Please read my commentary on what Louis C.K. has done to expand the debate about Common Core.
It was just posted on Huffington Post at the top of the page.
In my view, he has just smashed the carefully crafted narrative that the only critics of Common Core standards and tests are extremists of the right and left.
Being a comedian with 3.3 million followers on Twitter gave him a platform.
Being a parent of two children in public school gives him legitimacy.
His intervention changes the conversation. Maybe now we can have an honest debate instead of name-calling of anyone who dares to raise a voice in criticism of the CCSS.
Please leave a comment, if you choose.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Just read the ‘new’ tweets. Louis C.K. is a true ally., a ‘friend’. As a parent of public school attending kids he has absolute face validity and legitimacy. I must say, he misses the central problem with Common Core is that is rotten to the core for all the reasons that this blog’s posters have detailed (Implementation has,been flawed, shall we say, riddled with problems, and a general cluster f—-k).
As for Louis C.K’s “intervention” as a conversation changer, well I do wish I could agree with you, Diane, but the reactionary forces are deeply entrenched and sedimented throughout the media, corporate, foundation and educational domains. We will need far more than a new friend, valued as he may be, “to generate an honest debate”. As an aside. the notion that one can have an “honest debate” with the ‘deformers’ is belied by their history of mendacity. The stakes are far higher than will allow honesty on their part.
John A, Louis’ intervention gives the lie to the narrative about “white suburban moms” and other “whiny” parents, unless John King and Arne Duncan want to start a fight with Louis. I bet on Louis!
I am always willing to take “yes” for an answer.
We can’t be always pessimistic, always sure we will lose.
I will not succumb to pessimism.
Let’s be upbeat! Let’s recognize that Arne & company are losers. Maybe we should start to feel sorry for them, once we can get past our anger about the harm they are doing to our children, our grandchildren, our educators, and our schools.
Diane,
Agree. I do have pessimistic streak. Yes, I do count on you to keep up my spirits, Arne and company are losers. No doubt about that.. I would like nothing more than Arne et al to drop into history’s dust bin, along with their allies, BEFORE irreparable harm is done our nation’s public schools, their students and communities Should Louis C.K.’s intervention tilt the conversation, a grand smile w\ill cross my face. Your last sentence, was, I assume, written with tongue firmly planted in cheek. Though, in all seriousness, the harm that they have done and continue to do, will, I am afraid, linger on for a goodly amount of time. Again, thanks for your ‘kind’ rebuke of my inborn pessimism.
great piece!
Bob Shepherd, I just got a tweet from the author of the Newsweek piece, who said that your comment had not been “censored,” and that it would be posted.
Of course it wasn’t censored. It just disappeared itself. Twice. Glad that they’re going to re-post it. Hope they actually follow through.
I just looked at Diane’s posting on HuffPostEd.
Currently at 130 comments. Some gems; I provide one just below. To access, click on link provided in the posting for this thread.
[start quote]
Common Core, more and more testing, merit pay, teacher evaluation based mainly on testing that was never designed for such uses, statewide school grading systems– it is all inter-related and you know, if all that is such a great idea, why aren’t the private schools clamoring for it? In fact, I will tell you the precise moment when I will perhaps re-consider my view of all this testing. Common Core, data, more testing, misuse of testing results, “value-added” nonsense, etc etc– as anything other than a troubling and pernicious development in the education of our nation’s public school children: when Lakeside Prep in Seattle, Sidwell Friends in DC and other august and prestigious private academies decide they want their students to be signed up for this racket.
[end quote]
And in that vein, I remind viewers that perhaps the biggest supporter/promoter/defender of CCSS in Tennessee, Dr. Candace McQueen, well, from a recent posting on this blog:
“This is an unintentionally hilarious story about Common Core in Tennessee. Dr. Candace McQueen has been dean of Lipscomb College’s school of education and also the state’s’s chief cheerleader for Common Core. However, she was named headmistress of private Lipscomb Academy, and guess what? She will not have the school adopt the Common Core! Go figure.”
Link: https://dianeravitch.net/2014/03/23/common-core-for-commoners-not-my-school/
The self-styled “education reformers” and their grand schemes, one sort of school for THEIR OWN CHILDREN and another for OTHER PEOPLE’S CHILDREN.
Not an old dead Greek guy, but sometimes those old dead French guys will do in a pinch:
“Hypocrisy is the homage that vice pays to virtue.” [François de la Rochefoucauld]
😎
outstanding!
I can just imagine the Tweets that Louis CK would have written about math even if New York State had spurned RTTP and CCLS:
“Cat food and tap water for a while: quarterly bill from the math tutor just arrived. PS Kiddo, the tutor says I can visit you for a few minutes next week”
Then, assuming the tutoring worked and his daughter scored high enough to get into a decent middle school, there would have been Tweets of tears and rage as his daughter’s math skills were broken down and rebuilt, often via 2-3 hours of punishing homework assignments every weeknight. I have absolutely no question that the vast majority of middle school and high school teachers in New York City would say that the old K-5 curricula were not adequately preparing children for math beyond elementary school. Even for kids who went to high-performing or selective/accelerated schools.
Everyone likes to say that NY State’s old standards were superior to CCLS. That very well may be true, but the problem was that none of the curricula, but especially the loathsome TERC, were worthy of the standards. If CCLS forced districts and schools to adopt curricula that were more closely aligned to the standards, even if those standards are slightly less worthy than the old (which I suspect is debatable), it was a positive development.
I’ve tried to say express this same point here in various forms in the last couple days. There is a very low ceiling how upset I can get about the fact that my kids’ K-5 math curriculum is now “Common Core-aligned” instead of TERC.
And one of these days I’ll get around to comparing the released ELA questions from this year’s and last year’s exams to the older ELA exams. Based on my recollection of the test prep for the older ELA exams, I do not anticipate experiencing any nostalgia for the way things once were.
Again, folks, these are just the words of a dumb parent. Take it or leave it for what they’re worth to you.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx I believe the same can be said of NJ’s pre-CCSS math stds, judging from my kids’ experience 1992-2005. The transition from primary to middle school math was painful & required much tutoring/ remedial work. Unfortunately CCSS-math has just pushed the problem forward in the primary grades.
However I resent CCSS-ELA at all levels. Our district developed an excellent integrated K-12 writing program that has long been in place. CCSS introduces a mass of rubrics of dubious value that will distort our program and curtail valuable classroom time.
Also, when I tried to make this point in another comment yesterday, I was accused (I think that’s the right word) of being “pro-Common Core.” I’m still not at the point where I feel confident saying that I know what the Common Core *is*, let alone taking a reasoned pro/con position on it. What I’m against is continuously being on the receiving end of curriculum wars and labor disputes that I’m not even involved in.
Reblogged this on Dolphin and commented:
Well, now. THANK YOU, Louis C.K. (apologies that I’m out of the loop with his act)
Related to this–the parrot media was touting the “fact” that there were more people employed last month. They found jobs in the fields related to STEM, or Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math.
The worst of it is that it is not true. Not only is it a lie, but a damned lie.
This piece explores that lie, and although it’s from last year, it seems that they wish to continue the same script:
http://cis.org/more-us-stem-grads-than-jobs
I have heard of this personally where tech/engineering grads are either not able to find work, or they are having to take jobs with much lower salaries. As the article states, they allege a shortage, but then wages would have risen…instead they have remained at 1990s levels.
And the icing on the cake:
http://slog.thestranger.com/slog/archives/2013/07/31/theater-grads-have-lower-unemployment-rates-than-engineering-and-tech-grads
They insist on a shortage so they can get permission to hire outside the country (ie foreigners who will come here and do the work for far less money than Americans would).
It’s just that simple.
He was on Letterman last night. Hope someone posts the clip. He joked that schools that don’t score well will be burned down. Glad to see a celebrity getting the message out to the public.
Here’s Louis CK’s Letterman appearance. It’s great.
Can’t wait for season 4 . . . if you are a man in your 30s or 40s, Louis CK is your patron saint whether you realize it or not. Also, Louis CK *and* Amy Sedaris? That’s a show!
I think I stopped somewhere in the middle of season 3, and I have a bit of a phobia about watching any more because I don’t want to see the show tail off in quality. It happens to every tv show, but for some reason I have an intense aversion to the idea of seeing it happen to that show. Yes, I am insane.
Ok, but I’ve been feeling a little name called in this space as a math teacher who sees some value in the math standards (particularly the practice standards). I think the rhetoric is out of control on both sides.
When Pit Bull was embraced by ed reformers, Diane and others on this blog rightly said that Pit Bull’s track record of misogynistic statements delegitimized his voice. Why is Louis CK getting a pass for his long history of racism, misogyny, and anti-Semitism? http://yourfaveisproblematic.tumblr.com/post/45571605445/louis-c-k-aka-louis-szekely
The intelligensia has tremendous respect for Louis C.K. the same way it does for Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert.
They know they are super smart guys who use humor as their primary weapon to dissect the policies that are being foisted on us.
The Republicans are more inured to this ridicule because so many of their own supporters live in a separate Fox bubble and can pretend this satire doesn’t effect them. The Democratic supporters, however, CAN’T afford this sort of mocking. It is death to them because their constituents will more easily link them to the clowns on the Right.
For Arne Duncan and Bill Gates and Obama, this very public reveal of their educational plans is humiliating because they socialize with the very people who LOVE these comedians for their INTELLIGENT honesty. You can’t pull the wool over their eyes as easily and it is harder for the Ed Reformers to explain and justify their positions to this group of people. They will have PRIVATE conversations where they will say, “But you have to understand, what we’re REALLY trying to do is….”
And the more people like Louis C.K. and other really smart folks come out against their design, the harder it is for them to publicly keep up the sham.
The fact that Louis C.K. is making this an issue (as he did so on Letterman last night) brings him into the public arena. Arne Duncan is NOT going to debate Louis C.K. It is a losing proposition. What Duncan wants is Louis C.K. (and everyone else) to move on to another target in another news cycle.
But Common Core is here to stay and the reality is that they had hoped that they could carpet bomb their way into submission by this point. It hasn’t happened and now they have a real problem on their hands.
We are at the VERY START of the CC roll out. It is NOT like Obamacare (which they always try to compare it to) because that actually had a hundred economists figuring out the numbers beforehand to make them jibe. Common Core has no similar real world set of hypotheticals in place.
They counted on it getting implemented without any fuss, making the naysayers only the extremists in the Tea Party or the Occupy Wall Street set.
They didn’t count on real life parents.
And, unfortunately for them, real life WHITE well-educated parents (who both parties believe is golden demographic in this country) are not happy with it.
They can’t afford to alienate those people. Louis C.K. speaks to those people and has obviously touched a nerve.
We will see what happens and if Duncan Inc. responds to the latest insurrection. He was already burned by his “suburban white mom” comment so he will be much more careful and PC next time.
But I think we’re all hoping the education reform revolution genie is out of the bottle and Louis C.K. continues with his clear-eyed mockery.
Geronimo, you say: “The Republicans are more inured to this ridicule because so many of their own supporters live in a separate Fox bubble and can pretend this satire doesn’t effect them.”
Actually, Fox is the only real news network currently left. It’s why we conservatives know best what’s really going on. Likewise the tea party movement; it identified the danger of CCSS early on.