After the Common Core standards were drafted, they went to review committees. In the prior post we showed the comments and testimony of Dr. Sandra Stotsky on the English standards.
For math, the only professional mathematician and expert on content on the review committee was Dr. Jim Milgram from Stanford. He has long been involved in writing standards and evaluating international standards of the high achieving countries. A few years ago he was instrumental in providing testimony that Utah had very poor standards and this helped bring about our A- rated 2007 standards. His review of Common Core concludes:
“So it seems to me that you have a clear choice between
Core Standards – in large measure a political document that, in spite of a number of real strengths, is written at a very low level and does not adequately reflect our current understanding of why the math programs in the high achieving countries give dramatically better results;
The new Texas Standards that show every indication of being among the best, if not the best, state standards in the country. They are written to prepare student to both enter the workforce after graduation, and to take calculus in college if not earlier. They also reflect very well, the approaches to mathematics education that underlie the results in the high achieving countries.”
Below you can enjoy watching perhaps the most qualified person in America who could comment on the quality of the English standards of Common Core, tell why they shouldn’t be used in schools today. Dr. Sandra Stotsky has a illustrious background in writing English standards. This is her background as found on another website.
“I draw on much state and national experience with K-12 standards, curricula, and assessments. I was the senior associate commissioner in the Massachusetts Department of Education from 1999-2003 where, among other duties, I was in charge of the development or revision of all the state’s K-12 standards. I have reviewed all states’ English language arts and reading standards for the Fordham Institute in 1997, 2000, and 2005. I co-authored Achieve’s American Diploma Project high school exit test standards for English in 2004. I co-authored the 2008 Texas English language arts and reading standards. Appointed by then Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings, I served on the National Mathematics Advisory Panel from 2006-2008. Finally, I served on Common Core’s Validation Committee from 2009-2010.”
The video clips below show Dr. Stotsky testifying to a Texas legislature committee on the quality of the English standards and the non-transparent process used to create national standards. Among her comments which I’ve transcribed are these.
The development of the standards violated almost every civic procedure that I have been familiar with in my life and and I have been in the MA dept. of Ed in charge of the public process for the development of our standards so I know what the public process is like from a Dept. of education point of view…
NGA and CCSSO, the 2 groups that were developing the CC standards are private groups and therefore are not bound by the same civic procedures that a government appointed body would have to follow. But since what they were creating, and everyone knew this, were standards to serve as our national standards, there should have been an open process about a number of details that I will go into…
I was the only English language standards person on the [review] committee…
The standards which I have analyzed in detail many times over, do not signify readiness or authentic college level work, at best they point to readiness for a high school diploma, but it all depends on where the test scores get set and we don’t know that yet, but they do not prepare students for authentic college level work, and they are not internationally benchmarked. Professor Milgram says the same thing about the mathematics standards. We’re talking about the Common Core’s standards. Neither of them make us competitive with other countries that have high expectations for their high school students.
Second point is about the quality of your own 2008 standards in English, they are, at this point, the best set of standards in the country. This make come as a shock to many people in Texas, but now that MA, CA, and IN standards have gone with the wind because those states have adopted Common Core, the next best set of standards in English in the country are Texas’ and to back up my judgement I will quote from the Fordham Institute’s review that came out last July, and here is what Fordham said about Texas’ English language arts standards and it gave it an A-.
“Texas’s ELA standards are more clearly written, better presented, and logically organized than the Common Core standards.”
This is not from me, this is from Fordham.
“The Texas standards include expectations that more thoroughly address the comprehension and analysis of literary and non-literary text than Common Core, including helpful, detailed standards that outline genre-specific content and rhetorical techniques. In addition, Texas has prioritized writing genres by grade level.”
So here we have someone saying outside of my own judgement that the Texas standards are better than Common Core’s.
Alisa Ellis sent this letter to Brenda Hales, other USOE officers, and the State School Board this morning. We wanted to share this with the public and ask that you share this as well. There is a need for a hearing, perhaps in an education committee interim legislative meeting. Questions are not being fully answered by state officials who continue to say we’re wrong but without producing documentation.
Brenda –
I know you and others at the State office are frustrated with our continual fight against Common Core. This is why I feel it is time we sit down and talk. As noted after the public forum at Granite district offices by a reporter (loosely quoted) “both sides left further entrenched in their views”.
I have seen the articles and statements put out by you and others at the state office and I have read many, many government documents relating to the Common Core Standards and other educational reform ideals. From my perspective the documents and the statements put out by your office do not mesh.
I’ve seen your timeline and also studied the minutes of your meetings. I’ve studied the minutes from other states and feel that there is a lot of misrepresentation. I know you feel that I am misinformed but I can assure you I’m more informed than I’ve ever been in my life.
Of course there are some documents and meetings I am not privy too and so I feel it is imperative to sit down with you and Superintendent Shumway and go over all the questions I and other parent’s and citizens have. At a meeting on April 6th with Governor Herbert, he promised to help us set up a meeting with Superintendent Shumway and so I’ve copied his secretary to get that ball rolling if I must.
I would like to see documentation to the statements made by the state office.
I would like to see exactly how you and other’s in UT wrote the Math and ELA standards. Especially after I listened to the audio of the board meeting where you said they didn’t want us (UT) to send a team to help write the standards because they didn’t want it to turn into a Constitutional convention. I’d like to see a comparison showing the difference between Common Core State Standards and the Utah Core. I am very confused as to how UT claims to have written copyrighted standards. I read in the NCLB waiver that UT cross-walked our standards with Common Core standards. I’d like you to show me exactly how that was done and like I said show me the differences in the standards.
I’d like to know why members of the board are of the opinion that UT is not bound to any contractual obligations. We have an approved waiver application to NCLB (contractual obligation) and yet members of the board are of the opinion we can change our standards whenever we want. Be prepared in the meeting to explain exactly what process this will take when we’ve agreed to the definitions in the document and attached evidence of how we’ll meet the requirements outlined by the Dept. of Ed.
It is not effective to continue this “he said, she said dialogue”. We must have a meeting. I recognize it is summer but feel an urgency to sit down and talk with you.
I am available this week.
We do not need to keep down this path of confrontation. It is not conducive to constructive dialogue. I have 6 children in the public schools in UT and have no plans of backing down on my questions until I am satisfied that the answers given are backed up by fact and documentation and that this is the best move for our state and our children.
We already knew that the Gates Foundation was the driving force behind Common Core, funding the NGA and CCSSO to come together and develop them, but in this spreadsheet provided by the Pioneer Institute, they’ve been able to track publicly available grant information on the Gates Foundation website that shows they have put over $100 million into the development, approval, and promotion of Common Core standards. Check out the spreadsheet for yourself.
On Tuesday, July 10th, four experts on Common Core from out-of-state came to Utah to speak with the Governor, legislators, and the public. The videos below show two of their presentations. The audio on the public presentation is better than the legislator luncheon video so you may want to watch it.
We hope you will watch this presentation in its entirety to become better informed and educated on this vital issue of our day. If you would like to make a contribution to assist our efforts in spreading the truth about Common Core, please click the Contribute link to the right and select Common Core in block F. We appreciate your support and encourage you to share this video and other resources with friends and neighbors.
90-second Teaser from the public meeting Tuesday night
Common Core as currently implemented directly violates or comes to the very edge of the line of these three federal laws. Particularly the last one below is in process of being violated as states are required to incur costs of this implementation that are not funded by the federal government (AKA taxpayer money).
From the General Education Provisions Act (20 USC § 1232a)
“No provision of any applicable program shall be construed to authorize any department, agency, officer, or employee of the United States to exercise any direction, supervision, or control over the curriculum, program of instruction, administration, or personnel of any educational institution, school, or school system, or over the selection of library resources, textbooks, or other printed or published instructional materials by any educational institution or school system, or to require the assignment or transportation of students or teachers in order to overcome racial imbalance.”
From the Department of Education Organization Act (20 USC § 3403(b))
“No provision of a program administered by the Secretary or by any other officer of the Department shall be construed to authorize the Secretary or any such officer to exercise any direction, supervision, or control over the curriculum, program of instruction, administration, or personnel of any educational institution, school, or school system, over any accrediting agency or association, or over the selection or content of library resources, textbooks, or other instructional materials by any educational institution or school system, except to the extent authorized by law.”
From the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 as amended by the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (20 USC 7907(a))
“Nothing in this Act shall be construed to authorize an officer or employee of the Federal Government to mandate, direct, or control a State, local educational agency, or school’s curriculum, program of instruction, or allocation of State and local resources, or mandate a State or any subdivision thereof to spend any funds or incur any costs not paid for under this Act.”
Jamie Gass was on Rod Arquette’s radio show on July 6th, 2012, talking about Common Core. Jamie is the Director of the Public Institute Center for School Reform in Massachusetts. He is one of the individuals coming to speak at the forum on Tuesday night at SLCC. Listen to his 12-minute audio segment here. He calls Common Core, Obamacare for K-12 education. Listen to why he says Common Core is worse than Obamacare in the way it was adopted.
Ze’ev Wurman is a former senior policy official in the US Dept. of Education under George W. Bush, and served on the California Academic Content Standards Commission which reviewed the Common Core standards for California. He was recently sent a couple pages from Utah’s No Child Left Behind waiver application which talked about how Utah was going to accelerate math under their new integrated approach to Common Core. Those of you that missed reading the article on how the integrated approach is going to hurt math in Utah, please read Reigniting the Math Wars over the Death of Calculus.
Ze’ev generously responded with the following analysis.
Comments on Utah Waiver Application, Pages 24-25.
Ze’ev Wurman, Palo Alto, Calif.
July 2012
(Blue italics are direct quotes from the Waiver Application)
Myth: The structure of the new math standards are in line with that of countries with high mathematics achievement.
Fact: CCSS are not any closer to high achieving countries than Utah’s 2007 standards. CCSS stopped claiming that they reflect what high achieving countries are doing and now they only claim that the standards are “informed by top-performing countries,” whatever it may mean. In particular, the high school programs of the high achieving countries closely resemble the 2007 Utah traditional sequence (Algebra I, Geometry, Algebra II) and are completely different from the CCSS integrated Math-I, Math-II, Math-III sequence that Utah recently adopted.
Myth: The rigor and complexity of the new standards begins in Kindergarten and continues to accelerate through high school using an integrated approach. For example, students in ninth grade will be studying topics formerly common in Algebra, Geometry and Algebra 2.
Fact: It is true the CCSS are quite demanding in the early primary grades, but they significantly slow down by the third grade, and by grade eight they are one to two years behind what top-achieving countries expect of their students. The only mathematician on the CCSS Validation Committee refused to certify the Standards writing: “…large number of the arithmetic and operations, as well as the place value standards are one, two or even more years behind the corresponding standards for many if not all the high achieving countries.” (Appendix B, http://www.pioneerinstitute.org/pdf/common_core_standards.pdf )
Myth: The new core’s structure allows more flexibility to accelerate learning for students as they progress through their secondary education.
Fact: The new high school core is, if at all, less flexible and less demanding than the previous one. It is composed of loosely defined “integrated” courses in contrast to previous traditional coherent curricular courses of Algebra I and II, and Geometry. Further, these integrated courses exclude chunks of content that was traditionally taught in Geometry and Algebra II such as logarithmic and trigonometric functions and identities, complex number arithmetic, conic sections, infinite geometric sequences, mathematical induction, and more. As the result, it is expected that with this curriculum students will have more difficulty to take Concurrent Enrollment courses, or Advance Placement Calculus, in their senior year.
Myth: The new core includes Honors courses beginning in seventh grade and provides higher level math courses such as Calculus or AP Statistics for students who are ready to accelerate.
Fact: The accelerated (“Honors”) program in the seventh and eighth grade that is newly offered by Utah is a poor replacement for the honest pre-Algebra and Algebra courses that Utah offers today. The proposed seventh and eighth honor program adds content about history and uses of mathematics, and about set theory and different counting bases, that are poor preparation for acceleration of algebra, geometry, and pre-calculus that are key to STEM education.
Myth: In seventh and eighth grade, Honors courses contain extra topics not included in the former core. These topics include elements from discrete mathematics, non-traditional geometries, different counting systems, and other mathematics that would be interesting to advanced middle school students. … These courses have increased rigor and advanced content that will challenge the minds of high-ability students.
Fact: The seventh and eighth grade Utah’s Honors curriculum touches on discrete mathematics and different counting system and in that reminds us of the original 1960s failed “new math.” It also includes elements of graph theory that students are unequipped to handle at that point yet which it grandly calls “non-traditional geometries.” This assemblage of quirky bits and pieces of applied mathematics does not support accelerated and/or deeper acquisition of algebra, pre-calculus, and calculus. Consequently the promise to productively challenge high ability students rings hollow.
Myth: Courses for all students are much more advanced than in previous class work. Students on the regular pathway will be prepared for Pre-Calculus, AP Statistics, or CE in their senior year. In the accelerated pathway to high school (AP), calculus is a compacted version of Secondary I, II, III and Pre-Calculus and will begin in ninth grade. This pathway allows students successfully completing the three high school Honors courses to be ready for AP Calculus as seniors.
Fact: As already mentioned before, the new CCSS high school core has eliminated significant content in comparison to the 2007 core and, contrary to the claim above, are not “much more advanced”. In fact, just the opposite is true – the regular three CCSS integrated courses are at significantly lower level than the current core. Consequently, students taking the regular program will not be able to access AP calculus at they are now, using the 2007 core.
The suggested Honors program does, in fact, in theory prepare students for AP Calculus in their senior year. But it should be compared with the current sequence that potentially prepared all students, rather than only Honors students, for AP Calculus as Seniors. In fact, the current core also prepared accelerated students for AP Calculus already as Juniors.
But the new proposed Honors program is highly ambitions and untested, and faces significant challenges. Rather than use grades seven and eight for deeper preparation of Honor students in algebra and geometry, it spent those grades on inessential activities of counting in different bases and games-related bits and pieces. Consequently, it now needs to push a lot of content, including content that CCSS forgot like parametric equations, infinite series, polar coordinates, etc., into three heavily packed years. Time will tell how many students will be able to scale this steep three-year HS challenge, all to end up where the current core already gets them in much more relaxed rate starting with pre-Algebra in grade 7: to be ready to for AP Calculus as Seniors.
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Given the abundance of lofty claims unsupported by the actual new Utah core, one should treat the picture on p.24 that pretends to summarize the differences in rigor between the old (2007) Utah Core and the newly adopted CCSS Core as a work of fiction. The implication that old core’s 12th grade is equivalent to the new core’s 10th is beyond ridiculous. Anyone with more than a bit of understanding of actual mathematics rather than of educational mumbo-jumbo can easily satisfy himself that just the opposite is true for the regular CCSS Core, and that they are effectively equivalent in case of the Honors Core.
“If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.”
– Joseph Goebbels, Hitler’s Minister of Propaganda
The State
“The Common Core State Standards Initiative is a state-led effort coordinated by the National Governors Association Center for Best Practices (NGA Center) and the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO).” – www.corestandards.org
The Truth
Theevidence shows that powerful and influential people and organizations have collaborated to create a global education system that will track our children and move them toward a global perspective that seeks to erase state and individual sovereignty.
The Facts
In 1984, UNESCO publishes a report called “A Methodological Guide to the Application of the Notion of Common Core in the Training of Various Categories of Educational Personnel.” One focus of the document is how to make teachers agents of change within schools.
In 1988, Marc Tucker became the president of the National Center for Education and the Economy (NCEE). He joined up with Hillary Clinton, Mario Cuomo, and Ira Magaziner to get states to move away from local control of their schools and migrate to national standards. (link)
In 1992, Mr. Tucker wrote a letter to Hillary Clinton congratulating her on Bill Clinton’s presidential win. He included in his letter ideas for radical education reform. He stated the goal is “to remold the entire American system” into “a seamless web that literally extends from cradle to grave and is the same systems for everyone,” coordinated by “a system of labor market boards at the local, state and federal levels” where curriculum and “job matching” will be handled by counselors “accessing the integrated computer-based program.” (link)
Tucker’s ambitious plan was implemented in three laws passed by Congress and signed by President Clinton: the Goals 2000 Act, the School-to-Work Act Opportunities Act, and the reauthorized Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) called “Improving America’s Schools Act of 1994.” (link)
In 2004, Microsoft (Bill Gates) contracted with UNESCO (the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) to fulfill part of UNESCO’S Millennium Campaign Goals—universal education and education for a global economy. (link) The largest roadblock to creating a universal education system was the United States since each state has its own education standards and systems.
In 2005, Bill Gates funds the New Commission on the Skills of the American Workforce—created by Tucker. States begin adopting its education reform initiative, “Tough Choices or Tough Times.” In 2008, Utah’s Governor Huntsman touted it (see video in link below) and joined with 5 other states (Massachusetts, Delaware, Arizona, New Mexico, and New Hampshire) who adopted it in order to “reinvent their educational systems.” (link)
In 2008, theGates Foundation, along with two other foundations, created Strong American Schools (a successor to the STAND UP campaign launched in 2006, which was an outgrowth of UNESCO’s Millennium Campaign Goals for Universal Education). It called for American education standards. (link 1) (link 2)
Also in 2008, theGates Foundation funds the International Benchmarking Advisory Group report for Common Core Standards on behalf of the National Governors Association, Council of Chief State School Officers, and ACHIEVE, Inc. titled, “Benchmarking for Success: Ensuring U.S. Students Receive a World-Class Education.” This report showed the United Nations is a member of the International Benchmarking Advisory Group for Common Core Standards. (link)
The member of mention is the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) which developed UNESCO’s Millennium Declaration—partnering with the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. (link) The report states on page 37: “While states must take the lead, the federal government can help. And the federal government can do that best by playing an enabling role grounded in a new vision for the historic state-federal partnership in education.” (link) Gates also funded $2.2 million to the National Governor’s Association to advocate for a common state education system. (link)
In 2009, Marc Tucker wrote a chapter in the book “Change Wars: The Inspiring Future for Educational Change.” One chapter was called International Benchmarking as a Lever for Policy Reform. The book says the UN’s OECD launched the Programme for International Student Assessment in 2000 to monitor the outcomes of education. (link)
In April, 2009, Gates Foundationmembers, along with a few dozen others, participated in a Washington conference and produced “Smart Options: Investing the Recovery Funds for Student Success.” These ideas were funded by the 2008 Stimulus (ARRA-American Recovery and Reinvestment Act) and supported Race to the Top. Priority 1: Develop Common American Standards—also called Career-Ready Standards—in most states by January 2012. (link)
Among the requirements states had to agree to in applying for Race to the Top funds (rounds 1 and 2), were adopting yet-unwritten Common Core standards, becoming a member in one of the assessment consortia, and adopting a P-20 longitudinal database to track student information including confidential biometric information. (link) (page 4 defines biometric)
In the summer of 2009, the Council of Chief State School Officers, National Governors Association, and ACHIEVE, Inc. agree to partner on a common core standards project. (link) The Gates Foundation funds this effort starting in 2009, and through 2011, with over $20 million (Pmt 1, Pmt 2, Pmt 3, Pmt 4)
In the fall of 2009, the U.S. Dept. of Education signaled it would fund $360M for summative assessments aligned to Common Core Standards and began planning meetings. Two consortia begin competing for this funding: Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium (SBAC) and Partnership for the Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC). States begin adopting Common Core Standards and joined one of the consortia in order to receive No Child Left Behind waivers from the U.S. Department of Education Secretary, Arne Duncan. (link) Since the federal government is funding the assessments, they now had a “stakeholders” right to the data provided by those assessments which would be stored in state longitudinal database systems (SLDS). SLDS would now contain information previously protected by HIPAA due to regulation changes by HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius. (link) Thus the federal government would receive access to educational, medical, and biometric data almost in direct fulfillment of Mark Tucker’s desired cradle to grave database.
In October 2009, the Gates Foundation gave the Thomas B. Fordham Institute $1 million to review the Common Core standards. (link) The Fordham group has traditionally reviewed state standards and unremarkably gave Common Core high marks (link). The Common Core Validation Committee did not all give high marks to these new standards.
Also in this time frame, the Gates Foundation donated $1.5 million to Mark Tucker’s NCEE organization. (link)
In December 2009, the Gates Foundation paid the National PTA $1 million to mobilize the PTA for Common Core Standards. (link 1)(link 2)
In June, 2010, the National Governors Association and State Education Chiefs launched Common State Academic Standards. (link)
In April 2011, the SBAC Overview Curriculum and Assessment Conference issued a report stating that governing member states must adopt Common Core by Dec. 31, 2011. (link 1)
In September 2011, Obama Education Secretary Arne Duncan announced “Today, I promise you that [the Department of Education] will be a committed partner in the national effort to build a more environmentally literate and responsible society… We must advance the sustainability movement through education… Education and sustainability are the keys to our economic future-and our ecological future.” (link) Sustainability is a key buzzword for the U.N. Agenda 21 movement which the UNESCO/Gates 2004 contract are ultimately aiming for.
In November 2011, the conservative American Legislative Exchange Council’s (ALEC) education task force developed model legislation calling for the demise of the Common Core Standards, but shelved it after receiving a $376,635 grant from the Gates Foundation. (link)
Bill Gates also speaks at the November G20 Summitin Cannes and issued his report, “Innovation With Impact: Financing 21st Century Development” stating, “My report will address the financing needed to achieve maximum progress on theMillennium Development Goals, and to make faster progress on development over the next decade.” (link)
In 2012, states not on Common Core and not meeting the Annual Yearly Progress requirements of NCLB petition congress for relief. Lawmakers working on options were undercut when the Obama White House circumvented Congress to grant waivers from NCLB if states adopted Common Core. (link)
In February 2012, the Utah State Office of Education issued a press release that they had partnered with Choice Solutions to implement the required longitudinal database system as the P-20W to track all students in the state from preschool, through age 20, and into the workforce. (link) This same month the USOE filed its waiver application to get out of No Child Left Behind and stated they would “fully adopt Common Core as written” as one of their commitments. (link pg. 30, 34, 132)
Texas Education Commissioner Robert Scott stated that the common standards movement amounted to a “desire for a federal takeover of public education.”(link) and Governor Rick Perry’s Common Core rejection letter cited a $3 billion implementation, better state standards, and loss of state control over education, as Texas’ reasons for not adopting the standards. (link)
Now, additional states (who originally signed on), including Massachusetts, Iowa, Kansas, South Carolina and Virginia, are expressing concerns about the common standards initiative. (link)
Gov. Nikki Haley just signed a letter supporting legislation in South Carolina to block CCSS implementation stating, “South Carolina shouldn’t relinquish control to a consensus of states any more than the federal government.” (link)
The SBAC calls the standards requirements federal and States must get the U.S. Department of Education’s approval to exit the SBAC. (link)
Larry Shumway, Utah State Superintendent, a member of the CCSSO Board of Directors, a member of the Board of Directors at West Ed which is the project management partner for SBAC assessments, recommends Utah retain its relationship as a governing member of the SBAC (thus forcing Utah to use their tests). However, after the Utah legislature took steps to potentially force the state into reconsidering Common Core, the Superintendent wrote Secretary of Education Arne Duncan asserting our state’s rights to use these standards any way we choose. (link) The letter was written to reassure the legislature that this wasn’t a federal takeover. Sec. Duncan affirmed this position in a written letter back to Superintendent Shumway (link). This letter contradicted the mandatory language used in Duncan’s “Cooperative Agreement” document Utah obligated itself to. That document demands that SBAC and PARCC “foster synchronization” of consortia tests and share data with the Dept. of Education, as data must be given to the Dept. of Education “on an ongoing basis.” (link)
In a March 6, radio interview with Utah talk show host Rod Arquette, Mr. Shumway stated the reason for writing the letter as, “…I’m bothered by things I hear the secretary [Duncan] say in speeches and the President say in speeches where they take credit for these [Common Core] standards. And I’m bothered by the Department of Education making requirements that are associated with these standards.” (link)
Wait a minute, Mr. Shumway…if these are state-led, state-controlled standards, why would there be a need to write to Secretary Duncan, rather than to the National Governors’ Association or CCSSO, groups said to be in control of Common Core? Why would the Dept. of Education be making requirements tied to the common standards? Why are the standards non-amendable by us, copyrighted by the NGA? (link) And why is the Gates Foundation now funding biometric devices capable of assessing student interest in a lesson? (link)
The list of questions could go on and on, yet there is little doubt that given the evidence, the Common Core Standards Initiative was not initated by any state-led effort of the NGA and CCSSO. Regardless of who first initiated it, clearly, it was incentivized by the Department of Education. It was clearly also promoted, funded, and propelled by the Gates Foundation in order to bring about a global education system in accordance with its agreement with UNESCO.
Common Core has been in the works for decades and the various components associated with it were just waiting for the standards to push through in order to activate the network of organizations that would unconstitutionally take over state freedoms over education.
To see where Common Core fits into the scheme of related programs that make up the globalization of education, check out this visual diagram created by ROPE (Restoring Oklahoma Public Education) Read ROPE’s full document here.
A little addendum since this article was posted a long time ago. Much more could be added but this little bit is just further proof
In 2008, David Coleman helped convince Bill Gates to bankroll this effort, and then began the major effort to convince the governors that they should sign on. Listen to David say it himself, and how Common Core was created by a few people in a room on a napkin.
Special thanks to the many people involved in digging this information up. Much work has been done by people all around the country to put this information together and help follow the money trail. Please do your part now in passing this information on to everyone you know so they can be educated about what the Common Core Initiative is really all about.
I was at a Meet the Candidates event last night and someone told me that Phil Daro, one of the writers of the math standards, said they wrote Common Core specifically for social justice. For those that don’t know, social justice is a buzz word that means redistribution of wealth or helping the poor at the expense of the wealthy. I did a couple of web searches and found a teacher’s website (who seems to get it) with this video where Phil says it right at the end.
Common Core set minimum standards for all students which means minimal learning for those who could accelerate. Thus social justice is achieved by holding down the achievers to the level of the lowest common denominator and by forcing them to learn what you want them to learn instead of letting them become individualized and accelerating their education as they can. Nowhere is this going to happen more than in Utah where we adopted math standards in an integrated fashion instead of discrete years. If you’ve not read about that problem yet please click that link. Otherwise watch Phil’s video clip. I’m not sure who he’s speaking to but they are an easily entertained bunch. :)
For math, the only professional mathematician and expert on content on the review committee was Dr. Jim Milgram from Stanford. He has long been involved in writing standards and evaluating international standards of the high achieving countries. A few years ago he was instrumental in providing testimony that Utah had very poor standards and this helped bring about our A- rated 2007 standards. His review of Common Core concludes:
Below you can enjoy watching perhaps the most qualified person in America who could comment on the quality of the English standards of Common Core, tell why they shouldn’t be used in schools today. Dr. Sandra Stotsky has a illustrious background in writing English standards. This is her background as found on 
We already knew that the Gates Foundation was the driving force behind Common Core, funding the NGA and CCSSO to come together and develop them, but in this spreadsheet provided by the Pioneer Institute, they’ve been able to track publicly available grant information on the Gates Foundation website that shows they have put over $100 million into the development, approval, and promotion of Common Core standards. Check out the spreadsheet for yourself.
