Christie: Dump Common Core education standards
PEMBERTON — Navigating New Jersey interests and a likely presidential campaign, Gov. Chris Christie on Thursday proposed dropping national Common Core education standards he once supported but have since become a lighting rod issue for Republican voters.
The governor, speaking at Burlington County College in Pemberton, declared Common Core is "simply not working." Christie wants to assemble a team to develop a state-based group to develop "new standards right here in New Jersey, not 200 miles away on the banks of the Potomac River."
The speech is Christie's first policy speech delivered in New Jersey and his fourth such speech since taking concrete steps toward a presidential campaign. The first three speeches – which included topics such as national security and economic growth – were given in the early presidential voting state of New Hampshire.
"It's now been five years since Common Core was adopted and the truth is that it's simply not working," Christie said.
"It has brought only confusion and frustration to our parents and has brought distance between our teachers and the communities where they work," he said. "Instead of solving problems in our classrooms, it is creating new ones."
The statement comes five years after New Jersey became one of the first states to adopt Common Core, which are national standards that outline skills every child should learn at each grade level. Christie voiced his support for the standards early in his first term.
"We are doing Common Core in New Jersey and we're going to continue. And this is one of those areas where I have agreed more with the President than not," Christie said in August of 2013 at an education conference of the KIPP Public Charter Schools. "I think part of the Republican opposition you see in some corners in Congress is a reaction, that knee-jerk reaction that is happening in Washington right now, that if the president likes something the Republicans in Congress don't. If the Republicans in Congress like something, the president doesn't."
But as public concern over the standards grew, Christie's stance changed. He issued an executive order last year to create a commission to study Common Core and in February he said he had "grave concerns" about the standards.
Currently, Christie declared it's time "to do something different" in New Jersey and accused Washington D.C. and President Obama of pulling "education away from our neighborhoods."
Christie called for his "point-by-point review" of state standards to be completed by the end of the year. It will measure state standards and provide recommendations for instructional practices, he said.
"It is time to have standards that are even higher and come directly from our communities," Christie said.
However, Christie stopped short of calling for an end to Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers, or PARCC, testing in New Jersey.
"This will in no way affect our efforts to continue effective testing and measurement of our students through the PARCC test," Christie said.
"We must continue to review and improve that test based on results, not fear or speculation. I will not permit New Jersey to risk losing vital federal education funds because some would prefer to let the perfect get in the way of the good," he said. "We Christie: Dump Common Core education standards | NJ.com: