allisonck:

yes i do think so. school is not church. we send are children to school to learn fact based issues. why is this so hard for everyone to grasp. science shows us that things have an origin. from the smallest island in the ocean that was created from a volcanic magma deep under the ocean. that evolves into an island which eventually evolves to harvest micro-organisms{life}. everything changes or evolves depending on its enviroments. thats just the facts. and that is what i want my children to learn. what we KNOW for a fact to be true. it seems pretty obvious, logically and scientificly, that we have evolved. both physically and mentally. things just change. watching and documenting it over time has proven this to be true. i think sometimes well,most of the time man makes the answer more difficult than the question. then we confuse{or mix} facts and beliefs. then our children are just confused. simply facts are facts. beliefs are beliefs. seperate subjects intirely. if i want my child to learn of a god i will send them to a private school to learn of such things. but public education should just simply stick to the facts. educate  are children, prepare them for the real world.

Alot of science isn't based on fact.  It is based on educated guesses and theories.  Scientists can only summize how things began and evolved thousands of years ago.  We don't know for a fact anything past what has been witnessed...  It would be nice if it were as simple as you say..."facts are facts and beliefs are beliefs"... but it isn't that simple.  Can anyone prove that it is a fact that the earth is millions of years old? No.. they can't.  It is a belief based on accepted methods of scientific dating.  Some would say it is a belief that a God exists, but others would say it is a fact because of their own personal experiences.  As long as science is part of a public education, we won't be just teaching our kids "facts".  How do we prepare our kids for the real world, then?  I think everyone would have a different perspective on that question, for sure.  :)