Common Core, Palm Beach Post

"Is Common Core a Waste of Money? " by v. johns

I just finished writing an post on education explaining my views on “education and training” and how higher education, I believe, seems to focus more on ATTRACTING the so-called “best and brightest” than on BUILDING the best and the brightest. To read this article, please scroll down….

In the meantime, I’d like to get back to doing what I do best, which is analyzing old news and attempting to persuade readers of the overall importance of this “old news” in shaping our region and state. So, for today, I’ like to discuss an article by Palm Beach Post staff writer Kevin D. Thompson entitled: “National standards for K-12 learning: Common sense, or a waste of money?” (Sunday, July 18, p.1A).

Mr. Thompson begins the article by mentioning how education standards have always been “an uneven patchwork of guidelines, varying from state to state and often confusing teachers, students and parents.” He goes on to ask the question (Please pay close attention here!): “Why isn’t geometry in Florida taught the same way it is in California?” (Thompson, Palm Beach Post).

Indeed. Therefore…

Let’s start with the who and the what. As I mentioned before I’ve noticed some things happening on the educational scene that has left me feeling a sense that great promise may lie ahead for our education systems. One of them is the adoption of the National Governors Association and Council of Chief State School Officer’s Common Core State Standards plan. As for the when, where and why, according to Thompson, the Florida department of Education was expected to adopt the standards as of July 27 along with 22 other states, for the purpose of helping students “think more critically” and to “prepare them for the workforce” as well as to “make the U.S. education system more competitive with such countries as China, South Korea and Finland, which have long had national education standards.”  Mr. Thompson goes on to say that “The U.S. is on of the few developed countries that doesn’t have national standards for its public schools.” (Thompson, Palm Beach Post).  

Really? You know, I think it’s a shame that the U.S. always has to be compared to countries that are nowhere near as diverse as ours, but seem to function with the type of catalytic resolve in its talent and governing bodies that an allegedly fisrt-rate country such as ours SHOULD! Do you mean to tell me that as Americans, we’ve lost our resolve to maintain what has previously been deemed the best educational system in the world? If that’s the case, then it’s no wonder that the United States has not only lost ground educationally, but in every other vital statistic as well…

Perhaps the real sadness in all this is what I call the post-Johnny Carson Effect in which things that are universally familiar to most become dated, or die off, and are replaced or succeeded, over time, by a plethora of things that appeal more acutely to people’s unique personal interests and tastes. As fractured and niche-minded as our nation has become, you’d think that our educational experiences would be such that it’s the one thing we’d all have in common. Instead, we get generations of children learning an essentially hodgepodge assortment things based on often misguided state standards and tests that have nothing to do critical thinking and college preparedness.

The popularity of such blockbuster books as "Harry Potter” and the record crowds that followed the King Tut exhibit exemplifies the pent up demand for common educational knowledge, experiences and discussion that seems to have been looming over our nation for years on end in our recent, misguided “states rights” environment under flawed and corrupt Republican rule and weak Democratic party enablement of this rule. In particular, Florida’s own anti-intellectual environment is something that, while in the process of slowly reversing, has taken shape under Republican governance and must be eradicated either by threat (pressuring current leaders to actually do their job) or by force (replacing them and/or their party in upcoming elections).

Getting back to Mr. Thompson’s article, the Common Core plan was drafted in March after 14 months of responding to more than 10,000 public comments. Officials from 48 states, and the District of Columbia, “proposed changes that will require new textbooks, changes to the FCAT and additional expenses…”  As one might expect, Texas and Alaska wanted nothing to do with it. Furthermore, Minnesota and Virginia opted not to adopt. (Thompson, Palm Beach Post).

At least Minnesota and Virginia participated in the crafting of the plan. Such stand-offish states as Texas and Alaska, though excellent in their own ways, seem to have no interest in the overall standing of the Union in which they woefully reside. Their rugged-individualist culture and reliance on so-called “conservative values” put them at odds with the encroaching diversity of peoples and cultures forming the makeup of our nation. Thus, even though Florida is sometimes discussed in the same breath as these other states, as I mentioned before, we are truly in a world of our own down here. So, it is with much honor and pride that I am delighted to see our state, even if only for the money (Race to the Top), putting ideological differences with the Obama administration aside to begin correcting some of the states problems with its systems.

The article goes on to give the other side of the story. I won’t touch on them here. Just click on the link to this article and read them for yourself. Instead of addressing what I deem to be the same old tired arguments against anything new (costs, government intrusion, etc.), I will give you my overall opinion, a layman’s analysis, on how this development will help Florida get one more step closer in becoming the premiere place in the world to live, work, study, play, relax and do business… 

THE GOOD that will come of this adoption of the Common Core plan is that it will connect Florida, educationally, with the rest of the nation. With children all over the nation developing common knowledge in reading selections, writing methods and common mathematical problem-solving technologies, our children will be on par with the rest of the nation. No more comparisons with New York or anywhere else for that matter.

THE BAD? None that I can see. Although I will agree with teaching veteran Mike Dowling, quoted in the article as supporting a national curriculum, “so long as there is flexibility built into the system.” Thus, I’ll have to qualify lack of flexibility in standards a being a potentially bad thing.

THE UGLY, also provided by Mr. Dowling, is that “The recent curriculum debacle in Palm Beach County should make us very wary.” I agree. But even uglier than that is the consequences of not changing for the better will render our state as forever, though sometimes unfairly, unwitting owners of the dreaded “Flori-DUH!” label.

IN CONCLUSION…

I see the adoption of the Common Core State Standards for math and English as a step in the right direction for or state. Not only will flawed FCAT standards finally be put in check, potentially, but perhaps at the college and university-level, the need for post-high school college-preparation should diminish. (When I was in college, the overwhelming need for these kinds of classes was a pretty big deal and I’m pretty sure it still is.)

Furthermore, the adoption of a common national curriculum, I believe, will not only be immensely good for the state of Florida, but for the country as a whole, so long as foolish ideological debates on reading materials are left out of it (See Texas). A “silver bullet” for all that has gone awry in our education system, it certainly is not. But by giving our children common things to discuss and relate to, outside pop culture, not only will Core Standards serve as the basis for ultimate U.S. dominance in education and workforce development, it might actually help to heal some of the nasty divisions in our country that have fractured our national identity. At some point in the future, Ione would hope that we could address the challenges of the future, not as so-called “liberals and moderates and conservatives,” but as well-educated Americans, with the most unique most educated kinds of Americans being… Floridians!