Dear Ms. Mieras, This is a letter in regards to your questions about the teaching of evolution and creationism in the schools. I have difficulty understanding why this is up for debate at all. Perhaps it depends upon how you ask the question. Whether we are discussing the Judeo-Christian Bible creation story or one from any other religion or faith, these are not science and should be taught as such. Science is a process by which explanations of how nature works are pitted against the observable universe.
Scientists seek to discover and understand nature's laws.
A scientific theory is not a guess, or just a good idea. It is a well-tested structure of interlinked ideas that unifies and explains observational facts. Scientific theories must make testable predictions, must be falsifiable, and must be open to revision and rejection. As such, the theory of evolution is an excellent and presently the only explanation for an enormous array of observational evidence. That is not to say that it has all the answers to questions concerning life and its history.