There has been a rash of people claiming North Carolina, among other states, got rid of Common Core and that our standards are once again a mess.  This is not even remotely true.

I assure you, NO state that adopted Common Core has gotten rid of it and that definitely includes North Carolina.

Former NC Supt. June Atkinson would never have allowed anything to happen to her precious Common Core. She would have married those standards if she could have.

All that happened to Common Core in North Carolina was a series of formatting changes.

The NC Dept of Public Instruction made no changes of substance made to either the Common Core English Language Arts nor the Math standards.

In other words, the Common Core Pig got a new shade of lipstick.  No one from outside the state was allowed to inspect that shade of lipstick, of course.

So where is all this false talk about Common Core being ‘ditched’ or standards needing improving again coming from? From America’s most annoying Education Gadfly, of course.

Michael Petrilli of the Fordham Institute is now on a multi-state newspaper editorial tour pimping their newest standards report. And yes, the new report has Bill Gates money behind it – again.

I’m not kidding about a multi-state PR tour.  The article in the News and Observer I linked to in the tweet above is just one of many just like it in South Carolina, Missouri, Nebraska, and Oklahoma.

Don’t get me wrong, I am not mad about these opinion pieces by Petrilli/Fordham.

Why am I not mad? To be honest I just really welcome another chance to take the Common Core trash to the curb.

But I should be mad. Every parent in the country should be mad:

• Test scores on nearly every state and nationally given test, despite all of them now being Common Core aligned, have been flat or falling since the implementation of the standards.
• Graduation rates are falling.
• Reading proficiency in K-3 has not improved as promised.
• Reading and Math scores for minorities are not improving – if anything, the achievement gap is widening.
• Show me a state who has had rising “career and college ready” percentages at any grade level.
• The k-5 years are foundational learning years, and Common Core provides a consistent mental beat down for these young learners.
• The 6-12 years are not “rigorous.”
• Common Core has not performed as advertised. The moms told everyone this would be the case and we were harassed and mocked for it.

Now go re-read one of Fordham’s latest round of preachy, ridiculous editorials pushing the idea that states are not being faithful enough to a crappy set of standards.

While you’re re-reading it, also ask yourself if you’ve read anything more transparently about jumpstarting the multi-billion education spending money train or not.

Groundhog Day

One might recall the name Fordham – this organization was responsible for the 2010 report that graded state standards, flunked the majority of them, and determined that none of the standards in use were ‘career and college ready’.

That 2010 Fordham standards report was bought and paid for by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and it set the stage for Common Core to become the set of standards for all states to use.  Shorter: The Common Core fix was in.

Over the years, the Fordham Institute has received $8,911,462 in grants from the Gates Foundation and $4.7 million of which Fordham has received since the advent of Common Core.

What’s Old is New Again

With Common Core in the news again, the old and busted arguments of the supporters of the standards are back again too.  Time to get the Serenity prayer back out, Moms.