Reverence for Life: An Ethic for High School Biology Curricula

Ethical and pedagogical arguments are presented against the use of animals by high school students in experiments causing pain/suffering/death of the animal. No justification is seen for such experimentation when perfectly valid alternatives, using noninvasive techniques, exist or could be developed. An important concern is the emotional and psychological growth of young people. An overall objective of high school biology curricula must be to assist students in making viable connections with living biological processes and the natural world