Arne Duncan spoke to the American Society of News Editors yesterday, where he strongly defendedthe Common Core and caricatured its critics as extremists and fringe groups from the far-right.
An article about his speech on the Huffington Post says:
Duncan will give a full-throated defense of the Core in his ASNE speech. The Obama administration has been sensitive about the Core because its perceived closeness to the initiative can be seen as dampening Republican support. But Duncan is expected to relate what he calls the “powerful” Core to America’s future prosperity.
“Today, for the first time in American history a child in Mississippi will face the same expectations as a child in Massachusetts,” Duncan’s speech says.
This is an odd defense. There is already a common measure for children in Mississippi and Massachusetts. It is called the National Assessment of Educational Progress. NAEP shows that children in Mississippi are far behind children in Massachusetts.
His insistence that the federal government had no role in the Common Core is less than honest. He didn’t mention that his Race to the Top told states that they had to adopt something that looked just like the Common Core if they wanted to be eligible to win a share of the $5 billion prize. But since it is illegal for the federal government to attempt to influence curriculum and instruction in the nation’s schools, Duncan must stick with his fiction about non-interference and having no role at all. The gentleman doth protest too much.
Other than treating critics of the Common Core as an assortment of rightwing nut-jobs, Duncan never explains how adoption of a common set of standards and tests will assure America’s future prosperity. How does he know? What is his evidence? Or is it only extremists who demand evidence before spending billions of dollars and leaping into new practices?
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Where did Arne teach? How long ago, and for how long?
Nowhere, never and for zero days. He is not a teacher. He is not an educator. He is the Gates and Broad puppet. Pull a string, Arne recites a reformy message. That’s all he’s got other than being Obama’s basketball buddy.
From the article: “in his ASNE speech.”
I believe that should read ” in his asinine speech.”
The proof in in the pudding. If he has to so strenuously defend their position and name call the views of others we must believe they are feeling the earth tremors. Could it be the boots stomping towards them in a ground swell of protest. This is a slap back at those that would differ and probably because of the thin skinned architects of this betrayal. Just read the blog over all this time and you can imagine how annoyed and angry these we know better about how your future should be people must be. They are not used to this kind of a push back or being thought of as anything but saviors of us all.
This is a contrived public relations speech driven outside of government but perpetrated and assigned to give the message of a back at those that would protest. It is reaching in a way that reveals their achilles tendon and hopefully make them unbalanced enough to unhinge. The arrogance of this marriage of government and corporate is absolutely disgusting and insulting.
He is splitting hairs insisting that the CCSS does not demand federal collection of data. Technically, no. However, Race to the Cash does mandate that states measure and punish and is very much tied to their “encouragement” of the CCSS.
It is even more sickening that the cash was tied into a time period of decreased federal funding achieves by Big Business’s crash of the economy. They were saved from failure because they were “too big to fail” – our educational policy was bought off on the cheap. Our children’s futures are being gambled on the CCSS which supports big business in schools – apparently our children are too expensive to save but profitable enough to sell off.
“apparently our children are too expensive to save but profitable enough to sell off”……..B I N G O !
Double Bingo!!!!
Race to the Top required states to collect data and build a data warehouse.
Wow, this is the first time in my long life and long career that anyone has ever suggested I am part of the far right!!! The problem here is it is all rhetoric and not research. Perhaps the Core will be okay, although I doubt it, but still we won’t know the impact for years–at the expense of the children. It is easier to bark about the merits of an unproven curriculum than it is to confront the real issue of systemic, multigenerational poverty. That is another difference between the children of Massachusetts and Mississippi. In both states, by the way, the outcomes for the children are predictable by wealth/poverty indices.
I am surely not a member of the Far Right. However, this objection to the Common Core and to testing is one place where the Left and the Right agree about one thing, it is not good for kids as implemented. From what I am reading, many on the Far Right condemn critical thinking skills because they are afraid that if a child looks at things critically, faith will be shattered and parental values might be questioned. Those I know of want private, parochial, home or charter schools, because they don’t want their children “exposed to” diverse thought.
On the other hand, those on the left seem to object to the manner in which the CC is implemented and the fact that private schools are being funded with public money. Private and charter schools usually have a more selective admission policy, smaller classes, and can pay more attention to individual students. That may or may not result in a better education, depending on where and how it takes place.
If public schools could serve smaller class sizes and keep kids in their communities, better results would occur. If all things were made equal, there could be great advances in educational delivery. However, when money is funneled off to private corporations, tech companies, testing companies and executives, and when teachers are reduced to minimum wage earners with disrespected college degrees, a problem ensues.
I still see much of what is going on as related to biases that have different approaches to how to “restore” an America that they only THINK existed or to avoid returning to an Amerian that DID exist. Our Supreme Court has done everything it can to take money from people and give it to corporations and to allow states to return to pre-Civil Rights era voting laws. This is going to continue to push our society into two levels … haves and have nots. And, they wish to tear education apart, also.
I am glad I won’t be around when this whole mess collapses.
Dishonesty has become the hallmark of the deform school movement.
I wonder why is that …
In their crusade to slaughter democracy and critical thought, reformers believe that the only defense they need for anything they push down the American educaiton throat is, “Because I said so, that’s why.”
Yes, if you are reading Arne and David, where is the text based evidence?
Where is your argument backed up by relevant evidence?
I just purchased this book on amazon. You might want to purchase your own copy and please check out the standards for writing, speaking and listening (something you’re not very good at)…..the ones Coleman wrote and Arne endorsed.
Add this to your summer reading list, Arne.
I can talk you through it and you can submit sample papers for me to review.
Teaching Argument Writing, Grades 6-12: Supporting Claims with Relevant Evidence and Clear Reasoning [Paperback]
George Hillocks Jr (Author)
Yes. The Lords have spoken.
It seems like there ought to be a way to criticize the implementation of the CC without being ridiculed and without panning it as totally worthless. It is the actions taken and the swift manner in which they have been taken that have knocked people off their feet, left seasoned educators standing with their mouths agape, and even Teachers of the Year relieved of them employment.
Along with this, there is an indictment of the teacher education programs throughout the U.S. Excluding educators from important decisions and dismissing those who have been trained to become teachers as being part of the problem have served to kick hundreds of thousands of people in the gut.
There are good and bad schools, as well as good and bad colleges/universities. This occurs in every profession. However, the effort to deliberately demote the teachers’ roles to a job that “anyone can perform” is insulting, inaccurate, and unfair.
But, the bottom line here is: Arne doesn’t care. Michelle doesn’t care. Reformers don’t care.
Obviously he feels the need to defend the indefensible.
Does anyone have a text of the speech? I promise I will be the guinea pig and read it for all, although if you hear of my demise from reading it, hopefully it (my demise) will be premature.
Would you buy a car put up for sale that the manufacturer never even drove before they tried to sell it to you? They why should anyone believe this new whatever it is they call Common Core? My dad worked in aerospace since 1937 for Kelly Johnson. I also worked for him early on. They had to repeatedly test everything over and over again to make sure it worked and did not have glitches. You cannot believe what it takes to get things right.
I was taught by those who have done it for 900 years. Maybe, they know something. Maybe it isn’t that trick and it is all about paying real attention to each students needs. This takes a combination of things. One of them is the real will to do such as that is an infectious thing. You have to believe, then it is possible if possible.
Obama and Duncan are worse than used car salesmen. They know exactly what they are doing and do not care. Look at their previous associations with privatizers and corporatizers.
To me, as education reform takes on the cloak of “schools are businesses” we are seeing a top-down, patriarchial command system coming into place. This is why the nurturing. maternal aspects of teaching is being replaced by tech-filled, on-demand, so-called “rigor”.
I am not a feminist or a man-hater, but I do feel that traditionally male qualities are permeating these reforms because, just as housewives have been devalued monetarily, teachers and others who serve are being devalued. When we unionized and demanded fairness, the hair stood up on the backs of their necks and the wheels of “return to Pleasantville” began to churn. I have seen this change since the 1980s and it has only gotten worse.
I want no part of a male-dominated, commanding, demanding, checklisted, cold, and condescending society. My state’s issues have little to do with the current federal administration. It has everything to do with our General Assembly and “governor” being cozy with private business, trying to pave a way to the White House in 2016. I wouldn’t vote for Kasich for a pooper-scooper in a parade. He can run HIS BUS over HIMSELF.