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Tuesday, April 5, 2011

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Common Core Curriculum Coalition

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Common Core Curriculum Coalition

Common Core Curriculum Coalition

Who's on board?

What brings liberal policy wonks together with corporate reformers and right-wing think tankers -- Linda Darling-Hammond, to Louis V. Gerstner, Jr., to Randi Weingarten, to Chester Finn, to Kati Haycock, in common cause? Why it's common core curriculum of course. This broad coalition is now represented as a list of signers on a statement drawn up by the Shanker Institute, the AFT's think tank. Missing as one might expect are Deb Meier along with many of the sharpest standardized testing critics. Diane Ravitch's name is also conspicuous in its absence. On the other side, where's the charter school and voucher organizations? I guess, since they're excluded from all such requirements, they probably couldn't care less.

I haven't seen anything like this since the bipartisan coalition behind NCLB during the early days of the