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Price for State Board to Adopt Common Core Standards Is Simply Too High

by Eddie | 10:54 am, July 30, 2010 | 2 Comments

Well, Monday is the State Board of Education’s moment of truth: the decision whether or not to adopt Common Core standards. What once looked like an outcome not in doubt has changed in recent days. A great Ed News Colorado story today by Todd Engdahl lays it out well.

Some of the decisions made by the State Board are pretty cut and dry, many of an administrative nature. From time to time they are faced with more momentous choices. Monday’s vote certainly is one of them. My understanding — based on the Ed News report as well as what my Education Policy Center friends are hearing — is that of the Board’s seven members, two are definitely opposed (Peggy Littleton and Marcia Neal) and one is leaning that way. Board chairman Bob Schaffer could turn out to be the deciding vote.

It’s kind of a Catch-22: Voting Yes on Common Core opens up a potential Pandora’s Box of greater federal control and involvement over Colorado parents and schools. Voting No means effectively ruling out Colorado’s chances to bring home up to $175 million in U.S. Department of Education Race to the Top reform dollars. (Note: Over the four years of the grant award, that probably will amount to less than one-half of one percent of Colorado’s total K-12 revenues.)

I’ve thought long and hard about the matter, and believe that the price for adopting Common Core is too high. Colorado can continue to move forward on education reform and make tough decisions without the major federal entanglement it would entail. I agree with the Heritage Foundation’s Lindsey Burke:

…the Obama Administration’s push for national standards and tests, threatens the long-established right of parents to direct their children’s education and confuses a proper understanding of federalism. States model federalism for children by setting standards, tests, and curriculum. But that important lesson in self-government will be another unintended casualty of this standards overhaul now that the federal government is overreaching to set the educational terms for local schools….

But it’s not just our deep-rooted principal of federalism that is at stake in President Obama’s education agenda; it’s also our ongoing pursuit of excellence that hangs in the balance.

Adding weight, Matt Ladner’s latest in-depth analysis effectively exposes the weak arguments of some leaders advocating for the adoption of Common Core — those who are trying to tell us just to relax and not worry about the whole thing.

Sorry, I can’t relax, especially with Obama’s education secretary Arne Duncan pushing the envelope more and more on the federal role in education. The more I learn about Common Core, the more concerned I am about what a rash decision to approve them could mean for Colorado’s current and future students, like me. State Board member Peggy Littleton brought the important issue to our attention a couple months ago, and I’m very glad she did.

Also of interest on this topic: Listen to the new 10-minute iVoices podcast as Kit Carson School District’s Gerald Keefe explains why he and other rural superintendents are pushing back against the effort to enact national standards.

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Comments

  1.   Heather Cundari
      July 30th, 2010 @ 5:30 pm

    All I have to say Eddie is WELL SAID!!!!

    I hope your there on Monday to speak for the rest of us who agree with you. I am working and alas, cannot attend but I was FURIOUS hearing about the federal agenda they are pushing.

    IT IS UP TO PARENTS to educate their children, it is NOT the job of the federal government. They have made enough mistakes and enough mess, we don’t need their meddling in our business! Below is an email I copied from Peggy Littleton who is also against it and is wanting to see people attend the meeting and be heard. Please please please attend if you can! Thank you again for your great letter!

    I am inviting the media to attend so consider the following:

    · If possible, be there early to sign up to testify, but don’t let it stop you if you can’t arrive until later. With only 90 minutes available, we can have 30 comments at 3 min each or 45 at 2 min each. Take this into consideration when speaking. Having the board room filled to capacity at 60 will be excellent! If need be, we will fill the lobby as well.

    · Be respectful to all at all times, even if they disagree with you.

    · Keep your comments brief and focus on one point of the following: *why not the Common Core, *why stay with the CO model content standards, *what do we gain by keeping CO’s standards, or *what do we lose by signing on to the CC.

    · If another person has covered a topic, pick a new one to cover.

    · Bring small signs to hold that convey a message to the people that the press will consider newsworthy.

    Monday, August 2, 2010

    Opportunity for Public Comment

    Convened by Board Member Peggy Littleton

    7:30 a.m. to 9:15 a.m.

    This is an opportunity to provide testimony to the State Board of Education on the adoption of the common core standards. In addition to Ms. Littleton, other board members may be present. Testimony may be limited to up to three minutes per person depending on the number of individuals wishing to testify.

    Special Meeting of the State Board of Education

    Monday, August 2, 2010, 9:30 a.m. to 10:30 a.m.

    The State Board will convene (by phone) to vote whether to adopt the common core standards.

    The Opportunity for Public Comment and the Special Meeting will be held in the Colorado Department of Education State Board Room

    201 E. Colfax Avenue, Room 101

    Denver, CO 80203.

    ***

    You may listen to the proceedings by going to the State Board of Education webpage located at http://www.cde.state.co.us/index_sbe.htm,

    scrolling down on the page and clicking on the link:

    Click here to listen live to the State Board Regular Meeting

    Note: There will be no sound until the proceeding begins.

  2.   Cindy L.
      July 30th, 2010 @ 6:11 pm

    If this is passed nearly 100,000 readers of The Constitutionalist Today will be made informed and whomever voted for this decision to allow more of the Socialist Progressive control over our kids, all for blood money… they will loose favor among the people of Colorado. This 175 million is bribery by the FED’s to gain more control over our kids hearts and minds. Government has shown to be a very poor decider of standards in education.

    When a math or english class can be co-opted to also teach immorality rather than just math or english then it is a sign of a failing educational system. We pay federal taxes only to have a trickle returned and when what little is returned it is used to bribe us (our own money) then it is time to say NO more.

    We have got to say NO to the bureaucratizing of education.

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