Thursday, January 28, 2016

Fact-checking Trump’s new anti-Common Core video - The Washington Post

Fact-checking Trump’s new anti-Common Core video - The Washington Post:

Fact-checking Trump’s new anti-Common Core video

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In the race for the GOP presidential nomination, Donald Trump has said little about education except to occasionally bash Common Core, the new academic standards that have been adopted by more than 40 states.
Now Trump has released a new 45-second video that reiterates his disgust with Common Core, a favorite target for many conservative politicians, but sheds little additional light on his ideas for how to improve American public schools.
“I’m a tremendous believer in education, but education has to be at the local level. We cannot have the bureaucrats in Washington telling you how to manage your child’s education,” Trump says in the video. “Common Core is a disaster. We can’t let it continue.”
Trump goes on to offer the nation’s high per-pupil spending and poor performance on international tests as proof of Common Core’s disastrous nature. His message is obviously resonating: The video has more than 1.7 million views. But is he right? Let’s take a look.
1. “We are rated 28 in the world, the United States. Think of it, 28 in the world. … Third-world countries are ahead of us.”
It’s not clear what Trump’s source for this figure is; his campaign spokeswoman did not respond to a request for clarification. It’s true, however, that the United States does not fare particularly well on Fact-checking Trump’s new anti-Common Core video - The Washington Post: