Latest News and Comment from Education

Thursday, April 11, 2013

UPDATE: Missouri Education Watchdog: Common Core Standards and JC Penney's: Tales of Failure?

Missouri Education Watchdog: Common Core Standards and JC Penney's: Tales of Failure?:


Message to DESE: Please Allow Comments and Questions on Your Common Core Videos

The latest from DESE and another Common Core video:








Do we have to wait until Chris Nicastro comes to town hall meetings (if Senate Bill 210 passes) to discuss Common Core and ask questions?  Two main points in this video: Common Core standards will ensure students are successful and this principal talks about the time that would be wasted if the standards were not implemented.  What she doesn't tell you is that these standards that she thinks will make students successful are untested and non-researched.  How can she make these claims?

With all due respect, I would like to ask this teacher what she thinks about these articles about Common Core in kindergarten and the resulting disaster on children:


  •  http://www.edweek.org/media/joint_statement_on_core_standards.pdf....Statement signed by 

And Yet Another Teacher Says "Enough"

Here is another letter from a teacher disillusioned with Common Core and other special interest education reform mandates.  I don't know where this teacher is from, but she might as well have been from Missouri because, well, we are ALL "common".  How will DESE spin this letter?  What will be different in Missouri since we are all under the same mandates?

 From bgfay750blogspot.com and I am a teacher, and I am tired:

*********************************************************************** 
by savanna 

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere


Common Core Standards and JC Penney's: Tales of Failure?

The Wall Street Journal wrote about Ron Johnson leaving as Penney's CEO as the company has floundered under his leadership.  One paragraph caught my eye and could be applied to the adoption/implementation Common Core process.  From Penney CEO Out, Old Boss Back In:

The board's decision ends a brief and turbulent career in the corner office for Mr. Johnson. He arrived at Penney to great fanfare in November 2011, but lost the confidence of directors and investors after he rolled out an ambitious plan to reinvent Penney's stores without following the usual retail practice of testing the changes first. Sales tanked, with no sign of improvement. In the most recent fourth quarter, including the crucial holiday season, sales dropped 28.4%, contributing to a net loss of $552 million, the worst of the year. 

Mr. Johnson's ambitious plan to reinvent stores without first running a retail test to determine if the plan 



Teacher Quits Because of Common Core. How Would DESE Respond?

From the Washington Post and Teacher’s resignation letter: ‘My profession … no longer exists’:

STEM rules the day and “data driven” education seeks only conformity, standardization, testing and a zombie-like adherence to the shallow and generic Common Core, along with a lockstep of oversimplified so-called Essential Learnings. Creativity, academic freedom, teacher autonomy, experimentation and innovation are being stifled in a misguided effort to fix what is not broken in our system of public education and particularly not at Westhill.

A long train of failures has brought us to this unfortunate pass. In their pursuit of Federal tax dollars, our legislators have failed us by selling children out to private industries such as Pearson Education. The New York State United Teachers union has let down its membership by failing to mount a much more effective and vigorous campaign against this same costly and dangerous debacle. Finally, it is with sad reluctance that I say our own administration has been both