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Catholic Scholars Blast Common Core

By dianeravitch
November 11, 2013 //
105

In an unusual statement, 132 Catholic scholars wrote a statement highly critical of the Common Core, which they sent to every bishop in the nation. They urged the bishops not to adopt Common Core in Catholic schools and to withdraw it where it had been adopted. They conclude that the Common Core standards are designed as standardized workforce training, doing nothing to shape and inspire the hearts and minds of children.

 

 

Their statement says:

Gerard V. Bradley, Professor of Law
c/o University of Notre Dame, The Law School
3156 Eck Hall of Law, PO Box 780
Notre Dame, IN 46556

 

October 16, 2013
This letter was sent individually to each Catholic bishop in the United States. 132 Catholic professors signed the letter.

 

Your Excellency:

We are Catholic scholars who have taught for years in America’s colleges and universities. Most of us have done so for decades. A few of us have completed our time in the classroom; we are professors “emeriti.” We have all tried throughout our careers to put our intellectual gifts at the service of Christ and His Church. Most of us are parents, too, who have seen to our children’s education, much of it in Catholic schools. We are all personally and professionally devoted to Catholic education in America.

For these reasons we take this extraordinary step of addressing each of America’s Catholic bishops about the “Common Core” national reform of K-12 schooling. Over one hundred dioceses and archdioceses have decided since 2010 to implement the Common Core. We believe that, notwithstanding the good intentions of those who made these decisions, Common Core was approved too hastily and with inadequate consideration of how it would change the character and curriculum of our nation’s Catholic schools. We believe that implementing Common Core would be a grave disservice to Catholic education in America.

In fact, we are convinced that Common Core is so deeply flawed that it should not be adopted by Catholic schools which have yet to approve it, and that those schools which have already endorsed it should seek an orderly withdrawal now.

Why – upon what evidence and reasoning – do we take such a decisive stand against a reform that so many Catholic educators have endorsed, or at least have acquiesced in?

In this brief letter we can only summarize our evidence and sketch our reasoning. We stand ready, however, to develop these brief points as you wish. We also invite you to view the video recording of a comprehensive conference critically examining Common Core, held at the University of Notre Dame on September 9, 2013. (For a copy of the video, please contact Professor Gerard Bradley at the address above.)

News reports each day show that a lively national debate about Common Core is upon us. The early rush to adopt Common Core has been displaced by sober second looks, and widespread regrets. Several states have decided to “pause” implementation.

Others have opted out of the testing consortia associated with Common Core. Prominent educators and political leaders have declared their opposition. The national momentum behind Common Core has, quite simply, stopped. A wave of reform which recently was thought to be inevitable now isn’t. Parents of K- 12 children are leading today’s resistance to the Common Core. A great number of these parents are Catholics whose children attend Catholic schools.

Much of today’s vigorous debate focuses upon particular standards in English and math. Supporters say that Common Core will “raise academic standards.” But we find persuasive the critiques of educational experts (such as James Milgram, professor emeritus of mathematics at Stanford University, and Sandra Stotsky, professor emerita of education at the University of Arkansas) who have studied Common Core, and who judge it to be a step backwards. We endorse their judgment that this “reform” is really a radical shift in emphasis, goals, and expectations for K-12 education, with the result that Common Core-educated children will not be prepared to do authentic college work. Even supporters of Common Core admit that it is geared to prepare children only for community-college-level studies.

No doubt many of America’s Catholic children will study in community colleges. Some will not attend college at all. This is not by itself lamentable; it all depends upon the personal vocations of those children, and what they need to learn and do in order to carry out the unique set of good works entrusted to them by Jesus. But none of that means that our Catholic grade schools and high schools should give up on maximizing the intellectual potential of every student. And every student deserves to be prepared for a life of the imagination, of the spirit, and of a deep appreciation for beauty, goodness, truth, and faith.

The judgments of Stotsky and Milgram (among many others) are supported by a host of particulars. These particulars include when algebra is to be taught, whether advanced mathematics coursework should be taught in high school, the misalignment of writing and reading standards, and whether cursive writing is to be taught.

We do not write to you, however, to start an argument about particulars. At least, that is a discussion for another occasion and venue. We write to you instead because of what the particular deficiencies of Common Core reveal about the philosophy and the basic aims of the reform. We write to you because we think that this philosophy and these aims will undermine Catholic education, and dramatically diminish our children’s horizons.

Promoters of Common Core say that it is designed to make America’s children “college and career ready.” We instead judge Common Core to be a recipe for standardized workforce preparation. Common Core shortchanges the central goals of all sound education and surely those of Catholic education: to grow in the virtues necessary to know, love, and serve the Lord, to mature into a responsible, flourishing adult, and to contribute as a citizen to the process of responsible democratic self-government.

Common Core adopts a bottom-line, pragmatic approach to education. The heart of its philosophy is, as far as we can see, that it is a waste of resources to “over-educate” people. The basic goal of K-12 schools is to provide everyone with a modest skill set; after that, people can specialize in college – if they end up there. Truck-drivers do not need to know Huck Finn. Physicians have no use for the humanities. Only those destined to major in literature need to worry about Ulysses.

Perhaps a truck-driver needs no acquaintance with Paradise Lost to do his or her day’s work. But everyone is better off knowing Shakespeare and Euclidean geometry, and everyone is capable of it. Everyone bears the responsibility of growing in wisdom and grace and in deliberating with fellow-citizens about how we should all live together. A sound education helps each of us to do so.

The sad facts about Common Core are most visible in its reduction in the study of classic, narrative fiction in favor of “informational texts.” This is a dramatic change. It is contrary to tradition and academic studies on reading and human formation. Proponents of Common Core do not disguise their intention to transform “literacy” into a “critical” skill set, at the expense of sustained and heartfelt encounters with great works of literature.

Professor Stotsky was the chief architect of the universally-praised Massachusetts English language arts standards, which contributed greatly to that state’s educational success. She describes Common Core as an incubator of “empty skill sets . . . [that] weaken the basis of literary and cultural knowledge needed for authentic college coursework.” Rather than explore the creativity of man, the great lessons of life, tragedy, love, good and evil, the rich textures of history that underlie great works of fiction, and the tales of self-sacrifice and mercy in the works of the great writers that have shaped our cultural literacy over the centuries, Common Core reduces reading to a servile activity.

Professor Anthony Esolen, now at Providence College, has taught literature and poetry to college students for two decades. He provided testimony to a South Carolina legislative committee on the Common Core, lamenting its “cavalier contempt for great works of human art and thought, in literary form.” He further declared: “We are not programming machines. We are teaching children. We are not producing functionaries, factory-like. We are to be forming the minds and hearts of men and women.”

Thus far Common Core standards have been published for mathematics and English language arts. Related science standards have been recently released by Achieve, Inc. History standards have also been prepared by another organization. No diocese (for that matter, no state) is bound to implement these standards just by dint of having signed onto Common Core’s English and math standards. We nonetheless believe that the same financial inducements, political pressure, and misguided reforming zeal that rushed those standards towards acceptance will conspire to make acceptance of the history and science standards equally speedy – and unreflective and unfortunate.

These new standards will very likely lower expectations for students, just as the Common Core math and English standards have done. More important, however, is the likelihood that they will promote the prevailing philosophical orthodoxies in those disciplines. In science, the new standards are likely to take for granted, and inculcate students into a materialist metaphysics that is incompatible with, the spiritual realities –soul, conceptual thought, values, free choice, God– which Catholic faith presupposes. We fear, too, that the history standards will promote the easy moral relativism, tinged with a pervasive anti-religious bias, that is commonplace in collegiate history departments today.

Common Core is innocent of America’s Catholic schools’ rich tradition of helping to form children’s hearts and minds. In that tradition, education brings children to the Word of God. It provides students with a sound foundation of knowledge and sharpens their faculties of reason. It nurtures the child’s natural openness to truth and beauty, his moral goodness, and his longing for the infinite and happiness. It equips students to understand the laws of nature and to recognize the face of God in their fellow man. Education in this tradition forms men and women capable of discerning and pursuing their path in life and who stand ready to defend truth, their church, their families, and their country.

The history of Catholic education is rich in tradition and excellence. It embraces the academic inheritance of St. Anselm, St. Augustine, St. Thomas Aquinas, and Blessed John Henry Newman. In contrast to such academic rigor, the Common Core standards lack an empirical evidentiary basis and have not been field-tested anywhere. Sadly, over one hundred Catholic dioceses have set aside our teaching tradition in favor of these secular standards.

America’s bishops have compiled a remarkable record of success directing Catholic education in America, perhaps most notably St. John Neumann and the Plenary Councils of Baltimore. Parents embrace that tradition and long for adherence to it – indeed, for its renaissance. That longing reflects itself in the growing Catholic homeschool and classical-education movements and, now, in the burgeoning desire among Catholic parents for their dioceses to reject the Common Core.

Because we believe that this moment in history again calls for the intercession of each bishop, we have been made bold to impose upon your time with our judgments of Common Core.

Faithfully in Christ, we are:

Institutional Affiliations Are for Identification Purposes Only

Gerard Bradley
Professor of Law
University of Notre Dame

Robert P. George
McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence
Princeton University

Anthony M. Esolen
Professor of English
Providence College

Anne Hendershott
Professor of Sociology
Franciscan University of Steubenville

Kevin Doak
Professor
Georgetown University

Joseph A. Varacalli
S.U.N.Y. Distinguished Service Professor
Nassau Community College-S.U.N.Y.

Patrick McKinley Brennan
John F. Scarpa Chair in Catholic Legal Studies
Villanova University School of Law

Robert Fastiggi, Ph.D.
Professor of Systematic Theology
Detroit, MI

Duncan Stroik
Professor of Architecture
University of Notre Dame

Thomas F. Farr
Director, Religious Freedom Project and
Visiting Associate Professor
Georgetown University

Matthew J. Franck, Ph.D.
Director, Simon Center on Religion and the Constitution
Witherspoon Institute

Ronald J. Rychlak
Butler Snow Lecturer and Professor of Law
University of Mississippi, School of Law

V. Bradley Lewis
Associate Professor of Philosophy
The Catholic University of America

Patrick J. Deneen
David A. Potenziani Memorial Associate
Professor of Political Science
University of Notre Dame

E. Christian Brugger, D.Phil.
J. Francis Cardinal Stafford Professor of Moral Theology
Saint John Vianney Theological Seminary, Denver

Kenneth L. Grasso
Professor of Political Science
Texas State University

James Hitchcock
Professor of History
Saint Louis University

Maria Sophia Aguirre, Ph.D.
Director of Economics Programs and Academic Chair
The Catholic University of America

Fr. Joseph Koterski SJ
President, Fellowship of Catholic Scholars
Fordham University

Francis J. Beckwith
Professor of Philosophy and Church-State Studies
Baylor University

Thomas V. Svogun
Professor of Philosophy and Administration of Justice and
Chairman of the Department of Philosophy
Salve Regina University

Scott W Hahn
Professor of Theology
Franciscan University of Steubenville

Eduardo J. Echeverria, Ph.D., S.T.L.
Professor of Philosophy and Systematic Theology
Sacred Heart Major Seminary

Ryan J. Barilleaux, Ph.D.
Paul Rejai Professor of Political Science
Miami University (Ohio)

Brian Simboli, Ph.D.
Science Librarian
Lehigh University

John A. Gueguen
Emeritus Professor, Political Philosophy
Illinois State University

G. Alexander Ross
Institute for the Psychological Sciences

Suzanne Carpenter, Ph.D., R.N.
Associate Professor of Nursing
Retired

Patrick Lee
McAleer Professor of Bioethics
Franciscan University of Steubenville

Peter J. Colosi, PhD
Associate Professor of Moral Theology
St. Charles Borromeo Seminary

Dr. Robert Hunt
Professor of Political Science
Kean University

Matthew Cuddeback, PhD
Assistant Professor of Philosophy
Providence College

Dr. Joseph H. Hagan
President Emeritus
Assumption College

John A. Cuddeback, PhD
Professor of Philosophy
Christendom College

Dr. Michael J. Healy
Professor and Chair of Philosophy
Franciscan University of Steubenville

Thomas Hibbs
Dean of the Honors College
Baylor University

Susan Orr Traffas
Co-Director, Honors Program
Benedictine College

Michael J. Behe
Professor of Biological Sciences
Lehigh University

Thomas R. Rourke
Professor of Politics
Clarion University

Robert H Holden
Professor, Dept. of History
Old Dominion University

Philip J. Harold
Associate Dean, School of Education and Social Sciences
Robert Morris University

David T. Murphy, Ph.D.
Dept. of Modern & Classical Languages
Saint Louis University

W. H. Marshner
Professor of Theology
Christendom College

David W. Fagerberg
Associate Professor, Theology
University of Notre Dame

Melissa Moschella
Assistant Professor of Philosophy
Catholic University of America

Daniel J. Costello, Jr.
Bettex Professor of Electrical Engineering, Emeritus
University of Notre Dame

Brian Scarnecchia,
Associate Professor of Law
Ave Maria School of Law

Thomas Behr
Assistant Professor of Comparative Cultural Studies
University of Houston

Bernard Dobranski
Dean Emeritus and Professor of Law
Ave Maria School of Law

Daniel Philpott
Professor, Political Science and Peace Studies
University of Notre Dame

Anne Barbeau Gardiner
Professor emerita, Dept of English
John Jay College, CUNY

C.C. Pecknold
Assistant Professor of Theology
The Catholic University of America

Anthony Low
Professor Emeritus of English
New York University

Heather Voccola
Adjunct Professor of Church History
Holy Apostles College and Seminary

Raymond F. Hain, PhD
Assistant Professor of Philosophy
Providence College

Catherine Abbott
Professor of Mathematics
Keuka College

Thérèse Bonin
Associate Professor of Philosophy
Duquesne University

Dr. Francis P. Kessler
Prof. Political Science
Benedictine College

Christopher Wolfe
Co-Director, Thomas International Center
Emeritus Professor, Marquette University

Carson Holloway
Associate Professor of Political Science
University of Nebraska at Omaha

Stephen M. Krason, J.D., Ph.D.
President
Society of Catholic Social Scientists

Laura Hirschfeld Hollis
Associate Professional Specialist and
Concurrent Associate Professor of Law
University of Notre Dame

Wilson D. Miscamble, C.S.C.,
Professor of History
University of Notre Dame

Stephen M. Barr
Professor of Physics
University of Delaware

D.C. Schindler
Associate Professor of Metaphysics and Anthropology
The John Paul II Institute for Studies on Marriage and Family

Jeanne Heffernan Schindler
Senior Research Fellow
Center for Cultural and Pastoral Concerns

David L. Schindler
Gagnon Professor of Fundamental Theology
Pontifical John Paul II Institute, Catholic University of America

Rev. Edward Krause, C.C.C.
Professor of Social Sciences, Emeritus
Gannon University

Christopher O. Tollefsen
Professor of Philosophy
University of South Carolina

Paige E. Hochschild
Assistant Professor of Theology
Mount St. Mary’s University

Robert C. Jeffrey
Professor of Government
Wofford College

Rev. Anthony E. Giampietro, CSB
Executive Vice President and Academic Dean
Saint Patrick’s Seminary & University

Dr. Roger Loucks
Associate Prof. of Physics
Alfred University

J. Daniel Hammond
Professor of Economics
Wake Forest University

Kenneth R. Hoffmann, Ph.D.
Professor of Neurosurgery
SUNY at Buffalo

Timothy T. O’Donnell, STD, KGCHS
President Christendom College

Thomas W. Jodziewicz
Department of History
University of Dallas

Sr J. Sheila Galligan IHM
Professor of Theology
Immaculata University

Maura Hearden
Assistant Professor of Theology
DeSales University

Robert Gorman
University Distinguished Professor of Political Science
Texas State University

Steven Justice
Professor of English
University of California, Berkeley and
University of Mississippi

Carol Nevin (Sue) Abromaitis
Professor of English
Loyola University Maryland

Dr. Sean Innerst
Theology Cycle Director,
St. John Vianney Theological Seminary

Robert A. Destro
Professor of Law & Director
The Catholic University of America

Richard Sherlock
Prof. of Philosophy
Utah State University

Adrian J. Reimers
Adjunct Assistant Professor in Philosophy
University of Notre Dame

Dr. Jessica M. Murdoch
Assistant Professor of Fundamental and Dogmatic Theology
Villanova University

Mary Shivanandan, S.T.L., S.T.D.
Professor of Theology Retired
John Paul II Institute for Studies on Marriage & Family
at the Catholic University of America

Alice M. Ramos
Professor of Philosophy
St. John’s University

Dennis J. Marshall, Ph.D.
Professor of Theology
Aquinas College

Dennis D. Martin
Associate Professor of Theology
Loyola University Chicago

Janet E. Smith
Father Michael J. McGivney Chair of Life Ethics
Sacred Heart Major Seminary

Leonard J. Nelson,III
Retired Professor of Law
Samford University

Charles D. Presberg, PhD
Associate Professor of Spanish
University of Missouri-Columbia

Brian T. Kelly
Dean
Thomas Aquinas College

Michael F. McLean
President
Thomas Aquinas College

Philip T. Crotty
Professor of Management (Emeritus)
Northeastern University

James Matthew Wilson
Assistant Professor of Literature
Villanova University

R. E. Houser
Bishop Wendelin J. Nold Chair in Graduate Philosophy
University of St. Thomas (TX)

Gary D. Glenn
Distinguished Teaching Professor Emeritus
Department of Political Science, Northern Illinois University

Cynthia Toolin, Ph.D.
Professor of Dogmatic and Moral Theology
Holy Apostles College and Seminary

Virginia L. Arbery, Ph. D.
Associate Professor of Humanities
Wyoming Catholic College

Maryanne M. Linkes, Esquire
Adjunct Professor
University of Pittsburgh & Community College of Allegheny County

James Likoudis, M.S.Ed.
Education writer
Montour Falls, NY 14865

Dr. Emil Berendt
Assistant Professor of Economics
Mount St. Mary’s University

David F. Forte
Professor of Law
Cleveland State University

Anthony W. Zumpetta, Ed.D.
Professor Emeritus
West Chester University (PA)

Thomas D. Watts
Professor Emeritus
University of Texas, Arlington

Catherine Ruth Pakaluk, PhD
Assistant Professor of Economics
Ave Maria University

Craig S. Lent
Freimann Professor of Electrical Engineering
University of Notre Dame

Christina Jeffrey, Ph.D.
Lecturer on the Foundations of American Government
Wofford College

Robert G Kennedy
Professor of Catholic Studies
University of St Thomas (MN)

Holly Taylor Coolman
Assistant Professor, Dept. of Theology
Providence College

Raymond F. Hain, PhD
Assistant Professor of Philosophy
Providence College

David Whalen
Provost
Hillsdale College

David M. Wagner
Professor of Law
Regent University School of Law

John G. Trapani, Jr., Ph.D.
Professor of Philosophy
Walsh University

Tina Holland, Ph.D.
South Bend, Indiana

James F. Papillo, J.D., Ph.D
Former Vice President of Administrative
Affairs and Associate Professor in the Humanities
Holy Apostles College and Seminary

Dr. J. Marianne Siegmund
Theo. Department and SCSS member
University of Dallas

Dr. Daniel Hauser
Professor of Theology
University of St. Francis

Joshua Hochschild
Mount St. Mary’s University

William Edmund Fahey, Ph.D.
Fellow and President
The Thomas More College of Liberal Arts

John C. McCarthy
Dean, School of Philosophy
The Catholic University of America

Christopher O. Blum
Academic Dean
Augustine Institute

Chiyuma Elliott
Assistant Professor of English and African-American Studies
University of Mississippi

Mark C. Henrie
Senior V.P., Chief Academic Officer
Intercollegiate Studies Institute

Jeffrey Tranzillo, Ph.D.
Professor, Systematic Theology

Craig Steven Titus, S.Th.D/Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Director of Integrative Studies
Institute of the Psychological Sciences

Rev. Peter M.J. Stravinskas, Ph.D., S.T.D.
Executive Director
Catholic Education Foundation

William W. Kirk
Vice President for Student Affairs and General Counsel
Ave Maria University

Curt H. Stiles, Ph.D.
Professor of Business Policy
Cameron School of Business
University of North Carolina

 

Up next

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Categories Common Core, Education Reform

Test-related Stress on the Rise in New York: CORRECTION!

By dianeravitch
November 10, 2013 //
79

Yesterday I posted an excerpt from testimony to a state senate hearing in New York. I had seen it on another blog. I had the wrong name of the person testifying. Here is her name and her full testimony.

Mary Calamia
Statement for New York State Assembly Education Forum
October 7, 2013 at 10:14pm
Statement for New York State Assembly Education Forum
Brentwood, New York
October 10, 2013

I am a licensed clinical social worker in New York State and have been providing psychotherapy services since 1995. I work with parents, teachers, and students from all socioeconomic backgrounds representing more than 20 different school districts in Suffolk County. Almost half of my caseload consists of teachers.

In the summer of 2012, my elementary school teachers began to report increased anxiety over having to learn two entirely new curricula for Math and ELA. I soon learned that school districts across the board were completely dismantling the current curricula and replacing them with something more scripted, emphasizing “one size fits all” and taking any imagination and innovation out of the hands of the teachers.

In the fall of 2012, I started to receive an inordinate number of student referrals from several different school districts. I was being referred a large number of honors students—mostly 8th graders.The kids were self-mutilating—cutting themselves with sharp objects and burning themselves with cigarettes. My phone never stopped ringing.

What was prompting this increase in self-mutilating behavior? Why now?

The answer I received from every single teenager was the same. “I can’t handle the pressure. It’s too much work.”

I also started to receive more calls referring elementary school students who were refusing to go to school. They said they felt “stupid” and school was “too hard.” They were throwing tantrums, begging to stay home, and upset even to the point of vomiting.

I was also hearing from parents about kids bringing home homework that the parents didn’t understand and they couldn’t help their children to complete. I was alarmed to hear that in some cases there were no textbooks for the parents to peruse and they had no idea what their children were learning.

My teachers were reporting a startling level of anxiety and depression. For the first time, I heard the term “Common Core” and I became awakened to a new set of standards that all schools were to adhere to—standards that we now say “set the bar so high, anyone can walk right under them.”

Everyone was talking about “The Tests.” As the school year progressed and “The Tests” loomed, my patients began to report increased self-mutilating behaviors, insomnia, panic attacks, loss of appetite, depressed mood, and in one case, suicidal thoughts that resulted in a 2-week hospital stay for an adolescent.

I do not know of any formal studies that connect these symptoms directly to the Common Core, but I do not think we need to sacrifice an entire generation of children just so we can find a correlation.

The Common Core and high stakes testing create a hostile working environment for teachers, thus becoming a hostile learning environment for students. The level of anxiety I am seeing in teachers can only trickle down to the students. Everyone I see is describing a palpable level of tension in the schools.

The Common Core standards do not account for societal problems. When I first learned about APPR and high stakes testing, my first thought was, “Who is going to rate the parents?”

I see children and teenagers who are exhausted, running from activity to activity, living on fast food, then texting, using social media, and playing games well into the wee hours of the morning on school nights.

We also have children taking cell phones right into the classrooms, “tweeting” and texting each other throughout the day. We have parents—yes PARENTS—who are sending their children text messages during school hours.

Let’s add in the bullying and cyberbullying that torments and preoccupies millions of school children even to the point of suicide. Add to that an interminable drug problem.

These are only some of the variables affecting student performance that are outside of the teachers’ control. Yet the SED holds them accountable, substituting innovation and individualism with cookie-cutter standards, believing this will fix our schools.

We cannot regulate biology. Young children are simply not wired to engage in the type of critical thinking that the Common Core calls for. That would require a fully developed prefrontal cortex, a part of the brain that is not fully functional until early adulthood. The prefrontal cortex is responsible for critical thinking, rational decision-making, and abstract thinking—all things the Common Core demands prematurely.

We teach children to succeed then give them pre-assessments on material they have never seen and tell them it’s okay to fail. Children are not equipped to resolve the mixed message this presents.

Last spring, a 6-year-old who encountered a multiplication sign on the NWEA first grade math exam asked the teacher what it was. The teacher was not allowed to help him and told him to just do his best to answer.From that point on, the student’s test performance went downhill. Not only couldn’t the student shake off the unfamiliar symbol, he also couldn’t believe his teacher wouldn’t help him.

Common Core requires children to read informational texts that are owned by a handful of corporations. Lacking any filter to distinguish good information from bad, children will readily absorb whatever text is put in front of them as gospel. So, for example, when we give children a textbook that explains the second amendment in these terms: “The people have a right to keep and bear arms in a state militia,” they will look no further for clarification.

We are asking children to write critically, using emotionally charged language to “persuade” rather than inform. Lacking a functional prefrontal cortex, a child will tap into their limbic system, a set of primitive brain structures involved in basic human emotions, fear and anger being foremost. So when we are asking young children to use emotionally charged language, we are actually asking them to fuel their persuasiveness with fear and anger. They are not capable of the judgment required to temper this with reason and logic.

So we have abandoned innovative teaching and instead “teach to the tests,” the dreaded exams that had students, parents and teachers in a complete anxiety state last spring. These tests do not measure learning—what they really measure is endurance and resilience. Only a child who can sit and focus for 90 minutes can succeed. The child who can bounce back after one grueling day of testing and do it all over again the next day has an even better chance.

A recent Cornell University study revealed that students who were overly stressed while preparing for high stakes exams performed worse than students who experienced less stress during the test preparation period. Their prefrontal cortexes—the same parts of the brain that we are prematurely trying to engage in our youngsters—were under-performing.

We are dealing with real people’s lives here. Allow me introduce you to some of them:

…an entire third grade class that spent the rest of the day sobbing after just one testing session,

…a 2nd grader who witnessed this and is now refusing to attend the 3rd grade—this 7-year-old is now being evaluated for psychotropic medication just to go to school,

…two 8-year-olds who opted out of the ELA exam and were publicly denied cookies when the teacher gave them to the rest of her third grade class,

…the teacher who, under duress, felt compelled to do such a thing,

…a sixth grader who once aspired to be a writer but now hates it because they “do it all day long—even in math,”

…a mother who has to leave work because her child is hysterical over his math homework and his CPA grandfather doesn’t even understand it,

…and countless other children who dread going to school, feel “stupid” and “like failures,” and are now completely turned off to education.

I will conclude by adding this thought. Our country became a superpower on the backs of men and women who studied in one-room schoolhouses.I do not think it takes a great deal of technology or corporate and government involvement for kids to succeed. We need to rethink the Common Core and the associated high stakes testing and get back to the business of educating our children in a safe, healthy, and productive manner”

Categories Common Core, Students, Testing

North Carolina Scores Tumble with Common Core Tests

By dianeravitch
November 10, 2013 //
31

As expected, test scores in North Carolina fell dramatically after release of Common Core data for the state.

“Only 32 percent of students in grades 3-8 were proficient in reading and mathematics in 2012-13 — that’s almost a 27 percent drop from 2011-12, when 58.9 percent of students were proficient. The overall composite proficiency score for all state tests is 44.7 percent, down from 77.9 percent in 2011-12, a 33 percent drop.”

In this country, we used to have a belief that children should be encouraged, given the sense that they can succeed. Now we adopt untested standards written by non-educators, whose only certain result is to mark children as failures.

Is this a plan to demoralize and dishearten and shame an entire generation of children?

– See more at: http://pulse.ncpolicywatch.org/2013/11/07/student-test-scores-drop-significantly-due-to-adoption-of-more-rigorous-standards/#sthash.Lw37kXn9.dpuf

Categories Common Core, North Carolina

Nevada Teacher: No One Asked Me about Common Core

By dianeravitch
November 9, 2013 //
38

From Angie Sullivan, a teacher in Nevada:

 

I’m a union girl.  But I know that my union is huge and has become part of the privatizing problem – looking for money from big business and supporting politicians who take it too. 
 
So I lobby them too.  
 
Common Core is not supported by this member.  
 

With everything going on in my state of Nevada – NEA spends money and gives us a grant to implement common core standards? 

 
NEA likes to say that our “members” support common core.  Really?  In Nevada only half our teachers vote in elections but somehow NEA was able to poll us and determined we support common core?  That is a lie. 
 
The representative assembly considered this and while common core passed – this was NOT an issue for many states YET.   Most representatives sat out and did not vote for or against – I was watching.  States like California voted heavily NO.  This was not an overwhelming mandate from the body to support. A third of the room stood against.  Those of us oppressed by the system that no one paid us any money to implement said no.  I had no voice at any level about common core.  This was not democratically implemented. 
 
Common core was developed by big business.  They want all states to have the same standards – not to improve education – but to improve profit for themselves. Bill Gates will sell national software.  Pearson will dominate our market with national programs and textbooks.  The companies will no longer have to tailor Nevada products to Nevada.  This is a national standard to create a national unified market so that corporations can make money. 
 
And testing.  Common core is great for test makers correct?  We have a computer … so we must create systems to collect and compare data about our kids on a national level?  
 
No one asked me what it is like filling out a report card with 128 standards.  
 
No one considered developmental appropriateness for five year olds when creating the standards.  
 
No one considered the diversity that is in my classroom when developing the standards.  
 
No one asked me.  
 
So don’t imply that I support such a system because I see it for what it is.  It is no good for my students in poverty in urban Nevada. It doesn’t support language learners. It raises the bar?  Not really.  It does imply that every student in America fits into a cookie cutter. 
 
I believe my union is selling out students and teachers on this issue instead of doing what is right.   Authentic learning is more than a score. 
 
We will regret this – just as we regret No Child Left Behind – which my union implied I supported too.  It will oppress us.  It will encourage more tests and scores and failures.  It will measure teachers and compare us until we fail too.  This will promote an elite agenda … doing very little and most likely harm the kids I serve and love. 
 
No money or support – just churn- and failing kids left in the wake?
Unfunded mandates sold to us by big money and implemented without teacher voice or additional pay – sound familiar?
We have seen this before and the big question is … who is making money because we will be hard pressed to say it helped Vegas kids.
O God hear the words of my mouth, let my union be advocates and not waste our spare resources in directions that do not help our children.
Angie.

 

Categories Common Core

Los Angeles Baffled About How to Pay for iPads in Future

By dianeravitch
November 7, 2013 //
24

Los Angeles negotiated a sweet deal for Apple, promising to buy an iPad for every student at a cost that will eventually total at least $1 billion.

Forget the fact that the iPads are financed in large part by borrowing money from a 25-year construction bond issue, and that many schools will not get the repairs and upgrades they need.

Forget the fact that the iPads are loaded with Pearson content that is not yet complete.

Forget the fact that Los Angeles agreed to pay more for the iPads than their retail cost.

Forget the fact that the iPads will be obsolete in three years and the Pearson content is licensed for only three years.

Here is the question: How will Los Angeles pay for new iPads in three years? How can it afford to pay for the iPads it just agreed to buy? How will Los Angeles pay to repair its crumbling schools? Where will it find the money to reduce class sizes, some of which are staggering?

And behind it all is a lingering question: If the Common Core testing must be done online, and if every district in California is required to buy computers and establish the necessary bandwidth for Common Core testing, how many billions of dollars will be spent nationally to pay the cost of Common Core testing? If Los Angeles spent $1 billion, what will it cost for the nation?

One begins to understand why the tech corporations are so enthusiastic about Common Core.

 

Categories Common Core, Los Angeles

Bill Gates’ Utopian Vision for Your Child

By dianeravitch
November 6, 2013 //
115

Bill Gates has plans for your child. He wants to know everything he can about your child so he can customize and personalize the deliverables.

A teacher in California told me that his principal enthusiastically signed up for the Gates plan. Here is the survey that every teacher was asked to complete. Where do you think this is going? Is this utopia or dystopia?

**********************HERE IS THE CONTENTS WHEN CLICKING THE LINK:

ORIGINAL Survey Option E: Teacher Survey

We believe in the promise of personalization to dramatically improve student learning. In the future, each student’s learning experience – what she learns, and how, when, and where she learns it – will be tailored to her individual developmental needs, skills, and interests. This is a fundamental shift from the way that students learn today, and as such, we believe that for personalization to truly transform student learning, schools will likely look dramatically different than they do today. Our current efforts support districts and partner organizations in building system-level capacity to design, launch and scale school models that embrace this bold vision of personalized learning.

The purpose of this survey is to understand the teacher perspective on the personalized learning activities happening in schools, including current instructional practices, PD, supports, etc. Further, this survey aims to gauge the level of interest for teachers to implement personalized learning in their classrooms. For this survey, personalized learning is defined as follows: Learning experiences for all students are tailored to their individual developmental needs, skills and interest. Personalized learning can, and should, include the following supporting elements: learner profiles, personal learning paths, individual mastery, and flexible learning environment. These attributes can be further defined as follows:

• Learner profiles: Captures individual skills, gaps, strengths, weaknesses, interests & aspirations of each student

• Personal learning paths: Each student has learning goals & objectives. Learning experiences are diverse and matched to the individual needs of students

• Individual mastery: Continually assesses student progress against clearly defined standards & goals. Students advance based on demonstrated mastery

• Flexible learning environments: Multiple instructional delivery approaches that continuously optimize available resources in support of student learning

While we believe that true personalized learning requires much more than the mere adoption and use of new technologies, we are optimistic about blended instruction – instructional design and delivery that incorporates the use of new technologies alongside traditional instruction – as a means of personalizing learning. As such, we are interested in hearing about your use of technology as part of your personalized learning efforts and implementation.

***************HERE IS THE FIRST PART OF THE SURVEY************

1. What is the name of your school?

*

2. What level is your school? Elementary School

Middle School

Grades K-8

Grades 6-12

High School

Other (please specify)

*

3. What grade level(s) do you teach?
K

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

Other (please specify)

Categories Common Core, Data and Data Mining, Gates Foundation, Bill Gates, Privacy and Privacy Rights

St.Tammany Parish in Louisiana Drops Out of CCSS

By dianeravitch
November 6, 2013 //
74

St. Tammany Parish is one of the state of Louisiana’s high-performing districts. Its board passed a far-reaching resolution declaring that it was dropping out of the Common Core standards and would not administer the PARCC assessments. Its resolution explained why it was not willing to participate in this disruption to its schools:

It objects to federal control of its curriculum;

The CCSS were written and implemented too quickly, without due deliberation;

Compliance with CCSS and PARCC involves huge expenses, in relation to equipment, upgrades, time, and effort;

It objects to the data-sharing agreements that are associated with CCSS;

It sees CCSS and PARCC as an unfunded mandate.

For these and other reasons, the school board said “no thanks.”

 

 

 

Categories Common Core

Academic Standards and a Boy with Autism

By dianeravitch
November 5, 2013 //
40

This is a letter written by a mother in Louisiana. She sent it out widely.

“Academic Standards and Individualized Education Programs”

How are schools supposed to get every student to meet the same academic standards and meet the individualized education programs (IEP) for children with disabilities — both are required by federal law?

The following is a letter written from the heart of a mom with a son with autism.
It is not meant to expose any teacher or district. On the contrary, both are working hard to support the student. It is simply written to express an opinion of the situation we are all in at this time.

Dear “Is Anybody Listening?,”

Several weeks ago I sat down with my son’s teacher and listened to her tell me what her priorities are for him for this year. She revealed that she is largely focused on reading comprehension and, to a lesser extent, writing. It is indisputable that those are areas of high need for him. But what she had forgotten and said very little about, until I mentioned it, was language and social interaction. I could see a light bulb go off in her head. Suddenly she understood. Yes, of course, I must work on those too. Then I saw something else. It was something I can only describe as concern, although an insufficient descriptor. She started talking about all of the third grade standards. She handed me copies of the standards which she had already printed out, tucked safely inside page protectors. The teacher began to ponder, how will I address the core deficits of his disability in the midst of teaching the standards? Oh, maybe there would be a few minutes during group work or perhaps during a pull out session, but there’s so much to work on academically…

We are over half way through the first nine weeks and, although every member of his team is working hard, Jackson is so lost. He’s lost in a sea of standards and expectations for him to think critically and explain every answer. It takes much more than raising the bar or saying you believe students with disabilities can achieve for them to actually achieve. You see, he has only answered a why question a handful of times in his life. Now he’s asked why, how and explain your answer all day long. What do you think is going to happen when you test and assess him? He is going to fail. It will look as though he cannot and has not achieved.

Let me tell you what he has done, though. Jackson had been permitted to isolate himself from all the children on the school playground for the last 2 years. We were less than one week into the school year and Jackson was no longer standing next to the wall, far away from his peers. He was under a tree next to the playground. Fast forward a few more weeks and he has played on the equipment a few times, but more spectacularly, he is engaging and playing a game of “I see you” with a little girl in his class. She enjoys him. She likes him. He likes her. They play together for a few minutes every day. No standardized assessment he will take this year or any year will reflect that progress. No teacher or related service provider will be rewarded for their role in facilitating this achievement. After all, it’s not one of the standards. It’s not on “the test.”

As an advocate, some days are very challenging when both working and living in the disability world. There are no breaks. There is no escape. I sit in rooms with educational leaders who make statements about the 43% (of students with disabilities who passed the tests last year) and then I come home to the sweetest little boy who falls in the 57%. A boy who has an amazing ability to tolerate the world around him, but who no longer wants to go to school. How will it get any better? When will it get any better? It only seems like we’re heading in the opposite direction of improving outcomes for kids like Jackson.

Rebecca Ellis
Mandeville, Louisiana
504-261-342
ellis.rebecca@gmail.com”

Categories Common Core, Special Education

Jamie Gass: Is Common Core Legal?

By dianeravitch
November 4, 2013 //
26

Jamie Gass, who directs the conservative Pioneer Institute in Boston, is a historian and a determined critic of Common Core. While most conservatives support Common Core (Jeb Bush, Bobby Jindal, Mitch Daniels, Tony Bennett, and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce), Gass opposes Common Core and the testing because–among other reasons– he thinks that both are a violation of federal law. Read his latest column here.

Categories Common Core

Montessori Teacher to John King: Montessori Is Not About Testing and Common Core

By dianeravitch
November 3, 2013 //
39

I received an email from a Montessori teacher in Wisconsin. She asked me to publish this so that Dr. John King, State Commissioner of Education in New York, understands that the Montessori school to which he sends his own children does not have a philosophy aligned with what he proposes for Other People’s Children.

Dear Diane,
John King keeps on saying that Common Core is a lot like Montessori education. I am an upper-level teacher (1st-6th grade) at a private Montessori school in Kenosha, Wisconsin. I have read the CC standards and researched it. Many of our parents are teachers in the public school district and I discuss CC with them. I am reading your book and I can tell you that Common Core is nothing like the Montessori method. There are many differences, but I’ve limited my explanation to how we view homework and assessment in the Montessori classroom. This is also how I explain the differences to parents.
One of the current trends in education, to increase “academic rigor,” has resulted in elementary students receiving more homework on a daily basis. So why do Montessori students receive very little homework? While many schools and teachers feel pressure to assign daily homework, research shows this is actually causing children more harm than good. The harm includes loss of family time, limiting time for unstructured play and exercise, restricting the time that children have to pursue their own interests and self-learning, and most importantly, it kills off a love of learning. Children need to go outside and play. So what is our goal in Montessori schools? It is to help the parents raise a well-rounded, happy person with a healthy dose of curiosity and an everlasting interest in our world.How do we assess the students in the elementary classroom if we don’t give tests? First, let me clarify a common misconception about tests. In a conventional classroom, many of the assessments that students take are standardized tests. The results of these tests are received months after the test is given and are not used by the teacher to determine lesson planning for each student. Teacher-made-tests provide immediate results that are used for grades, but the results usually do not influence the lesson plans for each individual child. In the upper-level classroom, we continually evaluate the progress of each child through observation and discussion: observation of the written portion of the assignment, observation of the student at work, and discussion of the work with each student. We record the progress of each student, with the goal that the student is working at his or her best potential and has mastered the concepts. In order to achieve that goal, we often need to review, re-explain, alter assignments, or choose a material that will show the concept from a different perspective based on the needs of each individual student.

Maria Montessori said that “Before elaborating any system of education, we must therefore create a favorable environment that will encourage the flowering of a child’s natural gifts. All that is needed is to remove the obstacles.” There are many obstacles which may cause a student to struggle but the most common causes are fear and maturity, two factors that greatly determine a person’s ability or inability to learn but are rarely ever considered as relevant to education. In a Montessori classroom, we try to create an atmosphere where it is safe to make a mistake and trial and error is the norm, thus reducing the amount of fear and anxiety. The varied rates of maturity are reflected in the three year time spans of 3-6, 6-9, and 9-12. Montessori teachers evaluate the work habits that enable lifelong learning, independence, responsibility, and kindness.

On my evaluation form, I also include if the student is working for his or her own enjoyment. I must say that my students love coming to school everyday and it is hard for me to get them to leave at the end of the day. Parents have told me that their first graders are sad when it is the weekend because they can’t go to school. Montessori classrooms create a setting for children that is very natural to them and encourages learning, discovery, and creativity. It highly respects and values each child. That is the education that John King’s children are receiving.

Marianne Giannis

Categories Common Core, Education Reform, Testing
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