After ordering schools for years to follow Common Core, Corbett suddenly starts to attack standards
The public school systems have put a great deal of effort into complying with the Corbett Administration's orders that they follow the National Common Core educational standards. This has involved a great deal of re-training of teachers, as well as purchase of expensive new textbooks and software. The new statewide Keystone Tests are being designed to follow the Common Core, and they fortunately will cover many more topics than just math and reading.
Whoopsie. Now Corbett has declared that the Common Core is just like Obamacare. It is an evil federal intrusion into education, even though the standards were actually developed by a consortium of state education departments and business leaders.
Maybe former Corbett advisor Tomalis can work from home and figure it all out.
http://www.mcall.com/news/breaking/mc-pa-corbett-common-core-20140908-story.html
Excerpts:
"Reps. Ryan Aument, R-Lancaster, and Seth Grove, R-York, said Monday they did not understand Corbett's latest action. We are frustrated and confused by Gov. Corbett's incongruous decision to conduct a public review of Pennsylvania's academic standards, which were developed by his administration to remove Pennsylvania from the grasp of the national Common Core standards and supported by the General Assembly," Aument and Grove said in a joint statement.
Joseph Roy, superintendent of the Bethlehem Area School District, questioned whether Corbett's decision will have a ripple effect on the PSSA standardized tests, which are used to evaluate school performance and teacher performance.
"So if they are now being changed, how do you evaluate?" Roy asked.. Where does this leave the public schools in trying to comply with Corbett administration mandates?