NEA president Dennis Van Roekel has asked: “If you
don’t want it (common core), what do you want instead?"
The question assumes that something
is seriously wrong with American schools and that schools need to be fixed. We
are always working to improve teaching, but there is no crisis in teaching. The
real crisis is poverty.
What I want instead is: (1) dump the
CC$$ (for a quick summary of arguments, please see: http://skrashen.blogspot.com/2013/06/common-cores-claims-are-false.html (2) protect children from the impact of
poverty by investing more in food programs, health care, and libraries. (3) pay for (2) by reducing testing. A lot.
The question that Dennis Roekel asked is very typical of reformers. I work for State Ed. and my supervisor asks me the same question every time I bring up the difficulties that teachers and students are having meeting the demands of not just the common core, but the entire Reform Agenda. State Ed reformers spew out statistics like "The graduation rate for ELL's in NYS is 38%!" As if the common core would fix this.When I mention poverty. The typical answer is, "We will always have poverty and schools can't fix poverty" So I'm looking for a new job.
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