Scathing Purple Musings
Color me purple in Florida ALL Week
Chamber of Commerce Strikes Back at George Will For Criticizing Common Core
Boy, that was fast. It took only a few hours for US Chamber of Commerce CEO Thomas J. Donahue to respond to conservative columnist George Will’s shredding of Common Core and its proponents. Will called out the Chamber and others for engaging in “political dishonesty” intended to keep Core’s “nature and purpose to remain as cloudy as possible for as long as possible.” Writing in the Washington Pos
“We’ve Been VAMboozled” in Florida
So said United Teachers of Dade president Fedrick Ingram at yesterday’s “Walk a Mile in Our Schools” rally in Miami. From David Smiley’s report in the Miami Herald: A handful of local politicians participated in Friday’s rally, including Democratic state senators Oscar Braynon II and Dwight Bullard, and Miami-Dade School Board members Dorothy Bendross-Mindingall, Perla Tabares Hantman and Martin K
YESTERDAY
National Review: Common Core Marks Return to Mathematical Ignorance
David G. Bonagura’s column which details Common Core’s serious flaws in it’s math standards is the second anti-Core piece the conservative daily National Review has published this week. Writes Bonagura: The problem with Common Core is not that it provides standards, but that, despite its claims, there is a particular pedagogy that accompanies the standards. And this pedagogy is flawed, for, just
Pro School Choice Think-Tank Rips Florida’s “Tweak” to Common Core
Robert Holland is Senior Fellow for Education Policy at the Heartland Institute in Chicago. He pens the following letter-to-the-editor in the Bradenton Herald: The Florida Department of Education’s proposed revisions to the so-called Common Core State Standards amount to a little more than a public relations ploy, but not much more (Herald, “Florida schools officials propose 98 changes to Common C
Why it Will Be Main Stream Republicans – And Not the Tea Party – Which Will Sink Common Core
Its was easy for everyone to dismiss the early opposition to Common Core Standards as crack-pot tea party stuff when it came from Michelle Malkin and Glenn Beck. To be sure, the references to communism were over-the-top, but the arguments based on concerns regarding federal control and data sharing still have merit. The early surge of opposition did indeed come from tea party groups but it was moc
JAN 16
Gary Chartrand’s Irreconcilable Conflicts of Interest
This week’s report that the Jacksonville Public Education Fund is proposing a new school grade formula marks the second time the think tank founded and financed by chairman of Florida’s board of education, Gary Chartrand, has flexed it’s muscles. In June, JPEF’s top policy wonk, Jason Rose was on Tony Bennett’s cozy little “task force” that Chartrand ordered to ironically look into changing the f
JAN 15
Are Stew’s Standards All About Keeping Florida’s Race to the Top Cash?
Fifteen percent. That’s the number of changes allowed in Common Core Standards ambiguous loosely defined copyright and the estimated amount of largely cosmetic changes Florida education commissioner Pam Stewart made to Common Core Standards to make them “truly ours.” The other number is $375 million. It’s how much Florida has left of the Race to the Top grant its was awarded by the Obama administr
JAN 14
Most of Stewart’s Common Core Changes “Just Add Clarity”
Respected conservative education blogger, Shane Vander Hart, doesn’t think much of that changes Florida education commissioner made to Florida’s Common Core Standard and poked holes in the process Stewart and the FLDOE used. The commenting period ordered by Florida Governor Rick Scott ended on 10/31/14. The comments were supposedly evaluated and standards rewritten in 2 1/2 months (over the hol
Florida’s Cut and Paste Education Standards
A cryptic question came from a Common Core supporter today during the FLDOE’s workshop to explain Florida’s standards which we told are “truly our own.” Kathleen McGrory of the Miami Herald reports for the Times/Herald Tallahasee Bureau: Only a handful of people asked questions during Tuesday morning’s workshop on the proposed revisions to the Common Core State Standards. One question was technica
Michelle Rhee’s Florida Rep Says No Parent Trigger This Year
From Gradebook’s Jeff Solochek: A national advocacy group that in recent years has pressured Florida lawmakers to adopt the controversial “parent trigger” school takeover plan will not push that initiative again in 2014. Instead, StudentsFirst will spend its political capital urging the Legislature to improve the state’s financial reporting so that families can see clearly how spending is tied to
JAN 13
Stew’s Standards Have Arrived
From Kathleen McGrory in the Tampa Bay Times: TALLAHASSEE — Hoping to incorporate public input and assuage criticism, state education officials on Monday released 98 proposed changes to the controversial Common Core State Standards. The suggestions represent additions and minor tweaks to the national benchmarks, which have been adopted in more than 45 states and outline what students should know a
Skepticism in the Florida Senate on Common Core Roll-Out
Pam Stewart will be back at the legislature to deliver Florida’s own set of Common Core Standards, but it’s quite clear that senators on both sides of the aisle are skeptical of her being able to deliver on the entire package. Writes Kathleen McGrory: TALLAHASSEE — When Pam Stewart became state education commissioner in September, lawmakers said they would give her time to untangle the complicated
JAN 12
“Common Core Catastrophe”
Williamson Evers is a research fellow at the Hoover Institution and former U.S. assistant secretary of Education. Pittsburg Herald Tribune reporter Eric Heyl interviewed the George W. Bush appointee and got his thoughts on Common Core. ….it’s a kind of utopian project to align all the classrooms in the country to be doing roughly the same things. Anything like that is just an unimaginably difficul
For-Profit Charter Schools Want Standard Contracts to Dodge Accountability
Florida republican legislators are using predictable – and false – talking points to justify their latest charter school reform bill. Erin Kourkounis reports in the Tampa Tribune: …Three changes set for consideration in the state Legislature would inject the Florida Department of Education into a process now largely controlled at the school district level. The proposals would require a review of a
Rick Scott’s Common Core Political Problems
Education commissioner Pam Stewart has provided much-needed calm in Florida’s education universe. Rick Scott probably wishes he had her in place all along instead of ideologues Gerard Robinson and Tony Bennett. But Scott would probably admit that those were the kind of guys he wanted when he was elected in 2010. And he was smitten by the carefully crafted Michelle Rhee story and had completely bou
JAN 11
Michael Bileca’s One Size Fits All Charter School Bill(s)
Mark me down as skeptical anytime I hear one of Florida’s republican legislators say are they are worried about friction between school boards and charter schools. And then some new enlightened piece of legislation will take care of all that. Let’s consider a bill under consideration in Rep. Michael Bileca’s (R-Miami) education subcommittee for Choice and Innovation. Sun Sentinel reporter Scott T