Common Core

Is it right?

Self-Evident Truth

• What is a self-evident truth?

Education of Children

Parents

Children

Delegate to Local

Government limited power and authority

Self-evident Right and Duty to Educate

U. S. Constitution

Who has authority to pass laws?

What laws can they pass?U. S. Constitution Article 1 Section 8Laws regarding the education of our

children is not on the list

Tenth Amendment

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

Federal Laws

• There are 3 federal laws (besides the Constitution) that prevent the Department of Education from creating standards or curriculum.

1. Dep. of Education Organizational Act, 1979, Sec 103b2. General Education Provisions Act,3. The Elementary and Secondary Act, 1965

Presidential Powers

Legislature is the only branch that can make law

The president has the authority to suggest action to congress- but no authority to take action himself.

Are there problems with education today?

Where should solutions come from?

Can they come from the federal level?

Or must they, by law, come from the state and local levels of government?

Remarks on “No Child Left Behind”, Sept. 23, 2011

“I’ve urged Congress for a while now, let’s get a bipartisan effort, let’s fix this. Congress hasn’t been able to do it.  So I will. Our kids only get one shot at a decent education.  They cannot afford to wait any longer.  So, given that Congress cannot act, I am acting. So starting today, we’ll be giving states more flexibility to meet high standards.” 

What is Common Core?

The simple answer-Just a set of standards that is consistent across the country

State led initiative where states control the standards

States have control of curriculum

Marc Tucker1988- Marc Tucker becomes head of National Center for Education and the Economy (NCEE)– Pushed to move away from local control of schools

and migrate to national standards– stated the goal is “to remold the entire American

system” into “a seamless web that literally extends from cradle to grave and is the same systems for everyone,” coordinated by “a system of labor market boards at the local, state and federal levels” where curriculum and “job matching” will be handled by counselors “accessing the integrated computer-based program.”

Bill Gates

2004 Bill Gates contracted with UNESCO to fulfill part of the UN’s Millennium Campaign goals- Universal Education

2005 Bill Gates funded the New Commission on the Skills of the American Workforce which was created by Mark Tucker

Bill Gates Cont.

June 2008 Gates awarded a 2.2 million dollar grant to the Hunt Institute for Educational Leadership to promote the adoption of national standards

Gates continues to help fund UN programs to promote international standards- to date the Gates Foundation has spent over ¼ billion dollars

The UN is a member of the International Benchmarking Advisory Group for Common Core Standards

Barack Obama

• Created Equity and Excellence Commission• Created Obama’s Education Policy Transition

Team• Announced that Stimulus Funds would be

used for a contest called Race to the Top.• 2009 Called on governors and state school

chiefs to “develop standards and assessments”

Road to National Standards

Both of Obama’s teams determined that we needed national standards

Obama says he called on Governors and Chief State School Officers (Superintendents of Public Instruction) to create a set of standards- sounds state led

State Led?

Actually called on National Governors Association (NGA) and the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO)- Both are private organizations which have no binding authority with the states

What nobody knew was that the standards had already been written by a couple of individuals from a private group called Achieve Inc.- the standards were then accepted by both the NGA and the CCSSO

Obama’s Teams

Equity and Excellence Commission and Education Policy Transition Team have one person in common-

Linda Darling-Hammond

Linda Darling-Hammond

• Writes the assessments • Is a member of the CCSSO (even though she is not a

school officer in any state- it is a private organization) • Is a member of the NGA (even though she is not a

governor- it is a private organization with only 13 governors as members)

• Writes for Pearson Assessments, the largest curriculum publisher in the world

• Is the hero to communist reformer Bill Ayers.

Pearson Publishing

Thanks in part to the Darling-Hammond connection, Pearson Publishing is set to be the biggest common core publisher in the world.

Bill Gates has said- “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. For the first time, there will be a large base of customers eager to buy products…”

How Did They Bypass Congress?

• Obama announced Race to the Top • States were promised stimulus money if they

would sign on to Common Core and one of the two assessment consortia- PARCC and SBAC

• Wyoming has chosen Smarter Balance Assessment Consortium (SBAC)

• States were promised flexibility with NCLB and that if they didn’t adopt CC they would lose their Title I funds.

What Happened in WY?

• 2009- Gov. Freudenthal and State Superintendent McBride committed WY to Common Core by signing a binding agreement with the federal government (MOA)

• Common Core standards were not written until 2010- we committed ourselves before they were even written

• June 2010- State Board of Ed made it official

What Happened in WY?

• Public comment period in Jan 25 to Feb 14 2012, after they were already adopted.– WY Dept. of Ed says they sent out a press release

announcing the comment period but nobody has been able to find a published release in any WY paper

• WY Dept. of Ed now says that Common Core was adopted in April of 2012– WY Dept. of Ed’s meeting minutes and the MOA both

say they were adopted prior to 2012

WY agreement with SBAC

This agreement that we signed, called an MOU, ties WY to the SBAC’s agreement with the US DOE

SBAC’s agreement with the DOE states: “The Grantee must provide timely and complete access to any and all data collected at the State Level to ED or its designated program monitors, technical assistance providers, or research partners, and to GAO, and the auditors…

• Wyoming has an agreement with the SBAC

Which ties WY to the SBAC agreement with the US DOE

Giving the US Dept. of ED access to any and all data

Another Concern

• Another concern with this agreement that WY made with the SBAC is that we agreed to identify existing barriers in State laws, statutes, regulations or policies and change them so that we could implement the SBAC fully. So far 3 WY statutes have been identified.

But we can opt out!

Data Mining

WY in order to get that federal money agreed to implement a State Longitudinal Data System (SLDS) to track our students from Preschool to the workforce in a program called the P20.

P20 is scary!

What Data Will Be Shared?

• State Longitudinal Data System– Created with more federal money (15 million)– A network of communication channels that track

and store information on citizens from preschool to workforce.

• To get the money we agreed to the P20 data tracking

P20

• Preschool plus 20 years– We agreed to track every student from the time

they are in preschool for the next 20 years!– That is 4 years old to 24 years old- through all

school and into careers!– TEACHERS!!! Effectiveness will be measured by

matching teacher data to student data.

U. S. Dept. of Education

• “The program [Statewide Longitudinal Data Systems] provides grants to states to design, develop, and implement statewide P-20 longitudinal data systems to capture, analyze, and use student data from preschool to high school, college, and the workforce.”

• - US Dept. of Education website

Agenda of Achieve Inc

• “Longitudinal data systems should follow individual students from grade to grade and school to school, all the way from kindergarten through postsecondary education and into the workplace. . . . [States] must follow students through K–12 into postsecondary and the workforce and establish feedback loops to the relevant stakeholders . . .”

• Achieve Inc.- Achieve, Inc.

• individual students from grade to grade and school to school, all the way from kindergarten through postsecondary education and into the workplace. . . . [States] must follow students through K–12 into postsecondary and the workforce and establish feedback loops to the relevant stakeholders . . .”

• - Achieve, Inc.

Memo to Hank Coe and Matt Teeters

“The purpose of the WY SLDS is to establish the data cohesion and integration across multiple agency systems… that provides accurate information on how individual students, or aggregates of students are doing over time from pre-kindergarten through 12th grade and into post-secondary education and careers.”

Don’t we already track students?• Currently WY does track students in a P16 system

(pre-k through 12th grade) for those participating in the Hathaway scholarship- only school data is collected

• This information is kept at the state level• The new system shares data to the federal level

and contains much more than school data (medical data, criminal system data, behavioral characteristics etc.)

Why does the federal gov’t need our kids’ data?

Anyone?......... Anyone?......... Anyone?

Per the Federal DOE, individual biometric information is used and defined as “personally identifiable information”.

WHY?

Myths

• It’s state led– Do you still think so?

• It’s just standards– If A=B and B=C then A=C– If standards are assessment based and

assessments drive curriculum, then do standards determine curriculum? Ask Pearson Publishing and Bill Gates. Remember what Bill Gates said?

Bill Gates on Curriculum

“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. For the first time, there will be a large base of customers eager to buy products…”

Myths

• The standards are rigorous– According to two academic experts who were

asked by the NGA and CCSSO to be on the validation committee, the math standards put us 2 years behind high achieving countries and that the English language arts standards are “grossly deficient”. They refused to sign off on the standards.

Myths

• Internationally Benchmarked- Experts have searched other countries standards and have found NO evidence of this.

• The standards are developmentally appropriate- Many experts have stated that the standards go against everything we know about Piaget’s stages of development and can actually hurt students in the elementary levels.

Education of Children, Revised

GovernmentUsurps

Self-evident Right and Duty

to Educate

Children

Delegates to parents limited

power & authority

One last thought

Let’s just assume that the standards are harmless and even good. We have just given the authority to determine educational standards to a distant governing body. What will those standards look like 5 years from now? 10 years from now? Have you ever known government to usurp power and then give it back? Is it all worth it for a few dollars now?

What Can You Do?

• Write to your legislators• Write to your local school board and attend

the meetings.• Write to your County Commissioners• Write letters to the editor• Write to the SBOE and the Governor• Help educate other people about the CC