist materials in public school science classrooms.
She added: The initial version[47] of the policy contained two crucial statements that would have prohibited school districts from doing what the legislative sponsors and creationist authors of the LA Science Education Act designed the law to allow them to do: (1) "Religious beliefs shall not be advanced under the guise of encouraging critical thinking"; and (2) "Materials that teach creationism or intelligent design or that advance the religious belief that a supernatural being created humankind shall be prohibited for use in science classes."
In doing so, he revealed his true intent concerning both the LSEA and the BESE policy: to promote and protect the religious agenda of the LA Family Forum and its Discovery Institute accomplices.
He started working on a repeal with Barbara Forrest, who was an expert witness at the Kitzmiller v. Dover trial and was responsible for demonstrating intelligent design was simply creationism dressed up to appear scientific.
The effort to repeal the Louisiana Science Education Act may have had an effect in dampening the pressure to pass those bills.
Then they also succeeded in killing a Louisiana House bill (HB 580) which was meant to weaken the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education's oversight of public school biology books and supplementary materials.
Third, many science books are faulty of focusing on only one viewpoint when discussing controversial issues, and further do not accurately critique their proposed theory.