Submitted by: Joan Biz
Common Core-uption
By Marta H. Mossburg
Friday, November 22, 2013
Arne Duncan finds it "fascinating" that opposition to new Common Core
education standards throughout the U.S. is coming from "white suburban
moms who — all of a sudden — their child isn't as brilliant as they
thought they were, and their school isn't quite as good as they thought
they were."
The U.S. Secretary of Education later said he used a poor choice of
words when he spoke to a group of state superintendents last Friday.
Yes, definitely. All those women fed a steady diet of the Republicans'
war on their civil rights during last year's election that then went out
and elected his boss just found out what Barack Obama's administration
really thinks of them: selfish segregationists who only care about their
own children.
What Duncan cares about, by contrast, is prepping everyone for 21st
century jobs, whatever those will be. He does not want any child to be
forced to follow a substandard – to borrow the progressive catchphrase
for health policies that existed before Obamacare – curriculum that
allows a community to "feel better" about itself without academic merit.
Insiders
of several NYSE-listed companies met recently in a highly secured
building in downtown New York. The purpose: To determine when the next
stock market crash will take place.
To
start, the government will never be able to predict what the jobs of
the future will be, so how can it develop a set of standards to prepare
students for them? Second, the problem with the Common Core is that the
superiority of its standards as compared to those in current curriculum
is a hotly debated topic – not an established fact as Mr. Duncan makes
it seem. The guidelines, which were never voted on by Congress or state
or local governments, were foisted on states because the federal
government dangled $4.35 billion at states in so-called "Race to the
Top" grants. Perhaps most questionable, the same failed philosophy that
has turned teachers into test prep delivery devices and students into
information drones drives Common Core just as it does evaluation methods
today.
In a video that went viral, Ethan Young, a student at Farragut High
School in Knox County, Tennessee, eviscerated the one-size-fits-all
method of teaching at a school board meeting earlier this month.
That model, he said, "works with nuclear reactors, it works with
business models, why can't it work with students? I mean how convenient,
calculating exactly who knows what and who needs what. I mean, why
don't we just manufacture robots instead of students? They last longer
and they always do what they're told."
What's particularly ironic about Duncan's statement is that earlier this week a report in The Baltimore Sun
revealed that the nation's top ranked public school system, Maryland,
achieved its high scores on a test known as the Nation's Report Card by
removing a large pool of special needs students from testing. Maryland
Gov. Martin O'Malley, a surrogate for President Obama during his two
stints as head of the Democratic Governors Association, bills himself as
Captain Transparency and was an early advocate for Common Core, but
oddly didn't notify the public about a practice designed to help
students and teachers "feel better" about their performance at the
expense of holding them accountable for their learning.
So if even the state poster child for Common Core doesn't like to be held accountable, how can you blame "white suburban moms"?
The fact that high stakes testing will continue to drive funding for
public education under Common Core means more cooking the books as in
Maryland, cheating scandals and a draining of joy from classrooms around
the country.
Instead of slamming people who have legitimate concerns about Common
Core, Mr. Duncan should take a step back and think about the purpose of
an education.
Tennessee student Ethan Young said it well: "Somewhere our Founding
Fathers are turning in their graves — pleading, screaming and trying to
say to us that we teach to free minds. We teach to inspire. We teach to
equip, the careers will come naturally."
Take that, 21st century jobs.
Marta H. Mossburg writes frequently about national affairs and about
Maryland, where she lives. Follow her on Twitter at @mmossburg.
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