“Insidious, Ill Written, Poorly Conceived” Common Core Standards

by Lynne M. Taylor

 I was one of the 60 NC citizens who was able to speak out in a Committee hearing in Raleigh, on March 20, 2014. Of the first group of speakers, I was the first one to OPPOSE the Common Core Standards. My reasons, as follows, are based on extensive research, which I’ve been conducting on my own since 2009. I am a recognized private educator. I am a concerned citizen as well. While column space limits me to what I can share, I will say what I have been able to uncover is not only jaw dropping, but a shameful affront to our children.

1) Common Core Standards violate our U.S. Constitution and mock the sovereignty of the state of NC.

2) Common Core Standards envelop not only the U.S. Dept of Education, but almost every other major federal agency as well as the United Nations, where an ‘education for all’ by 2015 is the ultimate goal.”

3) Common Core Standards are NOT educator based.

4) Common Core Standards were not field tested before the states were coerced into accepting them via Race to the Top funding. (NC Rep. Speciale stated it best when he said, ” “We sold our kids’ education, we sold their futures for $400 million.”  “We are not in a position to be experimenting with their futures.”)

5) Common Core Standards have gone beyond ‘just standards’ and are now part of a multi billion dollar industry that will profit, not the students or educators, but the private corporations so heavily invested in designing texts, digital software, assessments, curriculum and the list goes on!

6) As a result of the mass production of “Common Core” brand of anything, causes families to be the ultimate bearers of a burden they should never be expected to carry. Why or how? The exclusion of parent involvement.

7) Has the regular person even looked at the Standards? If so, how are they OK with the proof of doctors evidence that states the ‘standards’ are age inappropriate. Just Google Kindergarten Sex Education.

8) Data mining thanks to Common Core and all its assessments, another huge money maker..and off the private information of not just students, but their families. Biometric devices do not belong in the classroom.

9) No other education reform has been as blindly accepted. Walk through the dollar store, the big box store..Common Core is there (yes, remember..’just standards’). Even the Holy Bible is being aligned to fit Common Core Standards. Does anyone remember “New Math” doing this??

10) Common Core Standards are tied to STEM, Next Gen, C-Scope, Agenda 21 as well as a vast web of other special interests. The misnomer that the Common Core is only in public schools is most grievous. Reliable sources are proving the Standards..and curriculum are showing up in charter schools (public and private), church schools, homeschools. NO educational choice is safe.

   Further research led me to these education experts (who, to the best of my knowledge do not belong to groups which have received money to endorse the Common Core Standards)

Common Core Standards are designed to herd states into massive amounts of constraints, assessments and scripted texts. So much for them being ‘just standards’.

Dr. Sandra Stotsky, a professor of English shared this statement, “The reading level deemed sufficient for high school graduation will be about 7th grade level.” Dr. James Milgram, Professor Emeritus of Math stated that “By 8th grade, Common Core State Standards will put our students about 2 years behind those of highest achieving countries.” Education expert, Diane Ravitch said “The biggest fallacy of the Common Core Standards is that they have been sold to the nation without any evidence that they will accomplish what their boosters claim.” (all these quotes are from Freedom Project Education’s Common Core Project resources)

 In closing, let me share a couple of the comments I shared with the NC Common Core Standards Legislative Study Committee: For every second we allow Common Core Standards to survive, we erode a child’s love of learning. For ever substandard goal these Standards/curricula carry forward from here, we chip away at our Constitutional protected rights.

We cannot allow anything as ill written, poorly conceived, experimental and insidious as Common Core to exist.