"I know no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them, but to inform their discretion by education. This is the true corrective of abuses of constitutional power." - Thomas Jefferson 1820

"There is a growing technology of testing that permits us now to do in nanoseconds things that we shouldn't be doing at all." - Dr. Gerald Bracey author of Rotten Apples in Education

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Saturday, April 6, 2013

More Common Core Spin from Missouri DESE

Missouri Commissioner of DESE took to youtube to deliver a pro common core message.


What the Commissioner said:

Common Core standards are now called "Missouri Learning Standards" of which Common Core is a part of.  I guess the 15% of standards Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortia "allows" Missouri to adopt in addition to CCSS supersedes the mandated 100% of standards Missouri has contracted with SBAC to follow.

The Commissioner fails to tell her viewers that if the bar was set too low for standards, she, as Commissioner, had the authority and duty to tweak the standards.  If she could not or would not, then we need a commissioner who could perform that job function.  The governor, DESE and the State Board did not have to sign an MOU (is that a contract?) to a 26 state consortia taking away local/state control and bestowing millions of dollars on to taxpayers in the form of unfunded debt for standards/assessments that are privately crafted/owned/copyrighted.

We hear the same old story that schools can set their own curriculum.  What is not said is that the curriculum must be aligned to common core standards.  It's like buying gasoline. You can buy it from different gas companies, but in reality, it's the same product.  The line of "you can pick your own curriculum" doesn't really mean much.  If it's all common core, it's the same curriculum.

The commissioner tells us we have:
  • an initiative that is common core but not really
  • standards that needed to be changed that we could have changed but didn't/couldn't/wouldn't
  • curriculum that we can choose but it's really the same because of the CCSS alignment requirement

Is it as clear as mud now? 

If you are against Common Core in Missouri, sign this petition to rid our state of the implementation of Missouri Learning Standards or whatever they will be called next week.  Make your wishes known on this petition.  You can't make comments on the video.  DESE has disabled comments.

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