Common Core has been an educational ploy from the first drip. Advocates blatantly mislead the public … and then seduced state legislatures … with the most gummy premise: that American schools are dismal failures. They insisted that this nation was rocketing toward the bottom in quick speed … and that a complete and total make-over was essential. It was all nonsense from the jump. The New Socrates … Arne Duncan, Bill Gates, Pearson enterprises, and theoretical musers flush with enticing cash … appeared during the economic doldrums of the recent past. They saw profit and power in their crystal balls. Fund-starved states bought into this slop-reform out of monetary expediency … and the deal with the Devil was sealed. American schools are hardly failures. Everywhere one looks the suggestion is put to rest. America is the premier economic and political force on the planet ... and its hardly about to be unseated. We enjoy the highest standard of living for the largest number of people in the history of the planet. Our economy sets the course for the world. America sets the cutting edge for medicine, technology, and sciences of all sorts. American based businesses are world-wide models. Our universities are the most favored in the world ... with students from every edge of the planet elbowing their way for admission. Our armed forces are the envy of all ... not just for our might, but for our technology and innovations. Our airlines crowd the heavens, our rail system hauls more people and cargo than any other, and our hospitals are magnets for patients seeking miracle procedures that can only be found here in the States. So much for failure. Common Core gained traction for all of the wrong reasons. It as, as the author states, developmentally inappropriate. It also attempts to impose factory-like quality controls on an effort that is flush with human variables. Schools dont cobble together cars or assemble cabinets or bolt bridges together. Schools are there to nurture wonder and shuttle children a place of curiosity and exploration. And they dont travel the same route at the same speed in the that journey. Common Core is so terribly formed it can never be polished. Headline blurts would lead one to believe that excessive testing is the great sin. Not true. Its the entire concept of one size fits all … coupled with the dismissal that all children are unique. It asks all student to swallow the same starch and emerge with the same crease. It is sheer nonsense that is the antithesis of what has made this nation the envy of the planet. As abused as children are the teachers. They are the magic makers. They know students dont have the same starting point … and certainly dont share the same finish line. Common Core has created an antiseptic, curiosity-allergic, overly regimented thrust that is mired in amateurish curriculum designs, testing mania, and swaddled in expenses that boggle the mind. Its a program fashioned by disconnected intruders who believe they are the New Socrates. With gullible politicos, they have gutted a largely successful effort and sought to replace it with a utopian design that is out of touch with educational reality. And it will cost taxpayers billions in the years ahead. More than 100,000 New York parents and concerned citizens demanded a separate ballot line to register their anger and distrust of Common Core … and they are hardly misguided. Ms. Coyle is spot on when she states that parents have no underlying agenda, we have no funding, we have no sponsors and we have no ulterior motives. The drive and the concern stems from the desire to protect our children from the worst attempt at education reforms we have seen in the history of our country. Shes simply enlightened. As are hundreds of thousands in this state alone. State Ed Commissioner King and Andrew Cuomo have remained deaf to the uproar … feigning that real reform is the demand de jeer of the citizens of NY. Reform? Im all for it. It should be a constant effort. This reform? A mess. At what point do real educators and concerned parents and citizens draw the line? This November for starters. But even that moment will not soothe those who have examined the underbelly of this crippled reform. Expect the friction to continue whatever November brings. Parents and teachers do not abandon their children. Ever. The fight is on. Denis Ian lohud/story/opinion/contributors/2014/09/01/view-coyle-common-core-concerns/14810367/
Posted on: Mon, 01 Sep 2014 11:24:50 +0000