By Neal McCluskey
Neal McCluskey
The reality of the Common Core national curriculum standards is finally coming out, and suddenly the Core has big parts falling off. Unfortunately, it is a contraption on which, thanks to Core supporters wielding federal power, almost the whole country has been coerced to fly — and crash.
In the past two weeks, South Carolina and Oklahoma officially chose to dump the Core. Indiana did the same in March. They join Texas, Alaska, Virginia and Nebraska, which never adopted, while Minnesota adopted only the English standards.
Oklahoma is perhaps the biggest blow to the Core, as Republican Gov. Mary Fallin is the chairwoman of the National Governors Association, which created the Core along with the Council of Chief State School Officers. The dominoes are likely to keep falling, with both houses of the North Carolina General Assembly approving Core-dumping bills last week, and the National Conference of State Legislatures reporting that 64 bills to slow or stop the Core have been introduced in state legislatures this year.
“National curriculum standard is crumbling, and we know who to blame.”
Indeed, it is in testing that the bigger exodus has occurred. Not counting states that eventually dumped the Core or never signed on, as of January, six states had left the two Common Core testing consortia selected and funded by the federal government. All of this happened before any state has officially used the Core’s exams. If test scores drop significantly after full implementation, as happened in New York when it used its own Core-aligned exams, opposition is likely to go from yell to scream.
Regrettably, to shore up the Core, supporters have often resorted to calling Core opponents misinformed, while simply asserting that high standards will drive high achievement. To a lesser extent, they have argued that dropping the Core would squander time and money
The two main arguments are hollow. Analysis from across the spectrum, including the left-leaning Brookings Institution, right-leaning Hoover Institution and my own work at the libertarian Cato Institute, has concluded that standards alone do not translate to improved achievement.
On the “misinformed” charge, while some anti-Core arguments are dubious — the Core would not impose a United Nations curriculum — most are substantive. For instance, despite Core proponents calling it “state-led” and “voluntary,” Core adoption was driven by Washington, which made it crucial for states to compete for grants in the $4.35 billion Race to the Top program. Adoption was also just …read more
Source: OP-EDS
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