Category Archives: Common Core

Surveys and Common Core Commission Funding

Posted on February 20, 2015 by A.P. Dillon

Daily Haymaker has an article up on the coal ash/Common Core commission funding bill, which is SB 14. Haymaker seems a little stressed out that $275k was allotted. I’m not. The commission has to work over the course of a year, handling what in essence is an educational and political hydra.

Haymaker also points out that the bill bans the commission from contracting third parties or services for surveys. That’s section four of the bill.

[BILL TEXT]

First things first. This section of the bill is clearly meant to keep the commission from really finding out what the people think as it makes reference to the legislative research committee (LRC). A committee, by the way, which didn’t fulfill it’s task. The financial and legal analyses do not appear to have been done. If they have, they were not made public.

Yeah, that “two hours” of stakeholder opinion? That was 60 people getting to speak for a whole huge 2 minutes.

KEEP READING.. Continue reading →

Posted in Academic Standards Review Commission, Common Core, June Atkinson, NC DPI | Tagged | 3 Comments

Kasich Goes to SC, Insults Millions

Posted on February 20, 2015 by A.P. Dillon

Ohio Governor John Kasich was recently in South Carolina. Kasich talked about all kinds of hot button issues — immigration, budget, Islamic state, gun rights.

The one topic he tried to dodge is the one thing that is going to characterize his visit: Common Core.

“That is not something that Barack Obama is putting together. … It’s local school boards developing local curriculum to meet higher standards. I cannot figure out what’s wrong with that. …

KEEP READING… THERE’S MORE TO THAT QUOTE. Continue reading →

Posted in A.P. Dillon (LL1885), Common Core, GOP | Tagged | 1 Comment

Common Core Aligned: ‘Scaffolding Apps’

Posted on February 18, 2015 by A.P. Dillon

“…to create just these kinds of tests—next-generation assessments aligned to the common core. When the tests are aligned to the common standards, the curriculum will line up as well—and that will unleash powerful market forces in the service of better teaching.”
– Bill Gates, 2009 Speech To Natl. Conf. of State Legislatures

The goal is to align everything so that students and the money have nowhere to go but Common Core.

9 Apps For Scaffolding… Continue reading →

Posted in A.P. Dillon (LL1885), Common Core | Tagged | 1 Comment

Bev Perdue Amazed By 2nd Grade Common Core Math

Posted on February 18, 2015 by A.P. Dillon

Bev Perdue: Isn’t Common Core great!?!?

Yeah, Bev, great.
Great by how overly convoluted it is and how badly it confuses our kids. I can’t wait to see the kids doing this stuff now hit complex concepts in algebra and geometry and try to make ‘buckets’ to figure it out. Continue reading →

Posted in Common Core | Tagged , , | 4 Comments

Post-Mortem of February NC Common Core Commission Meeting

Posted on February 17, 2015 by A.P. Dillon

Due to inclement weather, many were not able to attend the NC Academic Standards Review Commission (ASRC) meeting yesterday in Raleigh. I listened in to the live stream of the meeting after fighting with RealPlayer for a bit. For those … Continue reading →

Posted in A.P. Dillon (LL1885), Academic Standards Review Commission, Common Core | Tagged | 3 Comments

Policy Wonks. They Just Don’t Get it.

Posted on February 17, 2015 by A.P. Dillon

“Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon.”

-Saul Alinsky, Rules for Radicals

After reading the latest diatribe, One Size Fits Most, Even in the Suburbs, from Michael Petrilli, I have a feeling the quote above is on a plaque on his desk. In a nutshell, he now has pulled ‘liberal’ and ‘likely atheist’ suburban moms into the insult fold.

Following Alinsky still, in that article Petrilli is trying to “pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it”. Well, he’s doing it wrong.

Your target has to be specific. Mr. Petrilli is just flailing wildly at any parent he can hit with his mud. In most cases, Alinsky is right and ridicule is a potent weapon.

Moms are not ‘most cases’.

KEEP READING…
Continue reading →

Posted in A.P. Dillon (LL1885), Common Core, EDUCATION | 1 Comment