Common Core Education And More About Federal Government Control

[redcliffsw]

Looks like to me that you ought to run for School Board. 

[Ross]

Looks like to me that you ought to run for School Board.

Thank you redcliffsw.

I am registeed for the April 7, 2015 election day.

I am not part of any Status Quo, either.

I am just an average man who votes and pays taxes and cares about the wrong doing against the people.

I am just an average man who votes and pays taxes and cares about the wrong doing against the people.
And the bad attitude of some board members. Quote, " I don't care how many voters I piss off." a school board member made this statement during a Board Meeting. Who does this person think he works for?

This came from Matt Hilton while acting as President of the School Board during a School Board meeting.

The present School Board lakes couth, protocol, decorum and the ability to communicate amongst themselves.

It also has elements of an NGO, commonly know as Elk Konnected.

[Ross]

WND

'TOP TEACHER' WINNER QUITS DUE TO COMMON CORE
Announced to stunned audience: 'I can't do it anymore'

Published: 4 hours ago

Stacie Starr reacts to winning the Top Teacher contest (Bruce Bishop/ Chronicle-Telegram

Honored as the "Top Teacher" by ABC's "Live with Kelly and Michael" show, Stacie Starr was speaking at an education forum earlier this week when she dropped a bombshell.



The veteran teacher at Elyria High School in Elyria, Ohio, told a stunned audience Monday she will resign at the end of the school year because of the new federal Common Core system of standards and assessments adopted by her state, reported the local Chronicle-Telegram newspaper.

Stacie Starr

At the forum, which sought to help parents navigate the complex standardized testing system, Starr was talking about how special education has suffered under Common Core.

As she fought back tears, she disclosed she is leaving traditional education and plans 'to teach in a different way."

"I can't do it anymore, not in this 'drill 'em and kill 'em' atmosphere," she said. "I don't think anyone understands that in this environment if your child cannot quickly grasp material, study like a robot and pass all of these tests, they will not survive."

Her announcement was met with gasps of disbelief, the paper reported.

She explained that she has faith in her ninth-grade students, but they are reading at sometimes a fourth- and fifth-grade level.

"Each and every day, I have to look in my students' eyes and tell them I can't help them because the state has decided they have to prove what they know," she said, according to the Chronicle-Telegram.

Teaching is getting harder, she said, because "the rules keep changing."

Last month, a sixth-grade teacher in upstate New York tearfully asked the local school board to be reassigned due to her objections to teaching using Common Core, reported WNYT-TV in Albany, New York.

"This is not developmentally appropriate for my students, and I find it cruel and harmful to suggest that it is," Jennifer Rickert told the board.

"I do not believe in knowingly setting up my students for failure," she said. "I cannot remain silent for one more day."

Rickert received a standing ovation by parents and teachers in the audience.

On Monday, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, a possible 2016 presidential candidate, began promoting a 42-page proposal to reform American education at the national level that would repeal Common Core along with a general rollback of federal authority. He wants to increase school-choice options for parents and give educators greater administrative freedom.

'I have to get out'

Meanwhile, another teacher told Starr at the Ohio education forum she also is quitting.

"I'm like you. I feel like I have to get out," said Jackie Conrad, a third-grade teacher.

PJ Media noted another veteran teacher in the Elyria district, Dawn Neely, implored the school board to take control of the "testing culture" in their local schools, the Chronicle-Telegram said in Feb. 5 story.

"I don't know what to do. I am morally against what we are doing, and I think history will judge us for what we do to fight for our kids," she told the Elyria school board. "Look through the test books, and you tell me if you think they are developmentally appropriate. No one is advocating for our district, and I am asking my district to be honest with the parents about what we are doing to students."

In response, the board president, Kathryn Karpus, said the district can do nothing about it, because it's bound by Ohio laws that mandate the testing.

As WND reported, Common Core also has been accused of seizing control of education from local jurisdictions, politicizing subjects, censoring conservative viewpoints, dumbing down subjects, imposing one-size-fits-all standards and data mining of private information.

Mary Calamia, a licensed clinical social worker, said she observed a significant increase in the number of students struggling with anxiety and depression since Common Core's implementation in New York state.

"What was so upsetting for [the children] was they couldn't do the work, they feel stupid, they were extremely anxious, [and] extremely distressed about going to school," she said.

In Georgia, as WND reported, Meg Norris was forced out of her teaching job in Hall County last year after she ran afoul of mandatory testing for Common Core.

"We were one of the first counties in the nation to implement Common Core, and at first the teachers felt like we were special, we were all excited. I drank the Kool-Aid," said Norris. "But after teaching Common Core in my class for about 18 months, I started seeing a lot of behaviors in my students that I hadn't seen before. They started becoming extremely frustrated and at that age, 12 years old, they can't verbalize why they couldn't 'get it.'"

Will Estrada, director of federal relations for the Home School Legal Defense Association, has raised privacy concerns. He said the assessments tied to Common Core collect more than 400 points of data on every child.

"It's their likes and dislikes, grade-point average all the way through school, their home situation, health questions," he said. "It's an incredibly invasive collection of information that they are trying to collect in what they call P-20, or pre-K through workforce."


Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2015/02/top-teacher-winner-quits-due-to-common-core/#SMRBI5QTeeyeWulj.99

[Ross]

FEATURED STORIESNEWS

Common Core Hits
Major Roadblock
In West Virginia

One of the most convincing arguments came from the mouth of an elementary school student.

With criticism growing across the nation, politicians continue to consider proposals that would prevent federal Common Core education standards from taking root in local school districts. Although a majority of states initially adopted the curriculum, Western Journalism has followed the controversial program in recent years and reported that leaders in a number of states have since worked to repeal the standards.

Among the latest state lawmakers considering a Common Core rollback is West Virginia state Sen. Dave Sypolt. Reports this week indicate the Republican legislator drafted a bill that would strip the standards from state schools after conducting his own research and hearing from those affected by the program.

Prior to sending the bill to an education subcommittee earlier this week, he sought the opinion of numerous individuals – including one elementary school student who plainly described her frustrations.

"The math does not explain itself clearly so that we can fully understand how we are to solve the problems," she said. "I bet if you go ask the people in my math class they would say, 'Yes, this Common Core that you put in West Virginia is confusing.'"

In the state's House of Delegates, Republican Speaker Tim Armstead came out in favor of securing "parental and teacher and principal input" in developing state education standards. A bill to repeal Common Core passed in that chamber by a vote of 74 to 19 late last week.

Among those within the public school system, however, many are asking for extra time to prepare for the implementation of revised standards.

"Perhaps we could work an amendment that we could all live with for a year," suggested state school board member Beverly Kingery, "and then if things aren't better and people aren't more satisfied, we could have public meetings within a year. Then I would give you my blessings to do what you think is needed to do."

Read more at http://www.westernjournalism.com/common-core-hits-major-roadblock-west-virginia/#Wp15PmPMgeXuUBcP.99

[Ross]

Common Core Math Invasion

The November 12, 2014 edition of Education Week, "American Education's Newspaper of Record," features a 26-page section that attempts to explain and justify Common Core math. The supplement is titled, "Making Sense of the Math: The Common Core in Practice." Almost every other page features an advertisement for a Common Core-based product that would supposedly make the new math more readily understood by students and teachers. There are more than a dozen ads, many are full-page, and most are touting Common Core-related products. The ads sport statements such as, "Raising the Bar and Making it Reachable" and "The Future of Math Education is Here."

But there is serious concern that Common Core math is not better than previous methods, is not rigorous, and is in fact confusing students, parents, and even teachers who are supposed to be leading students. The Education Week insert seems meant to overcome, or at least diminish, those concerns.

Fallout from Common Core (CC) math isn't only happening in states that adopted the standards. Virginia did not adopt Common Core when 45 other states rushed to get Race to the Top grants offered by the Obama administration. Yet, Common Core math is being used in Virginia classrooms. This is partially due to changes in textbooks and materials and because Virginia is choosing to follow the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics recommendations.

What's Wrong With CC Math?

The Staunton, Virginia News Leader newspaper exposes the fact that although the Virginia Board of Education rejected Common Core in 2010, math teaching in Virginia schools aligns 95% with Common Core. (12-27-14)

Reporting from a Virginia elementary school, the News Leader gives the following report of students who, instead of using long division to figure out how many times 7 goes into 184, use "guessing" as a way to find the answer. The newspaper reports this, about a young student working on the math problem:
Damoni just guessed that the solution to the math problem was 12. So she then multiplied 7 by 12 and found that gave her 84, not close at all to 184. She subtracted the 84 from 184 and then took 7 into 100. She did this until the remaining 'balance' was two and then added the numbers she guessed together to get the rounded-down answer of 26.

In Virginia, this is called "student-centered math." Although the state did not adopt Common Core, "for all intents and purposes, 'student-centered math' follows Common Core standards" and it is "the way students must understand problems to score well on [Virginia's] Standards of Learning tests."

The News Leader reports that according to Dori Walk, executive director of instruction for Staunton Schools "every seven years, the department of education reviews standards in each subject and makes changes based on what is considered the best practice. . . . Virginia's standards and the Common Core standards stem from reports by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics about best practices for teaching the subject." So, the NCTM is a main reason Virginia students are being taught Common Core math, through the back door.

NCTM Promotes Common Core Math

Promising to do all they can to support Common Core, the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) website states:

The widespread adoption of the Common Core Standards for Mathematics presents an unprecedented opportunity for systemic improvement in mathematics education in the United States. [Common Core] offers a foundation for the development of more rigorous, focused, and coherent mathematics curricula, instruction, and assessments that promote conceptual understanding and reasoning as well as skill fluency. (NCTM.org)

In August of 2013, the NCTM called for increased funding for professional development for teachers and other school personnel involved in CC math; funding for research and implementation of CC assessments; and "accommodations in teacher evaluation systems." The NCTM says, "Most important, all stakeholders must acknowledge that systemic improvement takes a number of years, and a long-term commitment to supporting the Common Core Standards is necessary, even if initial assessment results do not show substantial improvements in student achievement."

In other words, taxpayers should spend lots more money to implement Common Core math and no one, including math teachers, should be held accountable when students don't do well when this new, "new math" proves to be yet another failed experiment.

http://www.eagleforum.org/publications/educate/feb15/common-core-math-invasion.html

[Ross]

VIDEO: Angry Mom Publically
Destroys Common Core
With This 1 Question

Karen Lamoreaux hoisted Common Core on its own petard when she appeared before the Arkansas Board of Education by doing one simple thing: asking board members to solve a math question the Common Core way.

The Arkansas mother had everyone in the room speechless when she went through the necessary steps under Common Core to do a simple division word problem.

"Are you smarter than a Common Core fourth grader? Let's find out," Lamoreaux began.

"The problem is: Mr. Yamato's class has 18 students. If the class counts around by a number and ends with 90, what number did they count by?"

Someone on the board answered five, and Lamoreaux asked how she knew that. The board member answered that she divided 90 by 18.

"You know why? Because that's what makes sense, right? That's the way we were taught to do it in the fourth grade level," Lamoreaux said.

"This, however, is what the Common Core Standards expect our fourth graders to do. If they solve it in those two steps they get it marked wrong. They are expected to draw 18 circles with 90 hashmarks solving this problem in exactly 108 steps."

Common Core: making simple division a Sisyphean task since 2010!

"Board members, this is not rigorous. This is not college ready. This is not preparing our children to compete in a global economy," she said.

Stating that she knew of kids who were in the top 80th percentile that were now getting C's, D's and F's under the Common Core initiative, Lamoreaux said that it was time for the board to listen to the concerns of parents.

"I encourage you to listen to us when we send you our e-mails despite the comments that were made by our chairperson here today. Our concerns are not based on hysteria or propaganda," she told the board.

"They are based on fact and we are prepared to present those facts. Can you see the trembling in my voice?"

She finished her speech with an impassioned plea.

"This is not working. And it's not what they told you it would be," Lamoreaux said.

"We will save the privacy concerns and the testing concerns for our legislature. But when it comes to standards, that's your ball court. And we need you to help us with this because this program is dumbing our children down." (H/T Western Journalism)

It's amazing to see that something that's so obvious to parents and students seems to elude the grasp of liberal educators so easily.

However, now that America has woken up to the sham that Common Core is, hopefully it won't be long before President Barack Obama's failed education initiative is put to rest at last.

See video at:
http://conservativetribune.com/angry-mom-destroys-common-core/?utm_source=feedblitz&utm_medium=FeedBlitzEmail&utm_content=936184&utm_campaign=0

[Ross]

It looks as if though it is not wanted
Obama's Common Core
Is
Being Forced

Common Core Testing in This State is Not Optional

Mar. 10, 2015 7:42pm   

As Common Core testing is stirring controversy across the country, Mississippi schools are being told the test is not optional and to document the names of students that don't take the test.

"Statewide testing is so important that is has actually been codified into state law," Mississippi Superintendent of Education Carey M. Wright wrote to district superintendents last week. "Mississippi law mandates that basic skills tests 'shall be completed by each student.' ... In summary, student assessments are not an option. They are a requirement."

Common Core opponents wave signs and cheer at a rally opposing Mississippi's continued use of the Common Core academic standards on the steps of the Capitol
in Jackson, Miss., Tuesday, Jan. 6, 2015. Both Gov. Phil Bryant and Lt. Gov. Tate Reeves have vowed that the state will quit using the standards. (AP Photo/Rogelio V. Solis)

Mississippi's 20-day window for administering the test began on Monday. Individual school districts pick which days of that window to administer the test. But despite that requirement, many parents are reportedly pulling their children from the PARCC exam. PARCC is short for Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers, which is prepared by London-based test maker Pearson.

"Document the names, grades and actual assessments for students who refuse to be tested," Wright goes on to instruct the district superintendents. "Your district test coordinator will need this information to input into Pearson's online delivery platform at the end of the PBA [Performance Based Assessment] and the EOY [end of year] cycle."

Keeping the names of students that did not take the test was not a matter of amassing any personal data, said Patrice Guilfoyle, spokeswoman for the Mississippi Department of Education.

"The student data is because under state law, 95 percent of students must be accounted for. If you don't take the test, we have to have their names," Guilfoyle told TheBlaze. "There is no personal information collected. It's to determine which students are tested and how students performed. We have the information for the students who took the test. If you don't fill that sheet out, we need a way of knowing you didn't."

On Tuesday, a New Mexico court heard arguments between two competing testing companies, which could potentially have a national impact. New Mexico is a state where students also reportedly walked away from the test.

Last week in New Jersey – which also does not allow opting out of the test – many parents just refused to allow their children to take the exam.

In Mississippi, Kelly Watson whose third-grade daughter Faith attends Martin Bluff Elementary School in Gautier, Mississippi, said she was bothered to see that information that is collected for students that don't take the exam.

"It makes me feel uncomfortable," Watson told TheBlaze.

But, in her district, she said parents did not have much of a choice.

"I tried to opt her out and they told me you don't have the authority," Watson said.

Guilfoyle, of the state Department of Education, said the letter to district superintendents was based on extensive research by the Mississippi Attorney General's office that determined the tests were legally required.

But, she said that the state provides latitude for school districts to decide how to handle the matter if parents don't want their children to take a test.

"There is no state penalty," Guilfoyle told TheBlaze. "We let the school districts decide."

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2015/03/10/common-core-testing-in-this-state-is-not-optional/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_term=Firewire&utm_campaign=Firewire%20-%20HORIZON%203-11-15%20Build-WED

My kid would not be taking their Common Core Test.
I'd keep him home.
I'd also instruct him if they tried to slip a test to him later,
not to take it and to call me immediately.

[redcliffsw]

Even without Common Core, the government schoools are not much good for anything except more government and that'll take more money to continue making the government improvements.  Except they say it's all for the kids.  It's government socialism - don't you think? 

[Diane Amberg]

What about private schools? You have nothing good to say about them either? How do you know which are good ones or not? Of course only the wealthy can afford to send their kids to those, right? Wrong! and the home schooled kids? Most turn out great, but some don't.
I just had the little kids (4-7) from the Delaware School for the Deaf back at the firehouse to do a spring tour. Some had multiple disabilities.  Some have cochlear implants, some are very slow academically, some are extremely bright. Shall we just flush them away as not being worth the effort?

[Ross]

Even without Common Core, the government schoools are not much good for anything except more government and that'll take more money to continue making the government improvements.  Except they say it's all for the kids.  It's government socialism - don't you think?

Redclif is Simply stating an opinion of a general nature, as he sees it related related to Common Core and asking about socialism. Very simple.

So why the derogatory attitude Diane?

What about private schools?

You have nothing good to say about them either?

Why the bad attitude on this thread Diane? What does your questions or statements have  to do with Common Core? Nothing what so ever.

How do you know which are good ones or not?

What are you talking about,        this question is about as clear as mud!
Are you asking is Commom Core Better than what we already have?

Of course only the wealthy can afford to send their kids to those, right? Wrong! and the home schooled kids? Most turn out great, but some don't.

Oh, Diane it has already been stated that the wealthy as well as Obama's chldren do not attend Common Core Schools! Read back through this thread for that information.

Common Core

is trying to make it into home schooling, once again please read back through this thread for that information.

I just had the little kids (4-7) from the Delaware School for the Deaf back at the firehouse to do a spring tour. Some had multiple disabilities.  Some have cochlear implants, some are very slow academically, some are extremely bright. Shall we just flush them away as not being worth the effort?

Was this the real reason for this post? So you can brag?
Did you get your picture in your local newspaper?  "Flush them" that is one hell of an asinine question to ask and is not at all relevant to Common Core in any way. Go check your diplomas ans see if they qualify you for such arrogant ignorance. Yes Diane that upset me. How gross of you.

I was raised with a father that was handicapped with serious disabilities. He belonged to a group of disabled people and I was raised as a friend to many, many handicapped people of all ages and many types of disabilities, but I never considered bragging rights for being helpful to them as my friends.

The only real handicap is attitude Diane, please try to remember that and never look down on these folks.  Unless they are like my friend in Washington State that is in basically in a laying down position in his motorized wheel chair at the job he holds down on a daily basis. He had great attitude.

I'd appreciate it if you would keep your bragging rights at Topic: East Coast Happenings http://www.cascity.com/howard/forum/index.php?topic=15176.new;topicseen#new
Thank you Diane.

Please Remember

[/b]