The term "public" in the British use of "public school" and "public house" (or pub) were used to denote institutions, services or buildings that were open to, or for use by, the general public. Previously, education in the UK was only open to royalty and/or related parties but public schools in the UK were still privately run and funded (and thus still expensive and of relevance to mainly the upper classes). The American use of the term (especially in terms of education), refers to "STATE education" (which means GOVERNMENT, at either the American state or federal level).Oh, same as Britain then! Well, at least if you go to a state school – “public school” means elite private school over here, bizarrely.
(Incidentally, I was taught Biology A-level by a teacher who refused to teach the evolution part of the syllabus for religious reasons, and claimed palaeontologists made most of the fossils up to give themselves jobs. She got uproariously laughed at by the students.)
Edit: I’ll add that I didn’t know what creationism was until I saw some of the online reaction to the Beast Wars episode Code of Hero.
When I was taught about evolution at school, we were given a short disclaimer by the teacher that mentioned creationism very briefly and then it was onto the science. We were taught more about the Bible's views on creationism, or how it differed from science or other aspects, in various parts of our R.E. (Religious Education) or Sociology lessons.
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