Process Matters in a Democracy: Common Core Fails the Test
Our nation is nominally a democracy, though this concept is greatly frayed and largely impaired. One of the core concepts that holds a democratic nation together, and allows it to move forward in a reasonably united fashion is the processes by which decisions are made. Decisions that violate democratic process are not legitimate.
Process matters.
In Poughkeepsie, New York, last week we saw the effects of a process gone awry. What was billed as a two-hour long community forum to hear concerns over the Common Core was dominated for the first ninety minutes by presentations from State Education Commissioner John King. Parents were given less than thirty minutes to speak, and were repeatedly interrupted by officials from the stage who wanted to dispute what they had to say. The result was tumult and frustration. And even this facsimile of democracy has been cut short, with future such forums being cancelled.
But the real failure in process had occurred years before. Let's take a look at what went wrong here. The federal Department of Education was created over the opposition of many people who