NAD Launches New Science Textbook

Who knew the evening news during spring of 2020 would be dominated by reports with vocabulary such as antibodies, virus, lipid membranes and vaccines? It takes many of us back to science classes in school.

Understanding the news calls for a good science education. The North American Division Office of Education, in partnership with Kendall Hunt Religious Publishing, has developed a timely and robust creation-based high school biology textbook, ByDesign Biology, to support student learning of real-life issues.

ByDesign Biology provides a coherent science curriculum acknowledging God as Creator. It extends the curriculum of the successful Adventist elementary science series produced in recent years. This new biology textbook of more than 700 pages of quality, research-backed scientific information was developed by contributing authors, most with doctorates in their fields, and the Kendall Hunt Publishing team. ByDesign Biology provides honest information on two worldviews that are often at odds: biblical creationism and evolutionary Darwinism.

Adventist Christian students entering higher education, particularly in secular colleges and universities, will be inundated with evolution as fact. ByDesign Biology provides a biblical-based worldview and helps them understand the other worldviews they will encounter. ByDesign Biology introduces students to the core tenets of both creationism and evolution in a balanced presentation. The textbook explores the flaws of the materialistic evolutionary view of origins, as well as some of the challenges posed for a creationists worldview.

Larry Blackmer, ByDesign Biology textbook coordinator and former NAD vice president for education, science teacher and Idaho conference resident, states, “I don’t think there’s a quality balanced textbook right now on the market that’s creation-based. Most of the [Christian science] texts are anti-evolution with a pejorative message that does not provide fully the picture of the competing worldviews.”

This is a rigorous, current and timely textbook that establishes our faith in the belief that God is the creator and sustainer of life.

Featured in: July/August 2020

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