WATCH OUT FINLAND, HERE COMES ILLINOIS !
I was looking at the wording of the goals for the new curriculum in Illinois, the “Common Core Curriculum”, (which by the way is about the 1,876th curriculum change in the last 40 years), but then again, who’s keeping score? One of the curriculum statements reads, “the standards were developed while considering the standards of top performing countries”. So, one of the goals of the new curriculum is for Illinois to be right up there in the rankings with Finland, Denmark and similar countries at the top of the world rankings in education. Go Illini!
Finland would be a good target for Illinois. Finland has virtually no poverty, ninety-five percent of the people are of the same culture and speak the same language, and they have arguably the best preschool system in the entire world. Finland has free universal daycare for children from eight months to five years old. The state mandated ratio of teachers to children is as follows: for three years old and under, one teacher and two “nurses” for every twelve pupils. (One adult for every four kids). The Finns consider high quality daycare and nursery to kindergarten schooling to be absolutely critical. The municipalities fund the incredible teacher to pupil ratio.
Illinois is billions of dollars in debt, has the most corrupt politicians in the country, the lowest bond rating of all