Gabriel Arana, a writer for Salon, shows how Common Core became toxic, but he misses a few crucial points.
He notes that there were few actual classroom teachers on the committee that wrote the standards, but in fact there were none. A few members had taught in high school, but in the past. None had ever taught in elementary school or middle school.
He notes that Bill Gates paid for most of the cost of the Common Core, but it is more accurate to say that he paid for all or almost all, somewhere between $200 million and $2 billion, depending on who is adding the dollars. Here is one audit. Here is another that puts Gates’ investment at $2.3 billion. And here is the Washington Post’s description of Bill Gates’ “swift revolution.”
He says that other nations have standards to define what students should know, and we don’t. True. He doesn’t acknowledge that low-performing nations have national standards, as well as high-performing nations. National standards do not assure high or equitable outcomes.
Too bad he didn’t check out Tom Loveless’s prescient article, in which he predicted that the Common Core standards would make little or no difference.
But at least Arana had the good sense to recognize that the uprising against the Common Core is widespread, not partisan, and is growing larger as teachers and parents see how the Common Core actually works.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
That article completely misses the point.
Common Core is not simply a “rollout” or “implemention” problem, as the article makes it sound.
And Common Core has not merely “been hijacked by the for-profit school-reform movement”. That was pretty obviously baked in from the get go — some might say the whole point.
The idea that “Progressives’ objections have less to do with Common Core as an idea than with the standardized-testing regime they come with” while strictly true, is really a distinction without a difference because one can not separate the standards from the tests. As Bill Gates himself has noted, the whole idea is to ‘align” the standards, curriculum and tests”.
Also, it’s not just “Education policy wonks on the right …[who] view it as a step toward nationalizing education’.
And the claim that “as a general rule, they prefer to keep control local” makes it sound like state and local control over education is merely a “preference” when there are specific laws forbidding interference with state and local control.
Why don’t the “journalists” writing these articles know any of this? or if they do know it, why don’t they report on it?
They could learn these things in a single hour perusing the articles on this blog.
Talk about “no excuses”. I think we need a “no excuses” school for journalists — and for politicians
The website, Knowyourcharter.com, rolled out this week. It identifies each school district in Ohio, with the amount of money it is losing to charters. The grades of the district schools are compared to the grades of the charters and on-lines. No surprise, the school districts score higher and receive less money. The Ohio State Board of Education and legislature are shameless.
And the question that comes to my mind on this — charters often open piecemeal. K-3, then add a grade a year after and so on. Many of them are elementary, not H.S. How do they stack up against public elementary schools that serve K-8?
It’s great. Breaking it out by district was an excellent idea.
I don’t know how anyone in Columbus can possibly justify these online charter numbers. They are skimming 15-20% of their per dollar state funding. It’s just …missing.
We’re getting robbed. One would think someone would act, at some point. How long can this go on?
http://knowyourcharter.com/
That’s a great resource. I wish my state had a website like this.
Of interest- the NEA is a funder of the Knowyourcharter.com.
On the other hand, the Ohio Federation of Teachers is listed as a funder of the Fordham Institute (Fordham website).
In 1964 we were rated at the midpoint in English, and in the 11th spot for mathematics, and science. In the last 50 years our Country has exceeded the world, in Medical discovery, Nobel Prize winners, industrial processes, electronic inventions, and world changing communication systems. Proving that our poor kids were taught by some teachers that inspired them to greatness!
A quote from a 29 year veteran Superintendent of Schools. “I m saddened I will now leave the profession I love after 43 years, convinced for the first time in my career that my state, nation, political party have adopted an educational policy that is “harmful” to children”
I pointed this out to a friend and she said it was foreign immigrants who are doing these things, not children born in the US.
The average person thinks children are whining, parents are coddling, and teachers are self serving.
Luckily we have some parents on our side, otherwise we would be spitting in wind.
Most Americans (on both ends of the political spectrum, unfortunately) have some really ugly ideas about children which is where a lot of education “reform” ideas come from. It’s just a variation on the “spare the rod” theme. The idea that children are human beings deserving of respect and care is a rare (and radical) notion.
Unless you are the parent of that particular child.
“foreign immigrants who are doing these things”
Aliens , from Bill Gates’ home planet.
Good point Dienne! I had always thought that the purpose of education was to develop the individuality and creativity of each child. I know. I am terribly old fashioned.
I fight the battle in st. Louis…..anybody know anything about this website? http://isupportthecommoncore.net/?s=ravitch Fact-Checking Diane Ravitch on the Common Core I was told……Check out Wentzville’s math stats after a few years of Common Core. they have chuck berry, but have they also been using common core for several years? people are meeting to present an alternative to cc….screaming, fighting, refusing to work together…..the lame duck commissioner has explained it is too difficult to get substitutes to allow time for teachers to participate…..or precipitate as the case might be.
From the website:
About
This blog is a resource for people who want to be active in support of the Common Core State Standards. It was started by Bill McCallum and Jason Zimba, two of the lead authors of the mathematics standards.
What else does one need to know? They are trying to protect their own creation (like the Monster and Dr. Frankenstein).
Applying a pure, data driven business model to the behavior of 50 million children was a bad idea to begin with. Deciding to use a ‘test-and-punish’ model that even failed in the business world was just plain stupid. But all that aside – all the BS marketing and snake oil claims, the stealth development and surreptitious implementation, the bottom line is that the Common Core standards and the companion assessments were fundamentally bad; so bad that they were more harmful than helpful.
Retired Engineer
I’ve only read complaints about Common Core; does this mean that everyone thinks the current education system(s) are adequate, or are there some alternatives we should be talking about?
No one here thinks the current system is fine. In fact, I would say most readers hate the high-stakes testing, federal policy, teacher-bashing, and privatization. Many don’t like Common Core because it was written in stealth by non-educators, it has no evidence behind it, it is developmentally inappropriate, and lots of other reasons.
What scares me Diane is the fact that the federal government has messed up the entire education system in the US. I know this because teaching is my specialty plus you have filled in the blanks of any questions I have had on the back story.
Now what does that mean in other areas, such as the Military, Foreign Policy, the Environment, and the Economy? Are they doing the same thing in all aspects of American life.
Has the whole government been bought and sold?
“Fine Buildup”
Education’s fine
Getting finer by the minute
Like gases in a mine
The fine’s collecting in it
Correlation is not, of course, causation, but the U.S.’s greatest period of internal and external economic growth, including and especially the growth of the middle class, coincided with the Great Society programs that regulated the rich (Glass-Steagall as just one example) and provided for the poor – jobs programs, Social Security, Medicare/Medicaid, the War on Poverty, etc. I say we do more of that and education will largely take care of itself.
To the extent education really does need to be reformed, I say we take our cues from the schools where the elite send their kids – let’s do more of that too.
Yes, Steve! Let’s talk about two parent families and taking financial responsibility for supporting one’s offspring. Hardly any children I teach are living with their two original parents. One student had such a complicated family structure, I had to take notes. Moreover, perhaps parents should think twice about repeatedly moving back and forth between two countries.
I’d like to add on to Tom Loveless critique of standards.
For the moment, let us agree that the standards and subsequent testing have value – hypothetically. (I don’t believe this, but let’s just say they do.)
When NCLB was adopted, there was a big push in the Buffalo Public Schools to raise the test scores. In a push to improve test results, one summer the elementary schools ran a full one day program for four weeks with staffing comparable to the regular school year. And it worked. The scores did improve. Teachers all over the state were working hard – and the results were promising.
And what did New York State do? Did they congratulate the school districts for successfully meeting expectations? NO! They said the higher results indicated the scoring was too lenient. So, the following year, the cut score was increased by the State Ed Dept (with no warning to school districts). All of a sudden, children who were doing well were identified as needing improvement. Districts had to scramble to put resources into place to assist these students in remediation. Instead of chorus or band or another elective, students now had an AIS class. Or they had to come to school early and stay late for extra help. This affected about fifty percent of a school population. Principals conducted parent meetings to explain the results. They did not hide their anger.
And the above clamor was from the Suburban school districts. Buffalo was back to square one, and returned to the drawing board coming up with some invasive policies which were a preclude to the CC. That dynamic is for another discussion.
Common Core and the APPR was thrown at the teachers in NYS and implemented without adequate training. In Buffalo, the administrators had a workshop attempting to explain the program, but they had more questions than answers. Everyone did their best with limited knowledge – a trait which continued.
Of course, the new assessment was even more severely evaluated. And there were few guidelines to assist teachers in their preparation for the students. However, it didn’t matter what they did, because the results were rigged to fail over 2 out of 3 students. And year two of the assessment had even more ludicrous, inappropriate questions which were guaranteed to stump the students, so the results were pretty much the same.
As I’ve said before, the NYS education is making my grand daughter stupid. A 3 in third grade, a 2 in fourth grade, a 1 in fifth grade, and a 0 in sixth (she opted out). We had her privately tested to see what was wrong and discovered she is very bright, in the 90th percentile of intelligence.
So, even if the CC standards were relevant (and I thought the former NYS standards were extremely doable), the way results are analyzed negates any good that might have been inherent in the system.
What a parent needs to know is whether a child is at grade level, above grade level, or below grade level. The teacher needs to know the specifics so they can reteach the problem areas. Right now neither dynamic is in place.
It’s like moving forward in the dark with the blind leading the blind.
In order for the education system to be successful in teaching our children life skills (which is more important than being college ready), someone needs to turn on the lights.
Moving the goalposts is their dirty little secret. This behavior certainly reveals their intentions. Some administrators are doing the same thing under APPR.
NY Teacher
You wonder how they sleep at night. They must be secret sadists to enjoy ruining teacher’s lives on a whim.
Not to mention the irreparable harm that is being done to too many children.
They deserve to be horsewhipped for their wickedness.
It’s funny how the Common Core math gets all the attention from parents, because that hasn’t been my experience here. Either we were doing “Common Core math” before Ohio put in the Common Core or we’re not doing it now, because it’s very much like what my 6th grader has done his whole time in (the same) public school. It is different than what I did in school, so maybe he always had “Common Core math”.
The big difference I see is English. I’m not clear at all on what they’re doing in English.
Ohio also put in “science standards” (I believe that is true! Don’t quote me! I can’t possibly follow all the ed reform this state does) and that is all rote memorization, which would seem to conflict with the CC math and english, or from what I understand to be the goals of Common Core math and english.
Chiara,
Do science standards “evolve” or are they “created”?
TAGO!
They’re memorizing minerals. Totally non-controversial, as far as I know.
Although maybe we’re “teaching the controversy” there too, I’m not sure. I guess you could get into how old minerals are. They better be less than 6000 years old, is all I can say 🙂
This is a conservative area, this part of the state, and we have periodic “evolution v creation” eruptions in public schools. “Teach the controversy!”, that sort of thing.
They are designed intelligently!
My partially-informed take on this is that this is a result of (1) parents of first-born children who entered elementary school in the last few years, combined with (2) the very recent uproar about the Common Core.
Part (1) means that you have a bunch of parents who are taking note of how math is taught to young children for the first time in 20 to 30 years. The math is very unfamiliar to them, either because they went to elementary school before “New Math” (or whatever it’s called, but you know what I’m talking about) was being taught or because they’ve spent the last two or three decades steadily slipping into innumeracy like most other Americans. The net effect is they see the math worksheets their kids are bringing home, and it angers and confuses them.
Part (2) takes the net effect of Part (1) and adds a big dose of panic.
My reaction to “CC math” is pretty much like yours. I was already angered and confused by TERC math when CC math showed up. It doesn’t seem that different to me. I’m still angry and confused, and if anything I’m marginally less reactionary and more receptive to “New Math” than I was before.
“Part (1) means that you have a bunch of parents who are taking note of how math is taught to young children for the first time in 20 to 30 years.”
I think it’s newer than 20 or 30 years, because his older brothers and sister didn’t use these methods – they’re all in their twenties- but he always has. My sense was it came in big when his class was in 3rd grade, and they were calling it “Singapore math” but that’s based on what I recall from one parent-teacher conference.
I don’t have much sympathy for the CC folks. They had a zillion dollars and there are seemingly hundreds of paid ed reform lobbying people. Maybe they could have explained this to tens of millions of parents?
They’ve spent more time jeering at parents than they have talking to them, and they basically announced at the outset than anyone who objected was self interested or fringe – “interest groups” and Duncan’s snotty, sexist, patronizing comment on “moms”.
There was no reason to treat people so poorly.
I can only speak about NYC, but I think that the level of parent outrage at the CC here is overstated, and that much of the parent anxiety is just feedback from the generally rising anxiety levels among teachers related to the cocktail of curriculum chaos plus the new teacher evaluation process. Most parents still don’t know what the CC is and probably never will. The “parent and teacher-led” protests against the CC that happened last year before the math exams in District 2 were all planned and coordinated by the school principals and staff. NYC public school parents were already more or less used to super high-stakes tests and constantly changing, crap curricula written by “education experts” and implemented by the DOE Death Star and “education experts” by the time CC showed up. The teacher evaluations, not the CC, have been the main anxiety driver. IMHO.
I disagree, Flerp. There is a grass roots push back against the CC by suburban parents in NYS who are actively involved in the PTA and volunteer in the schools. They actually see what is occurring and are willing to fight back and even opt out. The low assessment scores help promote the anger against the State Ed Dept and John King.
Many of the Buffalo City School parents have been pushed around for so long and there have been so many curriculum changes over the past ten years that the CC is just one more “adjustment”, so there is not as much outcry in the urban areas. However, the message is starting to seep through.
Is there a teacher/principal/ superintendent component to the opposition? Of course! But that does not negate the active parent involvement.
Agree to disagree. I only know what I see in my little part of the world.
Flerp, I worked in the city of Buffalo, but I live in the suburbs so I have seen both sides.
NYC is a different beast. I bow to your expertise in this area.
It’s a very diverse state.
This is sort of tangential, but disconcerting because of its relevance to what is happening and not only to and within education. It is something Duane Swacker alluded to in a comment to an earlier post.
“Fascism should more appropriately be called corporatism because it is the merger of state and corporate power.” – Benito Mussolini
Corporatocracy, Corporatism, Fascism
By Jim Kirwan
While the tone of the following excerpt is pretty pessimistic, it does seem to hint at what we are experiencing. What’s worse is that it is our children’s lives that are being stolen from them and therefore from us as well.
“Our entire way of life has been stolen and shall never return to the lazy and hopeful days of living and loving, of joy and promise, with the possibility for doing real and meaningful things with one’s own life – not to mention being able to envision a better world for more and more people – whose lives were so far below the levels we enjoyed. Instead of that promise, instead of that possibility – what we have now is the outright worship of Mistrust, of Fear, and of Paranoia – along with obscene profits for those who have purchased all the politicians, and who control every facet of this once nearly free society.”
http://www.rense.com/general62/corporatocracy.htm
My go-to definition of Fascism comes from George Orwell. As true or truer today than it was 70 years ago.
http://orwell.ru/library/articles/As_I_Please/english/efasc
“. . . almost any English person would accept ‘bully’ as a synonym for ‘Fascist’. That is about as near to a definition as this much-abused word has come.”
The edudeformers and especially their GAGAer administrators are Fascist then as most are excellent at using fear and intimidation-bullying to have the powerless (teachers) do their bidding.
Written by Woodie Guthrie, performed by Billy Bragg: