Evolution Takes a Back Seat in U.S. Classes

The New York Times has an article about the teaching of evolution in classrooms around the US in this article Evolution Takes a Back Seat in U.S. Classes

I was kinda pissed off about it all afternoon and decide to ask my kids what THEY learned about evolution in their school science classes. We live in Canada and I more or less expected this to be a non issue considering we are generally more secular than our neighbours to the south.

Keep in mind that my daughter is in Grade 9 and my son is in Grade 11.

Turns out they have NEVER been taught about evolution in school. Everything they knew basically came from what we discussed around the kitchen table over the years. I was also shocked SHOCKED I tell ya that they knew virtually nothing about Charles Darwin and his "Origin of the Species". That's shameful. Our school system is ignoring evolution, a valid topic for the science class. I have to wonder why? Are our school boards as afraid of the debate and it appears the americans are?

I naively thought the whole creationism/evolution debate was a non starter up here. I was wrong and I have no idea how to address this.