DESE Stifling More Debate About Common Core?

DESE doesn't like answering questions.

That was evident in the May 2 statewide meetings that were designed to be "informational" only.  DESE representatives were clear to the attendees that answers were not to be forthcoming but could be found within a week on its website.

The answers still aren't there and the clock keeps ticking.

Has DESE  blocked James Shuls of Show-Me Institute for wanting to have an "old-fashioned" debate on the merits of Common Core? 

From More Evidence of DESE Stifling Debate About Common Core?:

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On May 3, I sent a tweet to the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) and Commissioner of Education, Chris Nicastro. In the tweet I wrote, “I’m willing to have a good ‘ol fashion debate on the merits of #CommonCore. Missourians deserve that.” Apparently, state education officials aren’t interested in a true debate about Common Core, because I am now blocked from accessing the DESE Twitter page.

The tweet was sent the day after DESE officials hosted eight meetings throughout the state regarding the Common Core. Each meeting was conducted in the same way. The moderators read from scripts and refused to allow open dialogue. At the meeting in Springfield, the moderator can be heard telling the audience that they are “welcome to go ahead and leave” if they didn’t like how the meeting was being conducted.

I attended the meeting at Lindbergh, which was halted when citizens demanded to be heard.

Many people’s take-a-way from these meetings was that DESE was not interested in a true debate of the issue; they were more interested in controlling the message.

I have sent an email request to the commissioner and the head of the DESE communications department asking to be unblocked and to be told why my account had been blocked in the first place.

We shall see what they say. For now, it seems like just another example of the department trying to stifle debate about the Common Core.

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Send this article to your state senator and representative.  Since SB210 did not pass due to a filibuster threat, DESE is not being held accountable to any taxpayer or legislator on Common Core questions on cost or data retrieval.  

Why would a state agency funded by taxpayer dollars be allowed to block a taxpayer and educational writer/researcher from DESE's twitter account?  Is this because he asked for a debate on Common Core?  Ask your legislators this question.  If indeed this blocking has to do with Shuls' request for a debate, this is the height of bureaucratic arrogance.

If Common Core is so wonderful, why does DESE want to quash any serious discussion/questions about it?  Why didn't most Missourians learn about CCSS when the Governor and the Commissioner signed on to the adoption of them in 2009?  I guess you could tweet DESE and ask those questions but you may be blocked as well.

You gotta love government transparency.  It instills such trust in those bureaucrats in charge of educating your children.    

Is DESE telling the truth on Common Core Standards?

James Shuls, education policy analyst at Show-Me Institute, finds claims that the Common Core State Standards will not influence instructional practices downright disingenuous and obviously false.

He writes in Jay P. Greene's blog an article challenging Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education's claims that CCSS will not affect curriculum.  From Constructive Criticism for Common Core Constructivism Deniers:

In a recent Twitter exchange, the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education informed me that the CCSS don’t “tell teachers how to teach.” This is a phrase that has been echoing across the country as the Common Core has come under attack from the left and the right.

The fact is that curriculum standards don’t tell teachers how to teach in the same way that a high jump bar doesn’t tell a jumper how to jump. You could theoretically jump over a high jump bar in whatever way you would like; but because of how the jump is structured there is a clear advantage to doing the old Fosbury Flop.

It is clear from documents on the Common Core website and from the discourse throughout the country that these new standards encourage constructivist teaching practices. Take for example these two quotes from a Key Points in Common Core Math document.

• The standards stress not only procedural skill but also conceptual understanding, to make sure students are learning and absorbing the critical information they need to succeed at higher levels ‐ rather than the current practices by which many students learn enough to get by on the next test, but forget it shortly thereafter, only to review again the following year.
• Having built a strong foundation K‐5, students can do hands on learning in geometry, algebra and probability and statistics. Students who have completed 7th grade and mastered the content and skills through the 7th grade will be well‐ prepared for algebra in grade 8.

Common Core developers themselves are saying that traditional methods of math instruction aren’t working and students should be learning through “hands on learning.” It is reasonable to assume the tests will likely favor constructivist teaching practices.

Read more here.

Check out Shuls' twitter feed and particularly this tweet:

James V. Shuls ‏@shulsie 21h

@ericalayne @MOEducation Me: "Where does the curriculum come from?" Principal: "Common Core State Standards" Direct quote

Wonder how DESE will spin that tweet?
 

Packed Hearing for MO Senate Bill 210 (Anti-Common Core)

A packed room heard testimony from both sides on the Common Core issue in Jefferson City today.  One witness not heard from because of time restraint was James Shuls.  His written testimony may be found here, Missouri Should Avoid Implementation of the Common Core:

First, I will discuss the arguments that supposedly support adoption of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) and demonstrate why these arguments are vacuous. Moreover, I will demonstrate that if the real objective of CCSS is the centralized planning of education standards, then the CCSS do not go far enough. Next, I will offer what I suggest will be the real impact of implementing the CCSS.

Full Testimony (PDF)

Don't Worry about what the Legislature would do with Money from Higher Taxes. DESE, Governor Nixon and the State Board are Spending Money the State Doesn't Have Now.

The following was posted on HotAir's Green Room, written by Patrick Ishamel from the Show-Me Institute regarding a St.  Louis Post Dispatch editorial.  The Post Dispatch contends Missouri needs more money (tax increases) for government programs; Ishmael argues the expansion of government programs stifles the free market.  Ishmael believes it would be a nightmare if the Legislature had $4 Billion at its disposal to institute more governmental spending.  

Regarding education in Missouri (and other states), the outrage of the Institute should include concern about the incredible spending of money the state doesn't have for educational mandates that are unconstitutional, unproven, untested and underfunded.  It's  concerning to realize DESE, Governor Nixon and the State Board of Education have already signed us onto to at least $350,000,000 (or more) in unfunded mandates via Common Core standards via the Pioneer Institute study and a $1.6 BILLION early childhood program with Race to the Top type mandates. 

Perhaps the Show-Me Institute should do a study on the debt and mandates these agencies and politicians have signed taxpayers into funding without legislative approval.  Maybe there should be a followup article by the Post Dispatch entitled "Imagine (or, just sit back and watch it happening in real time) how much debt the governor, DESE and the State Board of Education can rack up with nary a legislative vote." 

The legislature has become impotent. It cannot (or will not) stop the actions by governmental agencies, politicians and appointed officials which create more taxpayer debt.  This is evidenced in what has occurred in the signing onto RTTT (or RTTT like mandates), Common Core, and Early Childhood mandates.  It doesn't matter if citizens are taxed an additional $4 Billion; our agencies are instituting  programs (without tax increases) Missouri or the Federal government cannot possibly fund.   The state bill for education alone is approaching an unfunded $2 Billion. 

How's that for a nightmare?

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The Post-Dispatch’s $4 Billion Tax Hike

Missouri’s major dailies have had quite a run over the past few days. Last week, the Kansas City Star told readers that the state’s governor needed “to promote reasonable revenue-enhancing measures” — taxes — and put more money toward state programs. The notion of “government investment” features prominently in the piece, as increasingly has become the case when “revenue-enhancing measures” are suggested, post-Stimulus. What the editorial board doesn’t say is that the city’s own local taxes are already among the highest in the region.

Stratospheric municipal taxes overlayed with an even higher state tax burden? This won’t turn out well.

But yesterday the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, The Star‘s cross-state peer, spectacularly one-upped the KC paper. Missouri lawmakers are constrained by law in how much they can tax and spend each year and are billions below the statutory limit. How much of that difference would the Post-Dispatch like to spend?

All $4 billion of it.

A lot of folks purchased Mega Millions lottery tickets last week dreaming about what they could do with $640 million. Imagine what $4 billion would do for Missouri.

Let’s be clear: That’s a radical tax hike proposal, tucked into what is otherwise an uninspired editorial about state and local governing responsibilities. Combined state and local tax rates have stayed roughly the same for decades in Missouri, but the Post-Dispatch would have those rates hurdle skyward to provide more public services and somehow, some way, improve the economy above the status quo.

Even the suggestion that raising taxes and spending would help the state makes no sense by the newspaper’s own standards. State and local tax rates have actually increased slightly since 1980, the apparent “good ol’ days” implied by the editorial, from 8.6% then to 9% today. The newspaper can’t even claim that plummeting tax burdens are why Missouri is suffering economically, since by its own metric, taxes have actually increased over the last 30 years.

The proposal is mostly academic here in Missouri, as taxpayers and policy makers in the state would blanche at the thought of such a hike, but that doesn’t mean the suggestion isn’t troubling. If implemented, the plan would have awful real-world implications — giving families less to spend and taking capital out of the market for use in less productive government programs. It’s a roadmap to ruin, and yet the Post-Dispatch apparently doesn’t see it.

“Imagine what $4 billion would do for Missouri”? No, imagine if legislators took their cues from Missouri’s newspapers. What a nightmare that would be.