3. Legislator or State Education Dept Actions --- This is what they are doing in the State of Florida and all other states should follow suit... - Dept of Education can decide to drop out of the two favored liberal testing consortiums, PARCC (FL is now in it) and SBAC. The Oklahoma Dept of Ed did this and is selecting own testing firm to develop tests, thus they eliminate worry of liberals salting exams with liberal philosophies or dumbing down the tests, or using computers to give better scores to some preferred ethnic or other groups. - Legislators can DEFUND Common Core per MI Rep Tom McMillan. Make sure the bill says state or local funds cannot be used to IMPLEMENT any national or Federal standards including Common Core. (from 7/5/2013 phone conference held by his office with Sandra Stotsky speaking.) - Local Groups or State Educators can form committees of representatives from Higher Education (colleges) to examine ACTUAL capability of Common Core graduates to be ready for higher education and for SELECTIVE colleges. Some quote CC developer David Coleman as saying math standards are set lower and are sufficient to get into non-selective colleges. Do this by getting representatives of higher level selective colleges look at standards by course and identify if they are sufficient for college courses. - Create Differential High School Diplomas - The State Education Dept. should create more than a standard high school graduation certificate, since Common Core is dumbed down. Create higher level graduation diploma (not prohibited by an Federal law or CC) only for those with defined higher level courses like Trigonometry. Thus schools can still offer higher quality math and other AP classes that were not watered down for CC standards. Example is higher level, more ambitious students can take higher level math not part of CC like Trig and Calculus. The Common Core exams wont test for those higher level subjects, so the schools would have to have their own exams. (from 7/5/2013 phone conference held by Mich. Reps office with Sandra Stotsky speaking.) - Initiate Efforts to Change the Appointed Education Commissioner position (like in Florida) to an ELECTED position so he (Dr. Tony Bennett) is accountable to voters and actually listens to parents, voters and taxpayers, rather than special interests and those who profit from a program like Common Core. - REDUCE Islam indoctrination in US textbooks by visiting CFNS.US and reading their reports on how Florida and other History textbooks have been massively revised to glorify Islam. Write your legislators demanding that bills be enacted to ensure all Florida (or your states) textbooks be free from religious and political subversion. (This is not defined in Common Core, but a side effect, since the favored Common Core textbook firm, Pearson, is doing this per a well researched report at CFNS.us . ) Watch this video. - Demand that legislators REVERSE a 2011 SB-2120 bill that removed the requirement to allow citizens to be on the Florida Dept of Education State Instructional Materials Commitee which selects textbooks, and reduced the number of textbook reviewers from 40 people to just TWO FDOE appointed & handpicked people. Read HERE about the FDOE sneaky, last minute tactic to remove citizen participation and public transparency over textbook selections and the resulting lawsuit by CFNS.us . The page has a link to download the actual CFNS.us lawsuit with the details in it. CFNS.us claims that the FDOE initiated the change after CFNS reported massive revisions in textbooks to indoctrinate students with only favorable statements about Islam and degrading statements about Christianity & Judaism. The secrecy of the new committee means it can also select books with highly liberal slants also. The FDOE did this very quietly on May 6, 2011 in a last-minute desperation move by getting new adoption-process language surreptitiously inserted into a so-called conforming budget bill - just three hours before the Florida legislature adjourned for this past session. No notice...no debate! It was rubber-stamp passed and sent to the Governor for his approval. - Demand legislators and the FL Dept of Education implement strong procedures to monitor computerized learning (i.e. virtual schools, eBooks, computerized testing, inbound online videos (like BrainPop) and learning aids) to ensure they are not incorporating any indoctrination of political or religious principles. Common Core in Florida requires computerized testing and many books will be in electronic format, so this is important. Public copies of all electronic learning files should be transparent, understandable and stored online for public access and review. The formal review process should also be public with hearings, video and audio recordings and studies be posted online for public review. - Legislation Needed to Protect Personal Privacy & STOP Collection of shareable data on students. I found these on the blog BadAssTeachers: – No collection of data from preschool to the first year out of high school – Eliminate the US DOE regulatory change allowing some student data to be shared with government agencies and research organizations – Modify FERPA by the U.S. Congressional action so no data can be shared without parent consent and so no such regulatory change can be made – Modify FERPA by U.S. Congressional action allowing students and families to sue in a court of law over privacy violations - A Teacher proposed these compromises if Common Core is to go forward: (my comments are in parentheses) Adopting CC in all states is part of a complete repealing of No Child Left Behind. (No reason to have two standards) New federal education legislation fully funds CC implementation and bans any public funds being spent on private corporation materials or tests. (i.e. exlcudes profiteers) All CC materials and resources will be produced, distributed, and monitored by the USDOE, and funded by federal and state resources allocated for education. (This may not be a good idea when liberals control the USDOE - I prefer the states do this). The USDOE will create a centralized web-based clearing house for educators to upload lesson plans and other resources for all teachers to implement CC. (good idea - create a teaching knowledgebase - I asked an administrator in the Lake County School District if they had something like this just for Florida County School Districts, and the answer was NO). States accepting federal funds and implementing CC must end immediately all high-stakes testing and linking teacher evaluations and pay to test scores. (Teachers dont like being ranked) NAEP assessments will be aligned with CC and then administered in 3rd, 8th, and 11th grades to random samples of students in all 50 states to create a data base for examining the effectiveness of CC. (Good idea of random samples vs 100% data tracking)
Posted on: Tue, 12 Nov 2013 18:52:27 +0000
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015