One more reason why the fed.gov Dept of Education needs to be not reduced, but eliminated, along with several others.
SWMBO read an article on the Common Core. The fed.gov DOE didn't come up with Common Core, you can thank the National Governor's Association Center for Best Practices and the Council of Chief State School Officers, though the fed.gov DOE is using the stick and carrot method for its adoption. The Bill and Melinda Gates foundation was main funder for the Common Core development. 48 states and DC were members of the CC initiative. Texas and Alaska were not members of the initiative. Nebraska and Virginia are members but have chosen not to implement the standards. Minnesota has only adopted the English language arts standards, but not the math standards. Indiana is the first state the retreat from the standards and South Carolina is also retreating.
The article also stated some items of concern.
1. As part of the Common Core process, the states will create mass tracking systems via databases of very personal student and family information, which it can share with other federal and state agencies. Overseen by the nonprofit, inBloom Inc., name, address, race, economic status, test scores, attendance, learning disabilities and hobbies are just some of the student data points stored on the system. InBloom is largely funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
2. Kids with disabilities and handicaps will be taught using the same standards. Special Education teachers are told they need to use the standards that match the age and grade level of the child but NOT their functioning level. Not all students are created equal, they have different learning styles - the Common Core standards do not take that into account.
You know you have an issue when the following happens:
In a May 2013 letter from 21 New York State principals to the New York Education Commissioner voicing concerns about the CC assessments that the state underwent last spring: "As it stands, we are concerned about the limiting and unbalanced structure of the test, the timing, format and length of the daily test sessions"..."many students spent much of their time reading, rereading and interpreting difficult and confusing questions about authors' choices around structure and craft in informational texts, a Common Core skill that is valuable, but far from worthy of the time and effort given by the test."..."When groups of parents, teachers and principals recently shared students' experiences in their schools, especially during the ELA exams with misjudged timing expectations, we learned that frustration, despondency and even crying were common reactions among students. The extremes were unprecedented: vomiting, nosebleeds, suicidal ideation and even hospitalization."
http://issuu.com/daycom/docs/cf0813?e=1606645/4265869Pages 6, 19 and 20
