By Kathleen Conlee
Quick question: What do you remember more about your first animal dissection? The hard facts of frog anatomy or the unwelcome memories of cutting into an animal and wondering just how that poor creature found his way onto the cold, metal tray in your biology class?
If your answer is the latter, you're not alone. Surveys have indicated that a vast majority of students—as high as 90% in one poll—believe that students should have a choice in dissection. That's potentially a massive number of students clamoring for alternatives; every year, an estimated six million animals are dissected in U.S. high schools alone, including frogs, fetal pigs, cats and other species.
Increasingly, students are getting those choices. Virginia is the latest state to offer students the option to use alternatives; as of July 1, 2004, the Old Dominion state requires public schools to notify students and their parents that they can request an alternative exercise if they object to dissecting animals. Two others states, New Jersey and Michigan, are or will be considering legislation to adopt similar student choice laws. The New Jersey bill has already passed out of the Assembly Education Committee with wide support.
These forward-thinking states join a host of states, counties, school boards and individual schools that are adopting student choice policies. Aside from Virginia, six other states have student choice laws that provide public school students in grades K-12 with the option to use alternatives to dissections; the other states include Florida, California, Pennsylvania, New York, Rhode Island, and Illinois.
Working for Choice
The Humane Society of the United States and other animal protection organizations are working extensively with students, legislators, parents and others to ensure that students are given a choice to use alternatives to dissection. Case in point: The HSUS, at the start of the school year, sent a letter to more than 300 public schools in Virginia to inform them of the new law and to offer free alternatives through our Humane Education Loan Program.
Yet, despite the trend toward student choice laws, not everyone is on board with the idea. In Massachusetts, Governor Mitt Romney has twice this year vetoed legislation to give students a dissection choice, effectively overriding the state legislature which overwhelmingly supported the bill. The original bill passed by a unanimous vote in the House and by a vote of 35-3 in the Senate. Romney, in vetoing the bill, capitulated to the biotech industry, saying that the student choice legislation would send a message that "animal research is frowned upon."
"We believe the biotech industry and officials like Governor Romney should be promoting alternatives to the harmful use of animals. Students are only asking for the right to choose an alternative—and they should be given that right," says Martin L. Stephens, vice president for Animal Research Issues for The HSUS.
The dissection issue affects many students, Stephens adds, not just those who take 10th grade biology class. Dissections also take place in middle schools, where millions more children are not offered alternatives.
"Students who want alternatives are raising serious ethical concerns," Stephens says. "Often, these are educated kids who have become aware of the suffering endured by animals during capture, handling, transport and/or killing as well as about the declines in wild animal populations in part because of captures for dissection exercises."
But more than that, Stephens adds, dissection may be actually hurting the scientific field. There's evidence that some students turn away from science because of animal dissection.
"The bottom line is that there are no valid arguments against allowing students to use alternatives," Stephens says. "Students who use alternatives, such as CD-ROMs, videos and models, learn the material as well as or better than those students who perform dissection. Furthermore, alternatives are less expensive than the use of animals. Given that schools have to operate under the constraints of a very limited budget, the cost saving is something that should be extremely appealing."
Tools You Can Use
The HSUS offers a variety of tools for students, teachers, school districts and legislators who want to introduce and provide alternatives to dissection. If you'd like to get started, please check out these resources:
If you'd like to work toward a student choice law in your state, please contact our Government Affairs office at legislation@hsus.org.
Kathleen Conlee is Director of Program Management for The HSUS's Animal Research Issues section.
