Petrilli’s Common Core “North Star” for Atheistic, “Choice” Moms
Fordham Institute President Michael Petrilli sells the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) for a living.
Petrilli has a bachelors degree in political science. He is not a teacher. He is a guy who landed on the soft fluffery of a think tank living.
He has testified in CCSS’ favor before lawmakers in Tennessee, Wisconsin, Ohio, Indiana, Missouri, and Arkansas.
His Fordham Institute associate, Kathleen Porter-Magee, testified in their favor in Wisconsin, and Fordham Institute founder Chester Finn has testified in their favor in Michigan.
Fordham Institute even has a webpage, Common Core Watch, which might be more accurately named, Common Core Defense and Promotion.
The bottom line for Fordham Institute is that it views itself as standards-grading experts. In their formal testimony in favor of CCSS, their “evidence” centers on their own skewed standards-grading “findings.” And even there, Fordham Institute did not “grade” CCSS as superior to all state standards. Nevertheless, Fordham Institute adamantly sells CCSS as though CCSS has been empirically tested and proven to deliver on some miracle promise of American Global Competitiveness brought about by nothing more than “standards sameness”– or, as Fordham Institute gravy trainBill Gates pushes, the “unleashing” of “powerful market forces” to produce “an large base of customers eager to buy products.”
Petrilli’s testimony in Indiana is particularly telling. I have cited it before.
In true Fordham Institute form, Petrilli urges Indiana to keep CCSS– even though Fordham Institute did not “grade” CCSS as “superior” to Indiana state standards:
First, you have already invested time and money into implementing the new standards. They have momentum. Calling for a do-over would waste the millions of man hours already invested — and potentially cost the state of Indiana more money than proceeding with the Common Core.Second, it’s not clear that returning to your old standards would put Indiana on a path toward higher student achievement. For while you had some of the best standards in the country for over a decade, you also had one of the worst student achievement records on the National Assessment of Educational Progress. Indiana was a classic case of good standards not actually having an impact in the classroom. You need a different way forward.Third, if you decide to opt out of the Common Core, you will be opting Indiana’s teachers and students out of an opportunity to participate in the incredible wave of innovation that these standards are unleashing. It’s as if the whole world is moving to smart phones and tablets while you’re sticking with a rotary. [Emphasis added.]
Sure, says Petrilli, Indiana had great standards, “some of the best in the country,” but Petrilli’s Common Core “North Star” for Atheistic, “Choice” Moms | deutsch29:
