Category — Education

The trouble with prevaricating is that it is necessary to remember what has been said. That can be difficult enough for one individual, but when the premier federal education agency does so and all associated entities must follow suit, someone is bound to make a mistake and tell the truth. Read the rest of this entry »

Some months ago this blog commented on David Coleman’s announcement that the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) had been revised to align with Common Core State Standards (CCSS). Coleman, now president of the College Board, is known as the architect of CCSS.Read the rest of this entry »

Common Core, the stealth invasion of public education, is now joined by another little known federal initiative. It is called “Excellent Educators for All,“ and it, too, is courtesy of President Obama and his education consigliere Arne Duncan. Read the rest of this entry »

Jane Robbins, author of “Uncommonly Bad” (Academic Questions, Spring 2013), reveals that one of the stated goals of the federally funded consortia creating Common Core-aligned tests and of the National Governors Association–which owns the standards– is for colleges and universities to accept a core-based test as sufficient for college entrance, no remediation required.Read the rest of this entry »

A Crucible Moment: College Learning & Democracy’s Future is a report produced by the National Task Force on Civic Learning and Democratic. Engagement. The Task force was appointed and funded by the Department of Education, and the White House endorsed the subsequent report. It carries forward Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign vow to “transform” the nation, and Secretary of Education Arne Duncan’s 2013 pledge to do the same to education.Read the rest of this entry »

Privacy has no place in the so-called Common Core Standards. The Gates Foundation has contributed $100 million to fund the creation of a database to track public school students‘ information and academic records from kindergarten through high school. This is called the Shared Learning Infrastructure (SLI) and it is now being run by an organization called InBloom, specifically created to operate the system. Best of all, InBloom has stated that it “cannot guarantee the security of the information stored … or that the information will not be intercepted when it is being transmitted.” Read the rest of this entry »

The 1974 Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) is intended to protect the privacy of student education records. Amendments by the U.S. Department of Education in 2008 and 2011 weakened that protection and diminished parents’ control over who has access to the records. By altering some definitions and inserting others, the Department increased the number of individuals with access to personally identifiable student information, while foreclosing parents’ ability to object.Read the rest of this entry »

Common Core, much like Obama Care, is based on a lie, or more accurately, several lies. Not only are the standards not “world class,” they are not necessarily better than state standards and in many cases, they are not as good. Stay tuned, as this will be the first of three comprehensive posts this week on this topic.Read the rest of this entry »

Once again, the National Association of Scholars provides enlightenment regarding the Common Core State Standards (CCSS). In the Winter 2013 Issue of the NAS publication, Academic Questions, Michael Toscano addresses the question of whether the CCSS was a bottom up, as the public is urged to believe, or a top-down initiative.Read the rest of this entry »

Never mind that the FTC lacks authority over non-profits. The small-time tyrants at FTC don’t need to understand progressive ideology to follow their leader. They just do what comes naturally. This time the target is a 100+ year organization dedicated to the promotion of piano playing.Read the rest of this entry »