When students take the Smarter Balanced Assessment this year, many may score poorly due to the computer-driven nature of the test, not because they did not know the material.  The Smarter Balanced Assessment is an online assessment, although a paper version will be made available during a transition period.  The flawed construction of the computer assessment is the subject of a critical report by education consultant Steven Rasmussen. Read the Education Week article about Steve Rasmussen’s Report and Steve Rasmussen’s report itself .

Rasmussen urges people to share his report with their friends. Please do so! And consider opting your child out of the Common Core Assessment.

Common Core proponents continue to make unsubstantiated claims about the standards’ merits and the way they were created. This commentary by Anthony Cody dispels those myths. It was posted on the Education Week site in 2013, but it still holds true.

Read the commentary.

(Image courtesy of Stuart Miles at FreeDigitalPhotos.net)

Here is another concerned mom’s testimony before her State Board of Education in Arkansas. There have been many parents speaking out against what is happening to their children. When will the legislators and the members of the boards of education start listening??

The Washington State House of Representatives now has a bill to eliminate the Common Core!

House Bill 2165, sponsored by Representative Elizabeth Scott, calls for a revision of the Essential Academic Learning Requirements (EALRs) such that they do NOT align with the Common Core, and it calls for Washington to withdraw from the Smarter Balanced Assessments Consortium.

The happy news is that bills such as this one and Senate Bill 6030 against the Common Core, will be alive for two years. Even though the bills may not become law during this session, they still have a chance next year.

They say politics make strange bedfellows, and it’s true. A coalition of very progressive grassroots progressives, very conservative grassroots conservatives, and the whole spectrum in between have joined to reject the Common Core State Standards. At the same time, Democrat Senator Marilyn Chase and Republican Senator Pam Roach have co-sponsored Senate Bill 6030 to reject the Common Core and return to what we had before–the Washington Essential Academic Learning Requirements or “EALRs.”

While we have never been fans of the the EALRs, at least they were Washington State EALRs. This bill is a first step in returning education control to the state level. When we once again have control over our own state standards, we will have the ability to improve them.

Read Washington State Senate Bill 6030 here.

Stay tuned. There will be a similar bill soon in the Washington State House of Representatives.

The GED, the General Educational Development test, is produced by the American Council on Education. In 2011, it  partnered with Pearson and the GED was aligned  with the Common Core State Standards. Pearson is heavily involved with both the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium (SBAC) and with Partnership for the Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) which are the assessment consortia developing assessments for the Common Core State Standards.

Beginning in 2014, students taking the GED took the revised test aligned with the Common Core State Standards

According to the e-newsletter SCENE, about 540,000 students earned their GED in 2013. In 2014 with the changes in the GED, that number has dropped to about 55,000. Read the article.

Some states have stopped requiring the GED and have begun to require alternate testing. See the map.

The GED’s new alignment with the Common core means that even students that were homeschooled must become knowledgeable about the Common Core standards if they want to earn their GED.

The new GED test will not only flunk more students but will discourage many from even attempting the exam.

Research increasingly shows that young children are not ready for the types of questions presented in the Common Core Assessments and practice exercises. At a conference held at Notre Dame in September 2013, Dr.Megan Koschnick explained how the Common Core questions are causing stress and harm to young children.

Although data collection is not found within the Common Core Standards themselves, other federal initiatives mandate the extensive collection of personal student information, and the two Common Core Assessment Consortia must allow the federal government access to the data. In addition, there are many other data-collection initiatives, some of the begun many years ago before the Obama Administration. Jane Robbins of the American Principles Project explains data collection under the Common Core.

Here’s another good example of an expression that means different things to different people: School Choice.

Of course people want choices. Who wouldn’t? However, often various education choices are either deliberately or unintentionally mixed together. Private school, homeschooling, online schools, vouchers,  and charter schools are often mixed together as “choices,” but there are big differences.

Private school, homeschooling, online schools, vouchers,  and charter schools are often mixed together as “choices,” but there are big differences. Within these choices, private schools, homeschools, and non-government online schools are independent of government money. In homeschooling and independent online schooling the parents are free to choose a curriculum that fits the child and the parents’ goals for that child. In private schools, the directors of the school choose the curriculum, but must be responsive to the parents’ wishes. However with government online schools, vouchers, and charter schools, all funded by government money, there are strings attached. Various aspects of the education the child receives will be dictated by the state. For example, currently in Washington State, all charter schools must follow the Common Core Standards.

There is a more insidious difference with government-funded education options. They work to destroy representative government. With charter schools, the school board members may be chosen by the charter corporation, not elected by the parents or taxpaying citizens, and thus they are really not accountable to the parents or taxpayers. Some say parents can “vote with their feet” and withdraw their children, but what about taxpayers who don’t have children in that school? They still have to pay taxes for that school.  In New Orleans, all the schools are charter schools, so the people there are disenfranchised with respect to the schools.

I rarely defend the current public school system, but at least the structure is compatible with representative government. The people elect the school board, and the school board makes education decisions for the district. If the people are dissatisfied, they can elect different school board members. I admit, in reality different political interests tug in multiple directions and a sort of stalemate often occurs, but the structure still honors representative government. In the Charter school system the parents’ voting input is so indirect that they are effectively out of the governance structure.

Many people think charter schools are akin to a free-market option. If the government is funding the school and controlling the curriculum, how can it be a free market option?

Please read Anita Hoge’s commentary, “Common Core, Choice, and Charter Schools.” Please be aware that even though the Obama administration is directing the development of Charter Schools, as well as promoting the Common Core and data collection, these concepts have been promoted by people from both parties for decades.

Kindergarten used to be a place to paint pictures, play with clay, make friends, and learn a few social graces. Now it is a place to be assessed and started on the path to be molded into human capital.  What has happened to common sense?

Some teachers are beginning to speak out in defense of their students. Valerie Strauss of the Washington Post writes about a Florida teacher who refused to administer one of the Florida kindergarten assessments, the FAIR test. See the article.

Although she feared she would be fired, she just couldn’t bring herself to subject her students to the assessment. Her gutsy stand led to the principal’s decision to drop the assessment. Read the follow up story.

This trend of early assessments started before the appearance of the Common Core Standards and Assessments. Now that data collection through the Race to the Top and other mandates has become a priority, the assessment machine starts in kindergarten or earlier, giving rise to such non-governmental organizations as the Early Childhood Data Collaborative. The assessments drive the curriculum and facilitate the data collection.  It isn’t even clear whether the assessments reliably or validly measure what they’re supposed to be measuring, or whether constantly assessing students actually improves education. We appreciate people like this brave teacher who speak out against them.