Since I wrote that I could not support the Common Core, several readers have written to say that I criticized the process of its creation and implementation, not its content. My response to more than one reader was that means and ends both matter. You can’t do the right thing in the wrong way. You can’t suspend democratic process for what you think is the good of the people. Good things imposed by force tend not to stick. (See my thoughts–written in March 2014–about “The Fatal Flaw of the Common Core Standards“, which demonstrates that they violated every protocol of standard-setting and ignored due process, transparency, the right of appeal, etc.)
This reader explains her objections to the process:
My thoughts on the CC:
Subtexts: Close Reading of the Common Core
As ridiculous as it sounds, my resistance to the common core standards is disconnected from its content. The document, itself, is of far less concern to me than its genesis and its prospects. This past-future duality is where the perils of the common core lie; therefore, it is critical to consider where they emerged from and where they are leading.
The common core materialized as a tool of the political elite and the private sector. The common core was neither sought nor developed by educators or those who care about students or the future of the common good. The common core is meant for political gain and economic profit. This matters because the origin of a movement affects its implementation. Despite elevated rhetoric surrounding the common core, its underlying assumptions about what counts as knowledge, literacy, and culture will exacerbate – not ameliorate – inequality.
Although necessarily speculative, the future of the common core is also suspect. It is certain, however, that national assessments will follow this attempt to realize a national curriculum. While assessment is an essential component of the teaching-learning process, standardized assessments have limited utility and vast, destructive defects. The common core, as the basis for creating a national, profitable system of assessments that purport to measure student learning and teacher effectiveness, is revolting.
And, perhaps, this initiative will provoke a revolution among those with expertise about education. The common core is simply a tool. On paper, it is neither good nor evil. However, like any tool, it requires critical analysis before it is used. With respect to its creation, educators must ask: Who made this tool and why? Who paid for its design, construction, and distribution? How was it made (under conditions of brutality and oppression, or in a collaborative, participatory environment)? Looking forward, we must reflect on the negative effects of standardized assessments, particularly on marginalized students, and ensure that the common core does not fulfill its potential to do further damage to future generations of students.
I love to write, but I don’t want to use a pen that was made by imprisoned children. And, despite its sharp point, I do not intend to puncture someone’s eyeball with my pen. Like my pen, the common core is a tool. And, like my pen, its origins and its prospects matter.
Julie Gorlewski
State University of New York at New Paltz
I very much wish that the Publishers’ Criteria for implementing the Common Core ELA standards had been incorporated into the standards document itself. Those Guidelines address many potential problems with the implementation. In particular, they address NOT treating skills in isolation but in response to complex texts and, if followed, would keep people from turning the standards into a curriculum map, which is a terrible temptation, given the high stakes.
Click to access Publishers_Criteria_for_3-12.pdf
The Publishers’ Criteria are VERY important for understanding how the CCSS are meant to be implemented. One can argue about the specifics of the Publishers’ Criteria document, but I think that most people will agree that it is an extraordinarily thoughtful document. I personally think that this document is a lot more thoughtful than are the standards themselves, with which, I believe, there are many problems.
Unfortunately, I don’t think publishers share your sentiments. They love the common core because they can simply rebrand old or current materials with a “COMMON CORE ALIGNED” sticker and sell them at a premium. $$$$
Thank you Julie. One of the deep outrages of the accountability regime, deep in the sense that it has settled into our discourse and disrupted how we make meaning of what we do, is that it presents as ahistorical, as without context.
Any teaching takes place within a social-historical-political context. We need to always attend to the history, the process, the avenues of access, of power and domination or of collaboration and voice. That is where meaning is made, where education either becomes reproduction or liberation.
The focus on content or on a number as the representation of teaching or of learning, takes our eyes off of the actual human experiences of teaching and learning.
The numbers, the demand for objectivity, even the language of accountability do not leave space for us to, as Freire reminds us to, name our world. The numbers and the endless standards and protocols name our world for us, limit the names available, and leave no room to say, ‘Wait, this is not what I see. Nor is it what I want.”
Democracy is a process. If we want democracy, we must always attend to process.
As a parent with advanced university degrees in geopolitics, history and international relations, while not in education, still allow me the ability to see and analyze this behemoth for what it is. Julie points out many flaws in the implementation of the common core and their deception therein. This kind of chicanery forbodes the ills which i as a parent see regularly in my childrens assignments. The data mining, political prodding about parents views, the constant harping on ” issues”, every book classic or not leads to some ” deeper” study always ending up with the same historical revisionism social science mumbo jumbo, climate crisis, and political indoc points… ”
USA agressors, Americans bad, stupid, pollutors, gluttons, world ending because of
Americans, communism plausible option, socialism is equality, communitarian third way plugs in young adult lit, obsession with poverty, rape, crime, all the kids parents fault. We have seen it in the press with social justice slavery math. Tip of the iceberg. The implementation tactics and the profiteer creators and those in their sphere are both indicators of what is at the gooey center of common core, and parents would not let their children eat this sickening candy, nor i imagine would many teachers want to feed it to them.
While paolo freire may be a posterboy for some educators, this parent sees him as a political tool in a succession of excuses to bring down the US, by way of cultural marxism and radical nonsence. Parents need their kids taught facts by honest
people/teachers who are not in it for clandestine political gain. Common core is just another means to that end, paid for by parent punching bags. Enough.
Reblogged this on Transparent Christina and commented:
exactly
Totally agree. As I wrote on my blog last week:
“Race to the Top was a money grab. The Common Core is a money grab. Teacher evaluation reform is a money grab. Policies opening up school choice and privatization are a money grab. Any potential good from any of these initiatives was poisoned in the implementation.”
Exactly. Evidenced by my chlldren’s shiny new Common Core workbooks which are not worth the paper they are printed on.
Yup: ” The common core, as the basis for creating a national, profitable system of assessments that purport to measure student learning and teacher effectiveness, is revolting.”
No Child Left Behind made an industry. An industry that effectively had a sunset date of 2014. By creating entirely new standards, the very same profiteers who benefitted from NCLB, get to pick our pockets all over again. This time with national standards that both lower their cost of production and raise the bar to prevent new players from entering the field.
Obama and Duncan facilitated it all with RTTT before anyone really understood what they were up to.
It’s kind of brilliant, really.
Bea: I have followed this blog since it began. Many astute and thoughtful observations [not all of which I agree with] have appeared on it since its debut in late April 2012.
Your second paragraph is one of the most insightful comments I have read yet. You brought together in a few words a host of topics and points in a clear and powerful way. Thank you.
🙂
Thank you. I’m astonished that there has been so little analysis in the media (not owned by Murdoch or Gates) about this.
This was just announced today: http://mashable.com/2013/02/26/pearson-catalyst/
Diabolically brilliant indeed. Figuring out ways to creatively deceive and rob the public on a grand scale always is.
They don’t control our minds. They don’t have experience. They don’t have the relationships we develop with our students and families. They don’t know my kids.
They never will. Close the door.
The problem that gets in the way is the standardized tests given each Spring that tie a VAM score to the teacher’s job. How can a teacher ignore the CCSS when the test is directly connected to it? It is a death trap with no way out. The standards are developmentally inappropriate, the tests are flawed, VAM is an unproven algorithm, and students and teachers are too afraid to ignore them. How many teachers are brave enough to close the door? Even if it is the right thing to do…
Just wait for the lawsuits when tenured teachers are let go due to VAM scores. I know enough to fake it for a iPad visit. You just got get the verbiage down…fake to make it…then got back to teaching. I don’t care about test scores.
The Common Core is a mess. My 9th grade son is floundering in Secondary I this year. I’ve hired some of my old students who are really good in math to come over and tutor him after school. They’re doing the same thing in their AP Calculus class right now that he is doing in the Common Core 9th grade math! And this is after throwing the kids into the deep end with no foundation, because he took pre-algebra last year, BCC (Before Common Core). How is he supposed to graduate when they expect him to understand Calculus concepts before even having had algebra? The roll-out of these standards is a disaster.
Should graduation from high school tell an outsider anything about he level of academic achievement of the graduate?
Good point. It is extremely important that we develop a way to demonstrate to the world what it is that the student knows and can do when they graduate. This is what the CCSS could do for us, in theory. As others have mentioned on this blog, there are two reasons it probably won’t be useful.
First, it seems to completely ignore the facts of child development.
Second, CCSS and SBAC proscribe an entirely different educational system than the one we have now. One that is rich in critical thinking and problem-solving. This is really good, except we have spent the last dozen years under NCLB cultivating the exact opposite, a system focused on drill-and-kill factoid assimilation. It will take another 12 years (a student’s K12 career, basically) to make the shift. However (in my state at least) we start with the SBAC testing next year. This means guaranteed failure for almost every school in my state for nearly a decade while we wait for the pendulum to swing.
So you would support a common core, just not this common core?
The major problem of Common Core is that it suspends all understanding of child development. I just got a list today of math vocabulary words Kindergarten students are supposed to understand under Common Core. I am sorry but I do not think I ever thought of the word “decompose” when I was in Kindergarten in 1960. And yet, I managed to get to college without a curriculum that would make me college ready.
I spent over an hour one Saturday reviewing the CCS for math with my principal. I accessed it again a few days later to clarify a point and imagine my surprise when the document had changed! The problem with the CCS is that there doesn’t seem to be any plan or standard! I spend hours poring over the mandated documents and websites.Materials are scarce as are pacing charts. Yet many of the elite private schools some of my students are applying to, do not adhere to the CCS. When I asked one administrator why, she laughed and walked away. I don’t think anyone really knows what is going on. Corporate America would rather see Deltas rather than Alphas!
Common Core hasn’t yet affected my livelihood, but it’s coming. Anyone can have an opinion about this, even university professors. Until I have personal experience, all I can do is comment from the sidelines. I hope those most affected by the “early” adoption of CC will keep us informed with first-person stories.
Thank you Diane for keeping the issue front-and-center.
I think the post clearly states the main problem with the Core’s standards:
they are inextricably linked to high-stakes testing and publisher’s curriculum.
The unstable compromise that came about in the early 1990s —
a National Standards that were voluntary and not coercive —
could not last. It was not only Lynne Cheney — that was something
Horace Mann could have predicted.
It is the corrosive power of money.
At least since the mid-1990s, investors have believed that the “fundamentals are all aligned for a great number of people to make a whole lot of money in this sector,” according to former Massachusetts Governor William Weld. Weld finished his statement, “and do well by doing good.” (Walsh, 2000 in Ed Week, 19 Jan 2000, p. 13)
The IB program requires extensive high stacks testing. Should it be opposed on the same grounds?
I think you raise a good question, teachingeconomist.
And if you are a teaching economist, congrats — you are one of the few.
The IB program is actually very expensive for schools to run and
there are a lot of problems with it.
It certainly creates equity problems.
Most poor schools could not afford it.
That does not mean, however, that the answer is yes.
I don’t know for sure, but I think the answer would be a qualified no.
Why?
I am guessing, but I think the effect of money has been less corrosive
for the IB because it is directed to people who have money.
First, the IB programs and the CCSS have a different history and a
different relationship to the moneyed players in the system.
While I am no expert on IB programs, let me suggest that the IB
program has followed a much different track than the CCSS.
For one thing, the people who started IB were marketing to
elite schools. A lot of private and boarding schools use the IB program
and it is often the program of choice for children of the elite in
less developed countries.
Also, the system of evaluation is much different.
While it is by no means preordained that the CCSS
would go the standardized test route, it seems close
to predetermined by the influence of testing companies,
Pearson & Pearson-like publishers, the Amplify’s and
Wireless Generations of the world. Let’s put it this way,
if I was making a bet, I’d bet the bubble-in test will still
dominate. It is much cheaper, after all, as regards the initial outlay.
The IB has a much different model of assessment. As I understand it,
they have outside evaluators from other schools who follow the common rubric
along with the in-school teachers. More weight is given to the outside evaluators.
I guess they’re supposed to be sort of like Ernst & Young, keeping things honest.
And this is a great signaling device for a school in Malaysia or Cape Town that
want the achievements of their students to be recognized.
But the CCSS seems to me to be something else — something that certain people
supported in order to create a rising tide that would lift all boats.
However, there were certain other people who saw (and still see)
public education as ripe for the picking and think this is the
right way to pick it.
So, on the one hand, we have the IB, which in Marketing terms is an elite-oriented product.
Then we have the Common Core State Standards, for all of us commoners.
They have different associations with different models and different revenue streams.
You’re an economist — does that make sense?
That is a real question — I’m not sure if my answer does make sense.
I am certainly not arguing in favor of an IB program. I know little about it as my school district does not offer it.
My point was that if high stakes testing was the main reason to object to the common core, those that reject the common core should reject other programs, like IB, that make extensive use of high stakes testing.
My point is that the common core is likely to be malignant
if it is tied to high stakes testing.
Not only that, it is likely to be transformed into something
quite different from what its supporters would like it to be —
yet another way to use metrics to assess and reshape
the system so as to lead to its dismantling.
If the core could be separated from high stakes testing,
then things might be different, but that is very unlikely.
While in theory that would be possible, in practice
the forces pushing ‘objective measurement’ are quite strong.
They — or a significant portion of them — want to introduce
virtual learning products, build up the testing and
tutoring industries and create a standardized curriculum
in order to do so.
Moreover, the Common Core is supposed to cover
EVERYONE — 60 million school age children from
pre-school to senior year of High School.
This is quite different from the 2 year IB program, which is
targeted at a small sub-section of the high-school age group,
maybe 5 million kids.
So there are differences. I don’t quite believe in the
IB philosophy either. As I understand it, if you don’t pass
the exams, you don’t get any credit whatsoever.
I don’t think a high pressure system is good for kids.
At this point, I don’t trust anyone trying to introduce standards.
The mission creep is everywhere.
And it seems to be headed to a creepy outcome.
I suppose my point is that if a program is likely to be malignant for being tied to high stakes testing, the IB program is likely to be malignant, as are AP classes.
Maybe, but AP and IB are limited to high school students, usually those preparing for college.
Common Core covers everyone.
There is a lot more money involved.
So if the supply of corrosion is directly proportional
to the demand for profit, then the
common core will be more highly corrosive.
If your concern is about the one size fits all nature of the common core I think we are. In agreement that schools and curiculem should be matched to students needs and desires as much as possible. Having said that, I still think graduating from high school should require some level of competence in reading, writ
…writing, mathematics, and critical thinking.
Dear Diane – As you predicted – please see the article in the Washington Post today
http://tinyurl.com/ax2dpct : confirming changes announced by David Coleman – new President of the College Board….
College Board to make changes to SAT
By Lyndsey Layton and Nick Anderson, Wednesday, February 27, 3:07 AM
The SAT, the most widely used college entrance exam for generations of students, is getting a makeover.
David Coleman, president of the College Board, which creates and administers the SAT, e-mailed his 6,000 members on Tuesday to inform them that the board will redesign the test to more sharply focus on the “core set of knowledge and skills” that high school graduates need to succeed in college.
In his brief message, Coleman called the project an “ambitious endeavor” but did not provide details about why the College Board wants to change the exam, how long it will take or what the process will entail.
Coleman, through a spokesman, declined to comment Tuesday.
The overhaul comes as the SAT is starting to lose market share to a rival standardized exam, the ACT. Historically, the ACT has been taken by high school students in the West and the South, while those on the East and West coasts have tended to take the SAT.
More than 1.66 million students in the class of 2012 took the SAT, making it the largest class of SAT takers in history. And the pool of test takers has become increasingly diverse, with rising numbers of low-income, African American and Hispanic students taking the exam.
But in 2011, the number of students who took the ACT surpassed the SAT for the first time, and Coleman suggested in his e-mail that one reason for the makeover is to ensure that the SAT is relevant.
“While the SAT is the best standardized measure of college and career readiness currently available, the College Board has a responsibility to the millions of students we serve each year to ensure that our programs are continuously evaluated and enhanced, and most importantly respond to the emerging needs of those we serve,” Coleman wrote.
He wrote that his objective is to increase the value of the SAT to students, higher education officials, and to K-12 administrators, teachers and school counselors.
As soon as Coleman became president of the College Board in October, he said the SAT could be improved. Before joining the board, he helped write the Common Core standards in English for kindergarten through grade 12 that have been adopted by 46 states and the District. The new standards will be rolled out by 2014.
Coleman has said the SAT should be more closely aligned with the new standards, to better connect the test to the kind of academic work expected of students in high school and college.
The SAT was last revamped in 2005, when a written essay was added, the test time expanded and the total possible score raised from 1600 to 2400, among other changes. Coleman has been critical of the essay, suggesting that it allows too much personal narrative and doesn’t challenge students to make evidence-based written arguments, a skill demanded in college.
A top official at George Mason University, where the SAT is accepted but not required, applauded the College Board announcement.
“I view this as a very positive step,” said Wayne Sigler, vice president for enrollment management at George Mason. “The College Board is aware, I think, of the need to continuously work to improve its product.”
But some college admissions leaders like the SAT more or less as it is.
“From where I’m sitting now, we’re not clamoring for them to change it,” said Charles Deacon, dean of undergraduate admissions at Georgetown University. “We still happily use the SAT. We’ve found that the test is predictive. There’s a lot of value in it.”
Georgetown accepts the SAT and the ACT, and many applicants submit both scores, Deacon said.
Henry Broaddus, dean of admission at the College of William & Mary, which accepts both the SAT and the ACT, said the school is “a satisfied customer with the SAT.” Efforts to improve it are fine, he said. “But I would not say that indicates a need for radical change.”
Valerie Strauss contributed to this report.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/college-board-to-make-changes-to-sat/2013/02/26/fb332bc4-8063-11e2-b99e-6baf4ebe42df_story.html?wpisrc=nl_cuzheads
And another article in the Washington Post today about the revamping of the SAT : note the comment by Bob Schaeffer at the end of the article :
http://tinyurl.com/bg2gu3d
SAT exam to be redesigned
By Valerie Strauss , Updated: February 26, 2013
The famed SAT college admissions exam will undergo a thorough redesign by the College Board, which is calling it an “ambitious effort” to “better meet” the needs of students and schools.
The SAT, first given in 1926, was revamped less than a decade ago when a written essay was added and some of the question formats were changed. Last year, for the first time, it lost its designation as the most popular college admissions exam to the ACT, by a margin of a few thousand students.
The College Board, the nonprofit organization that owns the SAT, late last year appointed a new president, David Coleman, who was a co-writer of the Common Core State Standards. In a recent speech at the Brookings Institution, Coleman said he has a number of problems with the SAT as now written, including with its essay and vocabulary words. (You can read about that here.)
College Board Vice President Peter Kauffmann said the following e-mail was sent to all members of the College Board:
In the months ahead, the College Board will begin an effort in collaboration with its membership to redesign the SAT® so that it better meets the needs of students, schools, and colleges at all levels. We will develop an assessment that mirrors the work that students will do in college so that they will practice the work they need to do to complete college. An improved SAT will strongly focus on the core knowledge and skills that evidence shows are most important to prepare students for the rigors of college and career. This is an ambitious endeavor, and one that will only succeed with the leadership of our Board of Trustees, the strong coordination of our councils and committees, and the full engagement of our membership.
First administered in 1926, the SAT was created to democratize access to higher education for all students. Today the SAT serves as both a measure of students’ college and career readiness and a predictor of college outcomes. In its current form, the SAT is aligned to the Common Core as well as or better than any assessment that has been developed for college admission and placement, and serves as a valuable tool for educators and policymakers. While the SAT is the best standardized measure of college and career readiness currently available, the College Board has a responsibility to the millions of students we serve each year to ensure that our programs are continuously evaluated and enhanced, and most importantly respond to the emerging needs of those we serve.
As we begin the redesign process, there are three broad objectives that will drive our work:
• Increase the value of the SAT to students by focusing on a core set of knowledge and skills that are essential to college and career success; reinforcing the practice of enriching and valuable schoolwork; fostering greater opportunities for students to make successful transitions into postsecondary education; and ensuring equity and fairness.
• Increase the value of the SAT to higher education professionals by ensuring that the SAT meets the evolving needs of admission officers, faculty, and other administrators, and that the SAT remains a valid and reliable predictor of college success.
• Increase the value of the SAT to K–12 educators, administrators and counselors by strengthening the alignment of the SAT to college and career readiness; ensuring that the content reflects excellence in classroom instruction; and developing companion tools that allow educators to use SAT results to improve curriculum and instruction.
Bob Schaeffer, public education director of FairTest, a nonprofit organization dedicated to ending the misuse of standardized tests, said this about the redesign:
The College Board’s announcement that it plans to revise its flagship exam, less than eight years after the previous “major overhaul” of the test was first administered, is an admission that the highly touted “new SAT” introduced in 2005 was a failure. The latest version of the test is, in fact, no better than its predecessor in predicting academic success in higher education or in creating a level playing field to assess an increasingly diverse student body. The only significant changes were that it was longer and cost test-takers more. As a result, more than 80 additional institutions have adopted test-optional or test flexible policies (attached), and the ACT overtook the SAT as the nation’s most popular exam for colleges which still require a test. Those developments left the new College Board leadership with no choice but to try to “reformulate” its product in an effort to maintain market share and relevance.
And now, news from the College Board: As he hinted last summer, David Coleman intends to align the SAT with the common core standards. An astute business development move, this gives the College Board a wide open opportunity to remake all of the lucrative test prep courses and to revisit their percentage of that market.
But even more ominous is the impact on students. Should a state or district opt out of the common core, are they short changing their students competitive edge in college admissions? As a parent, my gut reaction is to lobby hard for the ACT and no-test colleges.
More here: http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2013/02/27/college-board-announces-plans-redesign-sat
and here: http://chronicle.com/blogs/headcount/college-board-plans-improved-sat/34017
Who is john gault?