Lee Meadows, Ph.D.
Baptist
Retired Science Educator
Birmingham, AL

Learning evolution is tough for most high school students. It’s abstract, and learners have
to trace its development over millions of years. For many religious students, learning
evolution is really tough because it questions some of their deepest beliefs. I know this
first hand. I grew up in fundamentalist Christianity in north Mississippi.

I guide science teachers to see ways to teach evolution beyond a warfare model. Many
American science teachers see only two ways to approach evolution. Either they stay true
to the science and run roughshod over their religious students' beliefs, or they try to honor
the beliefs of those students and their families by not teaching evolution at all. There is a
third approach to these tensions. Teachers can both stay true to science and honor
students’ faith-based questions and concerns. This third approach is rooted in an inquiry based approach to teaching evolution, as I’ve outlined in my first book, The Missing Link (see below).

Changing how American teachers approach the teaching of evolution is a long, long
conversation. Teaching evolution can easily become a shouting match. My work is about
engaging science teachers in finding ways to bring civil discourse to their classrooms that
engage all science learners. In my other book, Making Sense of Science and Religion (see
below), I worked with a team of people to line out for teachers and science educators the
big picture of what this change looks like.

I’m a Ph.D. science educator based in Birmingham, Alabama, and a teacher at heart. I’ve
taught high school chemistry, physics, and physical science; college chemistry; and many
teacher education courses, especially science teaching methods. I guided the launch of
Alabama STEM Council as its first Executive Director, focusing the work on building the
STEM education system Alabama needs for a thriving workforce. Before that I worked as
professor in the School of Education at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB),
guiding science teachers to improve their practice especially with better skills for inquiry
and implementing science and engineering practices.