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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsDiane Ravitch Discovers a Capitalist Plot
The Common Core standards... championed by the Obama administration and the usual RW stink tanks and multi-millionaires... are setting kids and schools up to fail.
Why? (Do you really have to ask? ) Well, $$$$. Though she's too polite to say so in so many words.
I'm not. It's Disaster Capitalism come to education. And the whole monied/political class is fixin' to get in on the gravy train. And that includes aristos affiliated w. BOTH parties.
Here's how it works:
>>For months, school officials in many states have warned parents to expect proficiency rates on Common Core-aligned tests to plummet.
They have warned that the proportion of students rated proficient was likely to drop by as much as 30%.
When this happens, it will make public education in America look just as bad as the corporate reformers have been claiming.
When New York administered the first Common Core tests last spring, a copy of one fifth grade test was leaked to a Daily News reporter. She sent it to me and I studied it and concluded that the test questions were similar in difficulty to what was typically seen on an eighth grade NAEP test. I went to the NAEP website, looked at the released items and questions, and ranked the fifth grade test as difficult for an eighth grader.
Here is a report that I just received from the testing coordinator of a high-performing school in one of the best districts in New York:
Just to let you know that because I am my schools test coordinator I just looked at the scores for the ELA. We are a high achieving school. Last year only 5 students in grades 3, 4 and 5 got a level 1. Now it is 32. Approximately 40% of our students scored levels 3 and 4 this year down from about 80% last year. What does this mean? Nothing because a test that measures skills that could not possibly be taught and is developmentally too hard is INVALID.>>>>
more:http://dianeravitch.net/
pa28
(6,145 posts)A similar thing is happening right now with the post office and unfortunately Democrats are helping.
Smarmie Doofus
(14,498 posts)Doesn't it just give ya' warm glow?
Igel
(35,191 posts)As many Democrats as Republicans are eyebrow deep in the crap. By focusing just on the others, you give one side leave to do as it wants.
Obama/Duncan are making things every bit as bad as Bush II/whoever did.
FiveGoodMen
(20,018 posts)It SHOULD also be D v. R, but too many of the Dems are on the right and not the left.
BlueManFan
(256 posts)every time you bought an aluminum can you helped Goldman Sachs game the system. We are all complicit when we let them write the rules and then enforce them on the least of us. As a higher education professor I can tell you-----weep for the future of learning.
chervilant
(8,267 posts)Before I left Houston to get home to Newton County, I was teaching college algebra, trig and pre-cal at a small community college. I found that the vast majority of our students lacked even rudimentary math skills. They knew the classic jingle taught to most students to embed PEMDAS, but few could tell me the meaning of "order of operations"!
When I partnered with these students, and helped them see "the bigger picture," they were clearly capable of understanding the math, and their grades improved measurably.
Many students asked me "why didn't anyone explain this to me before?!?" It's like this huge psychic wound -- growing up thinking you're too dumb to get it, only to find out you've been lied to your entire life.
Response to chervilant (Reply #6)
BlueManFan This message was self-deleted by its author.
BlueManFan
(256 posts)I self-deleted. I too teach at a Houston area university and when I address the issue of race in class, I get cursed at for being too liberal, have students bring their parents to protest my offensive lecture, and get told, literally by one student to "fuck off" because I made the comment that politicians respond to their constituencies, and in Texas the constituency that gets heard is business. Today I handed back exams and one student said "You blew my mind. I never heard stuff like that before." Those comments are few and far between though. Most students text, surf the web during class, then whine they fail the exam. Remember Texas is the state that, swear to God, decided we needed to quit teaching critical thinking. That's why I said, I weep for the future of learning.
chervilant
(8,267 posts)Small world! I got my undergraduate degree at Rice, and was teaching at San Jacinto College South. I found that many students at San Jac had a sense of entitlement -- not surprising since the secondary schools seldom give grades based on actual comprehension, or performance on homework and tests.
I'm sorry to hear about your health crisis. This is a big one for me, too. I don't understand this vehemence we're seeing about Mr. Obama "doing the best he can." The health care debacle was my first clue there's something terribly wrong with our democracy.
No, I take that back. The theft of the elections in 2000 and 2004, Tom Delay, the illegal invasion of Iraq, Dick Cheney, and a plethora of other serious malfeasance over the past forty years has simply continued to blare a warning to us all, if we'll only listen.
BlueManFan
(256 posts)are subjects like "How To Deal With Student Incivility." An this is college........sigh.
JackRiddler
(24,979 posts)Jakes Progress
(11,121 posts)JackRiddler
(24,979 posts)Jakes Progress
(11,121 posts)that initially showed me how right-wing this administration is.
That is because my background is in education. It is obvious that this administration is carrying water for the same corporate education ghouls that the neocons did. No republican could ever get away with this shit. Democrats wouldn't let them. But if our charismatic leader supports right wing, corporate, neocon educations programs, it just floats on by.
Since my eyes opening about education, I have watched so many other examples.
Too many former Democrats (I use that term because no real Democrat would support a president doing this to education) can sort of see how bad the administration's education program is, but they keep their mouths shut because they don't want to appear disloyal or "aid the enemy". They are aiding the enemy when they support right wing politicians regardless of what they call themselves. They ignore it because they have other axes to grind. Well. It like the old adage. If you keep quiet when they haul away your neighbors in the night, don't expect anyone to fuss when they come for you.
Whatever Democratic dreams you have are going away. Education was just easy pickings. Something you hold dear is next.
LWolf
(46,179 posts)I hold education dear. Sacred, even.
I have to go back to work this month. For so many years, I was always excited about the new school year.
In the last several years I've begun to dread it.