Common Core Education And More About Federal Government Control

[Ross]

My Child Is Not Common

by Phyllis Schlafly
May 14, 2014

"My Child Is Not Common" are the words on the attention-getting signs carried by a group of white and African-American mothers protesting the adoption of the aggressively promoted Common Core standards. Common Core is scheduled to take over the testing of all U.S. kids, pre-K to 12, but parents are saying "no way" in every way they can.

Common Core was rapidly adopted by 44 states and the District of Columbia before any read the standards. Four states rejected it from the outset: Alaska, Nebraska, Texas and Virginia.

Those of us who have been speaking and writing against national control of education for years are amazed at the way parents are coming out of their kitchens to protest. None of the previous attempts by the progressives to nationalize public school curriculum created anything like this kind of grassroots uprising.

Bad education fads started some fifty years ago with Whole Language, which cheated generations of school kids out of learning how to read English by phonics. Call the roll of the fads that followed: Values Clarification, Goals 2000, Outcome-Based Education, School-Based Clinics, Sex Ed, Suicide Ed, Self-Esteem Ed, New Math, History Standards, School to Work, Race to the Top, and No Child Left Behind.

Our powerful and erudite articles against all those fads never aroused the angst caused by Common Core. Those of us who for years have been criticizing the mistaken courses that kept kids from learning are flabbergasted at what we see erupting among the grassroots.

Former Education Commissioner Robert Scott was the Texas official who articulated that state's rejection of Common Core. He pointed out how the feds tried to bribe Texas into going along.

Scott said, "We said no to Common Core and they said, 'you want Race to the Top money?' That was $700 million. They said, 'do it.' Well, we still said, no thanks. The feds also asked if Texas wanted a No Child Left Behind waiver and again, Texas said no."

Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal recently came out with a strong statement against Common Core: "As we have seen in Obamacare, President Obama's Washington believes it knows better than the peasants in the states. But centralized planning didn't work in Russia, it's not working with our health care system, and it won't work in education."

No wonder the grassroots have dubbed Common Core Obamacore. That's a play on the Obamacare health plan that is so widely despised.

Indiana became the first state to opt out when its Senate voted 35-13 to withdraw Indiana from Common Core standards on March 12, 2014. But Indiana Governor Mike Pence appears to have backtracked and just renamed it, a bureaucratic trick that doesn't fool either side, and is a disappointment to the Indiana moms who started the national revolt against Common Core.

Pence's action is particularly baffling because pre-Common Core Indiana was known to have one of the highest standards of all the fifty states. Hillsdale College professor Terrence Moore said that Common Core's English standards deserve an "F" and even omits teaching phonics, and Stanford University math professor James Milgram, who served on the Common Core math validation committee, charged that the math standards are so "incomprehensible" and complicated that they should be called "bizarre."

As Common Core keeps plodding right ahead in most states, parents are finding plenty to criticize in the curriculum. Parents think that the math questions children bring home are incomprehensible and stupid. New York parents are objecting to the fact that Common Core social studies standards say America is founded on the democratic principles of equality, fairness and respect for authority but don't mention liberty, and Alabama parents are objecting to the pornography in assigned readings.

There's no mention of education in the U.S. Constitution because the Founding Fathers believed education is a parental and a state issue. Our laws still reflect that assumption, but that concept has been widely violated in recent years by the flow of federal money with strings attached.

Parents are also suspicious of the gigantic amount of money that is being spent to promote the use of Common Core-aligned books and teacher training. Emeritus Professor Jack Hassard of Georgia State University estimates that billionaire Bill Gates has spent $2.3 billion on Common Core.

Some say Gates is a promoter of "global sameness of education as defined by UNESCO and the United Nations." Gates has expressed agreement with UN policies that many Americans oppose such as Agenda 21, which promotes global governance at the expense of private property and national sovereignty.

http://www.eagleforum.org/publications/column/my-child-is-not-common.html

[Ross]

(BIN) -- Common Core Standards are teaching racism. How can any parent allow their children to be taught racism in the public school system is beyond comprehension. Yet here it is live in Dupo, Illinios. How do you feel about this? Is this the truth? Is this how the new Common Core Standards are going to create even greater social disorder? Could this take the "Knockout Game" being practiced by Black youths around this country to a whole new level? There were plenty of "White" people who have voted for Obama, me being one of them in the first election! Why would The United Nations Common Core Teaching Standards teach racism against "White" people

Fourth grade students in Dupo, Illinois assigned to reading a Common Core approved biography of President Barack Obama are being told that all white voters were unlikely to vote for a black president due to racism.

Children at Bluffview Elementary who have been assigned to read the book, entitled "Barack Obama," published by Lerner Publications and a part of Scholastic's "Reading Counts" program, were informed on page 40 that despite Obama being a "nice fellow," many allegedly believed that no white American would vote for him in 2008 based solely on the color of his skin.

"But some people said Americans weren't ready for that much change. Sure Barack was a nice fellow, they said. But white voters would never vote for a black president," the book reads.

The book, approved for children as young as seven years old, also goes on to specifically mention controversial comments made by President Obama's former pastor Jeremiah Wright, while also claiming that the president has worked to bring whites and blacks together.

The book's comments were brought to the attention of the "Moms Against Duncan" Facebook page, a group of parents and education activists opposed to U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan who recently claimed that "white suburban moms" only opposed Common Core because it showed that their children weren't as smart as they thought, attempting to paint the nation-wide backlash against the curriculum as a race based issue.

"Would it have been possible for him to be elected (twice) without the support of vast numbers of white Americans?" one member stated.

The book appears to follow the viewpoint that all opposition to the president is based purely on race, which has reached near-comedic levels in its absurdity. Some are now even claiming that opposition to Obamacare is pure racism, despite 55 percent of the public being opposed to its disastrous roll out as millions get dropped from their current providers.

The book raises even more questions over what exactly children are being taught through the Common Core approved curriculum, which has continued to produce inaccurate and highly questionable material.

Just last month, sixth grade students in Arkansas were asked to throw out two amendments in the "outdated" Bill of Rights, causing major backlash from parents.

The month prior, students in several states using a Common Core approved textbook not only found incorrect interpretations of the Second Amendment, but were also taught that Americans who fought in the Revolutionary War, labeled as the "American mobs," were the same as "guerrilla" groups like those that fought in Vietnam in the 1960s.

http://www.redflagnews.com/headlines/bombshell-common-core-teaching-4th-graders-white-voters-are-against-black-barack-obama

[redcliffsw]

Lets see..no Gov't schooling= lower classes who stay ignorant, can't find work in today's high tech world, so we the taxpayers, have to pay for them with food stamps,.welfare and all the free stuff.Which is better? Either way the public pays. HA!

Speaking of staying ignorant, your government schooling is a very good example. 

It was the Republicans who created the scheme for universal free education after the Civil War.  The tyrants, along with mob rule voting, have been in charge of education in the USA since then.  They're teaching what they want their citizens and immigrants to learn.  After the Civil War, the Southern States were required to create a State Board of Education for the particular Southern State to be re-admitted to the Union.  That was the beginning of State Boards and the concept spread into the northern states soon thereafter.  Ross has mentioned that the Kansas BOE was founded in 1873 so now you should know that the republicans/socialists got their way in education over the entire USA shortly after the Civil War which the north defeated the America as established by our founding fathers.

The Republicans have been stealing the liberty of Americans since 1861 and as the Democrats have more fully accepted re-construction, neither party defends liberty anymore.  Both parties are pro-government and worship the Fed's power just like you Diane.

[Diane Amberg]

AH yes....room temperature IQ speaks again.  Do you collect points for everyone you try to insult? Good grief, you have slammed everyone.Repubs, Demos, Moderates, Independents,educators...Who died and left the office of professional griper to you? HA! .... And you don't even live and vote in ELK COUNTY? WHOOOOO!  Why in the world would anyone who is concerned about Elk County politics listen to you? That bond issue won't affect you one way or another! At least I support Elk County projects when I can.
  I'm very pro education but not at all costs. I'm also a very frugal person who wants good value for every penny I spend.Fluff and icing in education means nothing to me. Things that will help kids get ready for the adult world they will live in? Yes! That includes art and music, drama and sports too. If just a job is what is wanted, go to an industrial training school.
Some of the things you just mentioned can be given a very negative slant.Do you ever ask yourself WHY some of those things happened? How about the fact that many of the poor kids in the south weren't getting any education and the costs were keeping some kids from even learning to read. Not every family could send their kids to private school, especially in the post war south.  Can you even construct a sentence without using smear, negative words like tyrant and socialist? I doubt it.  BUT somebody did teach you to read,write and type and probably some math.were you home schooled? That can work very well too. How are you going to give the Gov't a black eye then?
You have no objectivity about education in this country and will not acknowledge that in some countries, who are supposedly better educated than our kids, are using strictly Gov't created curriculum to get that way.      Now go wrap yourself in some pessimistic black flag and think about how it would be to live in some other country. Now think of all the people who died to give you the freedoms you do have and be greatful.

[Ross]

AH yes....room temperature IQ speaks again. 

And you don't even live and vote in ELK COUNTY? WHOOOOO!  Why in the world would anyone who is concerned about Elk County politics listen to you? That bond issue won't affect you one way or another! At least I support Elk County projects when I can.

Who's IQ is room temperature?
I hope you are looking in a mirror!

It does not take a lot of comprehension to read the title/subject of this thread.

And I quote, "Re: Common Core Education And More About Federal Government Control"

That has nothing to do with the present ballot in Elk County!

Common Core is a national affliction?

I do believe Diane that you owe redcliffsw  and extreme apology.

How shameful !

But, I doubt he would stoop so low as to accept it.

[Ross]

For the sake of our children and for the sake of our nation, help get this done.
If Oklahoma succeeds the rest of the states will surely follow.

Ending Common Core - Please take action!

May 27, 2014

Common Core is on the defensive across the country, but Oklahoma has an opportunity to score the biggest victory against it yet! HB3399 would immediately repeal Common Core and return control of education standards to the state. It has been vetted by opponents of Common Core to ensure that it is a genuine repeal and not a political stunt.

Although this bill passed the state legislature overwhelmingly, Gov. Mary Fallin has not announced her intentions. If she takes no action by June 2, the bill dies. If she signs it, Common Core disappears from Oklahoma.

Gov. Fallin needs to hear from concerned citizens everywhere. Oklahoma students will benefit immediately, but other states will see that repealing Common Core is achievable and will be inspired to follow suit.

Since Gov. Fallin is the chair of the National Governors Association, which is a key supporter of Common Core, her repudiation would seriously damage Common Core's credibility. This is a matter of national importance, so Gov. Fallin needs to hear from you. Contact her today and urge her to sign HB3399.
   
Take Action

Please contact Gov. Fallin by email or by her office's phone number, 405-521-2342. Tell her to sign HR3399 and end Common Core in Oklahoma. Also, if you have not already done so, sign the petition to Gov. Fallin asking her to oppose Common Core at http://ngaendcommoncore.com/.
   
Suggested message:

We urge you to sign HB3399, the bill to repeal Common Core, and replace it with state-based standards. This measure would be a victory for educational quality and accountability all across the nation.

Although I am not an Oklahoma resident, I share the concerns of many Oklahomans that the federal government and private interest groups have taken control of our education system. Their voices are drowning out those of parents and teachers, who are the most invested in the success of our children.

Because HB3399 gives control of education back to the state and communities, we urge you to sign this bill because it has national implications in placing our education system back on the right track.

http://www.eagleforum.org/publications/alerts.html?vvsrc=%2fCampaigns%2f36217%2fRespond%3funregistered%3dVqhBCnJfemFcjEeIpy-GeA%26vvcgRD%3dA4brJ6529c%26vvsbr%3dS84544YADeAc3iqr2Hs4Jw

[Ross]

Education /analysis

3 States Push Back Against Common Core

Brittany Corona  / @BrittanyLCorona / June 03, 2014

Following Indiana's lead, state legislatures in Oklahoma, South Carolina and Missouri have approved measures to exit and replace the national standards and tests known as Common Core.

A proposal in Oklahoma would repeal Common Core and replace it with new standards developed by the state board of education. In the interim, Oklahoma's prior state standards, the Priority Academic Student Skills standards, would be reinstated.

"If signed, HB3399 would be the most thorough removal of Common Core from any state of adoption in the nation to date," said Jenni White, president of Restore Oklahoma Public Education.

The South Carolina legislature just agreed to a proposal that would create a committee to review and revise the Common Core standards in the state by the 2015-16 school year. The bill also requires the state to exit Common Core-aligned Smarter Balanced testing consortia completely and replace the tests with their own assessments by the 2014-15 school year.

In Missouri, the legislature has passed a proposal which also repeals and replaces Common Core.

The bill requires the state board to develop new academic standards by October 2015, in place of the Common Core, and adopt and implement these standards by the 2016-17 school year. "This puts the process back into the hands of the people," said State Senator Ed Emery, R-Lamar.

Missouri's bill also requires the Common Core-aligned Smarter Balance testing consortium to be used during the 2014-15 school year, likely resulting in Common Core being taught in Missouri for at least the next school year.

Indiana has fully exited the national standards, and Oklahoma, South Carolina, and Missouri have an opportunity to reclaim their state education decision-making authority. Sixteen other states have pushed back against the Common Core national standards by downgrading or halting implementation of the standards and/or national tests, including Arizona last week.

Exiting Common Core would give all these states the opportunity to implement strong state standards that are innovative and reflect the input of academic content experts, teachers, and parents across the state.

http://dailysignal.com/2014/06/03/three-states-push-back-common-core/?utm_source=heritagefoundation&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=morningbell

[Ross]

How
Bill Gates
pulled off the swift
Common Core
revolution

Written by Lyndsey Layton 
Published: June 7

The pair of education advocates had a big idea, a new approach to transform every public-school classroom in America. By early 2008, many of the nation's top politicians and education leaders had lined up in support.

But that wasn't enough. The duo needed money — tens of millions of dollars, at least — and they needed a champion who could overcome the politics that had thwarted every previous attempt to institute national standards.

So they turned to the richest man in the world.

On a summer day in 2008, Gene Wilhoit, director of a national group of state school chiefs, and David Coleman, an emerging evangelist for the standards movement, spent hours in Bill Gates's sleek headquarters near Seattle, trying to persuade him and his wife, Melinda, to turn their idea into reality.

Coleman and Wilhoit told the Gateses that academic standards varied so wildly between states that high school diplomas had lost all meaning, that as many as 40 percent of college freshmen needed remedial classes and that U.S. students were falling behind their foreign competitors.

The pair also argued that a fragmented education system stifled innovation because textbook publishers and software developers were catering to a large number of small markets instead of exploring breakthrough products. That seemed to resonate with the man who led the creation of the world's dominant computer operating system.

"Can you do this?" Wilhoit recalled being asked. "Is there any proof that states are serious about this, because they haven't been in the past?"

Wilhoit responded that he and Coleman could make no guarantees but that "we were going to give it the best shot we could."

After the meeting, weeks passed with no word. Then Wilhoit got a call: Gates was in.

What followed was one of the swiftest and most remarkable shifts in education policy in U.S. history.

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation didn't just bankroll the development of what became known as the Common Core State Standards. With more than $200 million, the foundation also built political support across the country, persuading state governments to make systemic and costly changes.

Bill Gates was de facto organizer, providing the money and structure for states to work together on common standards in a way that avoided the usual collision between states' rights and national interests that had undercut every previous effort, dating from the Eisenhower administration.

The Gates Foundation spread money across the political spectrum, to entities including the big teachers unions, the American Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association, and business organizations such as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce — groups that have clashed in the past but became vocal backers of the standards.

Money flowed to policy groups on the right and left, funding research by scholars of varying political persuasions who promoted the idea of common standards. Liberals at the Center for American Progress and conservatives affiliated with the American Legislative Exchange Council who routinely disagree on nearly every issue accepted Gates money and found common ground on the Common Core.

One 2009 study, conducted by the conservative Thomas B. Fordham Institute with a $959,116 Gates grant, described the proposed standards as being "very, very strong" and "clearly superior" to many existing state standards.

Gates money went to state and local groups, as well, to help influence policymakers and civic leaders. And the idea found a major booster in President Obama, whose new administration was populated by former Gates Foundation staffers and associates. The administration designed a special contest using economic stimulus funds to reward states (to bribe) that accepted the standards.

The result was astounding: Within just two years of the 2008 Seattle meeting, 45 states and the District of Columbia had fully adopted the Common Core State Standards.

The math standards require students to learn multiple ways to solve problems and explain how they got their answers, while the English standards emphasize nonfiction and expect students to use evidence to back up oral and written arguments. The standards are not a curriculum but skills that students should acquire at each grade. How they are taught and materials used are decisions left to states and school districts.

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation pledges to fund the writing of common math and reading standards for kindergarten through high school designed to make sure graduates are ready for college or jobs. Early grant recipients include groups that will promote the idea among state legislators and business leaders. In the past, states took about five years to develop new education standards.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/how-bill-gates-pulled-off-the-swift-common-core-revolution/2014/06/07/a830e32e-ec34-11e3-9f5c-9075d5508f0a_story.html

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Perhaps checking out some of the lessons that have been posted on various places throughout the internet might be helpful in determining if this plan purchased with the Gates Foundation and Money and Influence is worth it!

I do believe they have said in this article that our School Board should perhaps be discussing Local Educational Standards as well as all school Districts through out the US of A.

Is there room for improvement?

[Ross]

The state may have to pay back the $400,000,000.00 bribe
they received to enter into something they knew nothing about?
Something they didn't understand?

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North Carolina On its way to
Repeal and Replace
Common Core

No money for tests; will take time
June 5, 2014
by Ann Kane

Just this evening, the North Carolina House of Representatives passed HB 1061 with a vote of 78 to 39. The bill would repeal and replace Common Core State Standards.

The Senate passed its version on Tuesday, and now the House Committee Substitute to the SB 370 bill will be going back to the Senate and into conference for final shaping.

Before the vote, when the floor was opened up for debate in the House, members of the legislature voiced their concerns or support. [see video supplied by WRAL.com]

Rep. Marcus Brandon

Rep. Marcus Brandon (D-Guilford) was opposed and said, "We are using this bill to appease about 20 percent of the population that's very upset about something that's very misconstrued."

With tongue in cheek, Brandon went on to say, "This bill was about indoctrination, Obama. We want to do a repeal and replace and we have to be very careful because we tried to do that with Obamacare...and we still have a fiasco in this state in how we're dealing with that."

Brandon's main concern was that he doesn't see a clear set of standards to use as a replacement for the ones presently used. He also said, "so now we're going to take all this on because we're big bad North Carolina and Obama can't tell us what to do."

In response to Brandon's remarks, the main sponsor of the bill Rep. Bryan Holloway (R-Rockingham) gave a comprehensive look at what the bill intends to do with the Common Core.

Holloway said, under the bill, the school board wouldn't be purchasing tests or other materials connected to Common Core.

Holloway said:


The standards are in place, the curriculum has been created to go along with those standards and to say that we're operating with no standards is a little exaggeration.

If we ripped the rug called Common Core out from underneath our school system today, which would leave us with no standards, then we would be in jeopardy of having to send $400 million dollars, roughly, back to the federal government.

But we are not doing that. We are going to take the state board...they are already going to do a five year study...this is not the first time the standards have ever been amended. This will not be the last time the standards have ever been amended. They're going to do this anyway. They're going to make changes. We're saying in this bill, when you do your review next year, we want you to move away from Common Core.

We want high standards. If there are pieces or components of Common Core that you think are age appropriate, they can take those individual pieces, but as a whole they need toward something new and we want more rigorous standards.

As it stands, a majority in both houses voted to repeal and replace Common Core. Once the final version is crafted, it will go to Governor McCrory to sign. McCrory has generally been in support of the standards, so whether he will sign off or allow it to take effect is still a question.

http://watchdogwire.com/northcarolina/2014/06/05/north-carolina-on-its-way-to-repeal-and-replace-common-core/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=sunday

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Why take money for something you don't understand and is not even developed when the money is offered? Why?   GREED, that's why?

[Ross]

Doesn't this article just shout that education
has been bad off enough
without Common Core
just making matters worse.
I think this will catch on across the country.

Education /commentary

A Defeat for
Terrible Teachers
in California

June 10, 2014

It won't be as simple from now on for ineffective California teachers to coast off to a lifetime career on easy street.

In a Los Angeles Superior Court ruling today, Judge Rolf M. Treu "found five California laws governing teacher tenure, layoffs and dismissals unconstitutional," reports Politico.

"Treu found," reporter Stephanie Simon wrote, "that the statutes permit too many grossly incompetent teachers to remain in classrooms across the state —and found that those teachers shortchange their students by putting them months or years behind their peers in math and reading."

There's no doubt that not all teachers are created equal. Some are excellent, of course. But not all of them are, and in California, it's almost impossible to fire a tenured teacher.

The case, which was brought by nine public school students, challenged five California statutes related to teacher tenure, including one that requires teachers to receive tenure—or be dismissed—after a mere 16 months on the job. In contrast, 41 other states give school authorities a full three years to make that tenure decision.

Students Matter, a group affiliated with the nine students in the case, asserts that poor teachers were hurting California students. "According to the testimony of Dr. Raj Chetty, a student assigned to a grossly ineffective teacher loses $50,000 in potential lifetime earnings compared to a student assigned to a teacher of average effectiveness," states the group's fact sheet.

Minority students have been particularly hard hit. "According to the testimony of Dr. Thomas Kane, in Los Angeles Unified [school district], African American students are 43 percent more likely than white students to be taught by a teacher in the bottom 5 percent of effectiveness," Students Matters wrote. It's an even worse story for Latino students, who "are 68 percent more likely to have a teacher in the same 5 percent of effectiveness."

The ruling should help boost California public school students' access to a decent education.  This "tentative decision" (the court's words), based on the California Constitution, will likely be appealed. While assessing the quality of education is normally a policy matter best left to the legislature, unless you're a lousy teacher, this should be a cause for celebration.

http://dailysignal.com/2014/06/10/defeat-terrible-teachers-california/?utm_source=heritagefoundation&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=morningbell