This morning Jonathan Johnson called on Utah to end SAGE testing. Tonight Governor Herbert called on the state board to get Utah out of Common Core standards and SAGE testing. Dang I love election years!
With Jonathan Johnson defeating Governor Herbert at the GOP convention 55%-45%, largely influenced by Common Core issues, the Governor no doubt had an awakening. I have never doubted the Governor’s intentions to provide a quality education to Utah children, but I still find this move politically opportunistic to try and salvage his chances of being re-elected. Of course, the Governor can make this call knowing he has no authority to actually carry it out. That belongs to the state board…
Having had several discussions with Jonathan Johnson, I know he is fully committed to principles of local control that I’m not sure the governor is committed to at the same level based on his letter. His letter brings out some positives for sure, but I believe it’s time LEA’s (Local Education Agency) had much greater control over their financing, standards, assessments, data collection and privacy, and the state shrunk back in it’s role interfering with local education (and of course the feds are cut out of the picture completely).
In essence, here is what the Governor said:
-Common Core had a poor implementation (Oak: this is the go-to excuse for all failure programs like Investigations math)
-Naturally, he said there is misinformation on the subject, but added for what I think is the first time, that there are legitimate concerns.
-He asks the state board to change out the standards and keep these three principles in mind:
–Maintain high standards in all subject areas
–Keep the feds out of education decisions
–Preserve local control of curriculum, testing, data collection, and instructional practices.
-Make the process public (not something that happened the first time)
-There are shortcomings to the one-size-fits-all approach. We need standards that are flexible to allow a wide variety of curricular decisions by individual school districts.
-Eliminate the SAGE mandate for high school (and evaluate the effectiveness of it in other grade levels)
-“I have eleven grandchildren in Utah public schools. I have seen firsthand the frustration they and their parents have had over an assignment they did not understand and that teachers struggled to teach.”
End of summary.
No doubt this will be nationwide news that Utah’s Governor who has been one of the biggest proponents of Common Core, now wants out. That’s helpful for the entire movement across the country and for that, I’m grateful.
To download a copy of Governor Herbert’s letter, click here.
If this happens, then Governor Herbert has my vote once again. I salute you sir!
Susan, the governor has made a deathbed repentance because he sees the writing on the wall that his re-election efforts are in danger. For six years he’s had a chance to acknowledge problems and issues and what has he done? Surrounded himself with people that call us the “Common Core Crazies.” He’s done a lot of damage to the education system by persisting in his course of action and he still doesn’t understand the depth of the entanglements that circle us. He still has a mentality of state control being local control and that is not local control. Jonathan Johnson still firmly has my vote because he understands this. Then there are other issues surrounding the governor on taxation (won’t take a no new taxes pledge) and 2nd amendment. For Governor Herbert, it’s too little, too late for me.
What about Herbert secretly approving the influx of large numbers of Syrian refugees into ghetto-like conclaves despite the fact that no one can do any vetting of the refugees who may all be jihadis.
And what about the fact that he wouldn’t listen to reason on Common Core which he virtually single-handedly took federal money for foisting an unconstitutional program on our children, one he knew from the start would indoctrinate children and be 100% run by D.C. , then he lied to Utahns about it.
And what about the fact that Herbert refused for 6 years to listen to the people, but is always available to sit down with lobbyists and worse as long as they bring him a big check. He thinks he’s fooling the people into believing he’s conservative, while he’s really a corrupt progressive–havn’t we had enough of him yet?
First and foremost, the Governor is a politician – and a progressive one at that. Wonder if he’ll be singing the same tune if he’s re-elected?
Governor Herbert is a RINO. Common Core, among other issues, is just another example the Governor’s office is broken and needs to be fixed. Jonathan Johnson has my vote.
Hmmmm……. made changes out of convenience?
Not sure I can trust if down the road he’ll make any other politically motivated changes.
I agree with Oak Norton. Herbert has done everything he could to support Common Core and derail our efforts to stop it. Then recently he started to take credit for stopping Common Core when none of his actions supported that. Herbert will say what he needs to say to get re-elected and then all bets are off. Jonathan Johnson sounds like a man who will follow through with this and remove Common Core from Utah schools.
The bottom line is that we need to fight aggressively against career politicians who will say and do anything to get reelected. Time for Herbert to go.
AMEN! Jonathan Johnson for Governor!
Common Core is only one of the issues that Governor Herbert has sided with the progrssives on. His stance of the Federal Government control of public lands, his stance on the 2nd Ammendment are two more. He has had several years to change his stance and has fought it for too long for me to be able to believe this last minute 180 would be honored. Time for a new way of thinking in the Governors Mansion. I will give my vote to Johnson this go around.