Federal Secretary of Education: “To Phase Out the Authority of States” Have you seen the new regulations that just came out of the White House? Americans who see these must run screaming to legislators for protection against the Department of Education. The new regulations declare that Secretary Arne Duncan will amend ESEA to “phase out the authority of States to define modified academic achievement standards and develop alternate assessments based on those modified academic achievement standards in order to satisfy ESEA accountability requirements. These amendments will permit, as a transitional measure, States that meet certain criteria to continue to administer alternate assessments… for a limited period of time.” reginfo.gov/public/do/eAgendaViewRule?pubId=201410&RIN=1810-AB16 “Phasing out the authority of the states” has been precisely the point for every last one of Duncan’s promoted education reforms, from Common Core to Common Data Standards to State Longitudinal Database Systems to P-20 programs to Common Core Assessments to teacher and school evaluations. It’s been the shared vision of non-governmental education reformers as well, from Marc Tucker to Michael Barber to Linda Darling Hammond to the Center for American Progress. Utahns Against Common Core have been pointing out this phase-out of local authority for over two years. Others have been saying it for decades. But fat cats (Salt Lake Chamber of Commerce, School Improvement Network, Prosperity 2020, Education First, Pearson Inc., Microsoft) –each of whom wants to sell fat educational products to the fat, “uniform customer base of Common Core” (as Gates put it) will not listen, and will mock and scorn critics because they want to get fatter and fatter on the taxpayer’s dime. Why does such a supposedly conservative state allow the educational authority of the state to be “phased out” –because of businesses’ greed and lack of care for our children? Where are our children’s educational defenders when we need them? Where is the action behind all the flag-waving speeches that we’ve heard, now, Governor Herbert, Education Advisor Pyfer, Senator Stephenson, Representative Powell? Why doesn’t our Governor, our legislature, our state school board, lift a finger to fight for our Constitutional right to educational self governance? I cannot understand the apathy and the complacency and the tolerance– even at the legislative level– of all reforms aligned to the Common Core. Is it not tragically crazy that we, as a state, willingly allow liberties –guaranteed under the supreme law of the land– to slip so easily out of our lives? We allow ourselves to be lied to by our leaders, who cradle these education reform lies in positive, appealing language, and only for one reason: cash flow. Not for our children, at all. When will Utah, when will America, wake up to this devastation of liberty and education?
Posted on: Mon, 24 Nov 2014 22:27:53 +0000