Yes regarding Palin I have already said she is extremely ignorant of the subject, ...
And you are an expert?
I only learn what I am taught. And I have no reason to believe there is some huge liberal conspiracy out there to try and stop creationism from being taught in schools. In reality the debate about creationism and ID does not belong in the science classroom mainly because it cannot be tested scientifically. In fact the whole concept of god is not scientific. In my lab writing class we were taught how to identify what is a scientifically testable hypothesis. My professor asked is the question " was the universe created by a flying spaghetti monster?" a scientific question. The answer of course is no, because it cannot be tested. Now does that mean the universe was not created by a flying spaghetti monster? Of course not, but it just cannot be proved or disproved scientifically. Similarly ID pretends to show how god had a hand in the creation of the universe and the creatures in it but their argument is basically " since the universe is so complex there must be a hand of god/creator". This may or may not be true but it is not to be debated in a science classroom but rather in a religion/philosophy classroom. Whether or not god is our creator it is pretty obvious that evolution is how creatures change and adapt on our planet. Perhaps god is the one who came up with "evolution", perhaps not, but it just cannot be tested scientifically and thus that debate must occur outside the science classroom.
With all due respect to your professor, scientific questions are not merely of the sort that can be tested with a definitive true/false result. There are a number of examples in the theoretical and experimental domains.
Mathematics is the backbone of scientific inquiry and consistent application of mathematical logic a hallmark of well-reasoned science. Yet, Godel's theorems on incompleteness prove that within any consistent mathematical framework there are meaningful propositions that cannot be either proved or disproved. To theoretical science this means that any self-consistent model of nature can face meaningful scientific questions that cannot be resolved. For instance, legitimate questions about measurements in quantum mechanics can be unknowable.
In the more earthy world of experimental science, certainty is not a given. I would expect that your lab stresses not just measurement, but the inherent uncertainty in those measurements. Most experimental papers that I encounter make no affirmative or negative claim, but use statistics to describe the likelihood of a particular hypothesis. This is much fuzzier than the clean true or false that I feel society sometimes expects of science. I think much of the misinformation in the global warming debate stems from attempts to interpret statistical result towards an extreme of truth or falsehood.
In the context of ID, I don't find its methods particularly useful to include in a science classroom, where there are specific skills and relationships that need to be taught. However, using ID with some detailed sources from that view, might be useful for developing critical thinking. There is wisdom in learning one's limitations, and that can apply to knowledge as well.
