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Tuesday, December 1, 2015

ESEA Federal Education Alert by a NGO and a Parent’s Organization. Whose Primary Concern is for the Students? » Missouri Education Watchdog

ESEA Federal Education Alert by a NGO and a Parent’s Organization. Whose Primary Concern is for the Students? » Missouri Education Watchdog:

ESEA Federal Education Alert by a NGO and a Parent’s Organization. Whose Primary Concern is for the Students?

whiteboard advisors & ESEA


The privately funded NGO Whiteboard Advisors sent out an email alert regarding the pending ESEA reauthorization.  It is a group that describes itself as a consulting firm and has extensive public/private partnership relationships:

whiteboard advisors & ESEA 2


Education is a big business with marketing needed to fit public policy. Whiteboard Advisors provides a service for businesses so they can determine how best to implement these policies. Even if you aren’t an “insider” in the education reform circles, it’s an invaluable site to read so you can figure out what the elites are planning for your student, state legislature, local school district, and state educational agencies.
While any ESEA reauthorization will affect the business community, it also affects the students.  Who is writing about the effect on students?  It’s not Whiteboard Advisors or other private NGOs.  Organizations/parents with no outside or special interest funding are filling in the rest of the narrative on why this reauthorization is not good for students, public education, and states’ rights to direct/develop education.  From Truth in American Education and The ESEA Reauthorization Conference Report Is Now Public:

The conference report for the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, now called the Every Student Succeeds Act, has been made public.  It is 1,059 pages long and Congress is somehow supposed to throughly vet this bill and vote in two days.  This is simply not acceptable.
The House Education and the Workforce Committee puts a positive spin on the bill.  They claim:
  • Prohibits any agent of the federal government — including the secretary of education — from incentivizing, forcing, or coercing states into adopting Common Core, or interfering with a state’s standards or assessments.
  • Rejects policies and programs the secretary has used to coerce states to adopt Common Core, including waivers of K-12 education law and Race to the Top.
  • Prevents the secretary from imposing additional burdens on states and school districts through the regulatory process in areas of standards, assessments, and state accountability plans.
First, as it relates to Common Core, this bill is like slamming the barn door shut after the horses have already run out. The damage has been done.
Second, the bill still requires state plans and gives the Secretary of Education enormous authority to approve or disapprove them which in reality negates the claims that this bill do anything to help states get rid of Common Core.
Third, this bill expands early childhood funding and thus federal strings into pre-school.  The bill’s language still reflects a change in No Child Left Behind’s application to “all public elementary school and secondary school students” with “all public school students.”
Fourth, this bill still contains a testing mandate and the opt-out amendment that was added to the original House bill has been stripped out.
Let your voice be heard, contact your member of Congress today!
You can read the bill for yourself below or download here.


Activist Cheri Kiesecker in Colorado points out the data required under this act is expanded and states must align to the USDOEd Secretary’s mandates:
ESSA Pg 616-617- Please read. strings attached- an MOU contract that promises a pipeline of data -mental 
ESEA Federal Education Alert by a NGO and a Parent’s Organization. Whose Primary Concern is for the Students? » Missouri Education Watchdog: