Showing posts with label Common Core. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Common Core. Show all posts

Tuesday, June 23, 2015

It's On! North Dakota Throws Down!

June 23, 2015 Common Core , Lawsuit 0 Comments
Lawsuit Challenges The Constitutionality of Common Core In North Dakota 

By The Thomas More Law Center

Responding to the concerns of parents and teachers over the Common Core State Standards and the Federal government’s control of curriculum nationwide, the Thomas More Law Center announced today that it has joined in filing a lawsuit against North Dakota’s governor, state superintendent and other state officials. The lawsuit claims that North Dakota’s participation in the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium (“SBAC”) and its implementation of Common Core is unconstitutional and violates several federal laws that prohibit federal control of our public schools and their curriculum.

The Thomas More Law Center, a national public interest law firm based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, teamed-up with attorney D. John Sauer of the St Louis, MO firm, Clark & Sauer, to file the lawsuit. This lawsuit follows Sauer’s success in stopping Missouri’s membership in SBAC on similar grounds. Bismarck, ND Attorney, Arnold Fleck, has agreed to assist in the lawsuit as local counsel.

Plaintiffs in the case, who are all North Dakota residents and state taxpayers, include: Steve Cates, Catherine Cartier, Charles Cartier, and Robert Skarphol, who is also an elected member of the North Dakota House of Representatives.

The Compact Clause of the United States Constitution provides that “[n]o state shall, without the consent of Congress . . . enter into any agreement or compact with another state.” As the Smarter Balanced Consortium is an interstate compact which Congress did not authorize, its existence is a violation of the Constitution. Accordingly, North Dakota’s membership in the Consortium and membership fee payments of over a half million dollars per year, equate to participation in and funding of an illegal entity.



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Thursday, August 28, 2014

Common core=more fed gov't interefernce

August 28, 2014 Associated Press , Common Core 0 Comments
Bobby Jindal Suing Feds Over Common Core

By The Associated Press, Aug. 27, 2014, Newsmax.com

Gov. Bobby Jindal planned to file a lawsuit Wednesday against the Obama administration, accusing it of illegally manipulating federal grant money and regulations to force states to adopt the Common Core education standards.

The U.S. Department of Education has used a $4.3 billion grant program and federal policy waivers to encourage states to adopt uniform education standards and testing. The Republican governor says that "effectively forces states down a path toward a national curriculum" in violation of the state sovereignty clause in the Constitution and federal laws that prohibit national control of education content.

A draft copy of the lawsuit was provided to The Associated Press by the governor's office. Jindal planned to file it Wednesday in the federal court based in Baton Rouge.

Jindal, one of the leading voices opposing Common Core, expressed his views on the program in a Newsmax exclusive, "Saving America's Students from the Federal 'Education Octopus.'"

Common Core is supposed to ensure that students in all states meet consistent expectations. But Jindal sees it as yet another federal incursion analogous to healthcare reform.

The legal challenge puts Jindal, who is considering a 2016 presidential bid, at the forefront of a dispute between conservatives and President Barack Obama, bolstering the governor's profile on the issue as he's trying to court conservative voters nationwide.

Read the full story:  www.newsmax.com

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Monday, June 30, 2014

Calif. School Bond Bill To Pay For Illegal Aliens/Common Core Headed For November Ballot --Taxpayer revolt? Ever?

June 30, 2014 Academia , California 0 Comments
By Stephen Frank, Jun. 27, 2014, Calpoliticalreview.com

Guv Browns’ recent budget includes over $1.2 billion to implement Common Core. A recent study shows that $12.5 billion is spent yearly on illegal aliens. The budget also takes $5 billion from the classroom, technology, textbooks and facilities to pay for the unsustainable CalSTRS system. In 2012 the voters passed Prop. 30 to give government schools $6 billion a year for seven years. Even with all that, it is never enough for government schools.

Democrat Assemblywoman wants to put on the November ballot a $9 billion bond measure (actual cost is $128 billion, when you include interest). Between pension slush funds to hide corruption and incompetence, Common Core and illegal aliens, California government schools already have more than enough money to fail our children education needs. At what point will the parents and taxpayers of California demand excellence, not unions, as the ruling ideology of schools. Angry yet?

Bi-Partisan School Bond Bill Clears Assembly Floor


Assemblywoman Joan Buchanan, 5/29/14

Assembly Bill 2235 by Assemblymembers Joan Buchanan (D- Alamo) and Curt Hagman (R-Chino Hills) to place a school facilities bond on the November 4, 2014 ballot was approved 75-0 on the Assembly Floor yesterday. The bill authorizes a $9 billion general obligation bond that, if approved by voters, will provide $6 billion for the construction and rehabilitation of K-12 schools and $3 billion for higher education facilities.

“The last bond passed in 2006. Funds for the construction and modernization of K-12 and higher education institutions have been depleted for several years, jeopardizing the completion of many local projects. Passing a state bond will ensure that students attend safe and adequate facilities, positively impacting student achievement,” said Buchanan.

State bond funds for K-12 school facilities are administered through the School Facility Program, which requires a 50% local match for construction of new schools and 40% match for the modernization of schools. State bond funds are matched more than 2 to 1 by local bond funds and developer fees. Local communities pass local bonds anticipating the state match.

Assemblymember Curt Hagman added, “I spent a year reviewing the school facilities program, and it has proven to be one of the state’s most successful partnerships. I am pleased that both parties recognize the critical need for a new bond to build and modernize educational facilities. The bond also has the added benefit of aiding our economic recovery by creating tens of thousands of jobs and controlling the once volatile costs imposed on the construction of new residential units to fund school construction.”

The bill has a long list of supporters, including statewide organizations such as the California Chamber of Commerce, the State Building and Construction Trades Council, the California School Boards Association, the California State PTA, the California Building Industry Association, as well as over 30 school districts and county offices of education and over 25 community colleges and districts.

The bill now moves to the California State Senate.


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Poll: In Reversal, More California Voters Oppose Common Core Standards --An awakening?

June 30, 2014 Breitbart.com , California 0 Comments
Dr. Susan Berry, Jun. 29, 2014, Breitbart.com

A new poll finds that 44 percent of registered voters in California have a negative impression of the Common Core standards compared to 38 percent who say their impression of the nationalized standards is positive.

The 2014 PACE/USC Rossier Poll also showed that nearly half of the voters polled – 47 percent – said they were familiar with the Common Core standards, a substantial increase from the 2013 poll when just 29 percent of voters were familiar with the standards.

Both findings suggest that, as more people become knowledgeable about the Common Core standards, their view of them is increasingly unfavorable.

In addition, as mfour.com reports, poll participants were also asked to choose between two statements regarding the Common Core. Regarding a statement that California should not implement the standards because they represent a “Washington D.C.-based, one-size-fits-all approach” to education, 41 percent of voters agreed with the statement, while 32 percent said California is right to implement the standards because they prove a “clear, consistent understanding of what students are expected to learn.”

In the 2013 PACE/USC Rossier Poll, only 25 percent were opposed to the Common Core’s “one-size-fits-all approach,” while 36 percent of California voters said their state should implement the standards. This most recent poll, then, indicates a reversal from the prior year’s survey.

The latest poll also found support for Common Core varied widely by age and political party affiliation. Voters aged 65 and older were most negative about the controversial standards, with 51 percent expressing a negative impression and 36 percent having a positive impression.

Among Democrats, 46 percent viewed the Common Core positively, compared to 34 percent who held a negative impression. For those with Republican Party affiliation, 56 percent had a negative impression while 30 percent had a positive view.

“In a strongly Democratic state that has seen relatively few implementation issues, this points to a real messaging problem for advocates of the Common Core,” said Morgan Polikoff, assistant professor of education at the USC Rossier School and an expert on the Common Core standards.

The poll was conducted June 19-22 by polling firms MFour Mobile Research and Tulchin Research. The survey’s margin of error for the overall sample was +/- 3.5 percentage points.

Read the full story:  www.breitbart.com

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Friday, May 9, 2014

Good Riddance: Common Core Backlash Claims New Political Casualties By Michelle Malkin

May 09, 2014 Common Core , Michelle Malkin 0 Comments
By Michelle Malkin, May 9, 2014, Townhall.com

 All politics is local. So Republican politicians with national ambitions better pay attention to what grassroots parents are saying and doing about the federal education racket known as Common Core. In bellwether Indiana this week, anti-Common Core activists won a pair of pivotal electoral victories against GOP Gov. Mike Pence.

 Pence's attempt to mollify critics by rebranding and repackaging shoddy Common Core standards is fooling no one.

 Tuesday's Republican primary elections in the Hoosier state resulted in the landslide defeat of two establishment incumbents running for statewide re-election. Pence had endorsed GOP State Rep. Kathy Heuer over challenger Christopher Judy. Pence's Lt. Gov. Sue Ellspermann had endorsed GOP State Rep. Rebecca Kubacki over challenger Curt Nisly. The incumbents enjoyed the support of the Common Core-promoting U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

 These same Big Business elites backed Pence's ploy to stave off grassroots parental opposition by "withdrawing" from Common Core -- and then immediately adopting "new" standards that recycle the same old rotten ones. (See my April 30 column, "Big Government GOP's Common Core Rebrand Hustle.") As Hoosier mom Erin Tuttle put it, Pence's stunt "gave the appearance of voiding the Common Core, while the Indiana Department of Education and the Center for Education and Career Innovation walked it through the backdoor."

 Challengers Judy and Nisly made their opponents' refusal to help end Common Core in the state a central issue. Hoosiers Against Common Core, led by moms Tuttle and Heather Crossin, endorsed the dark-horse challengers. With little money and scant press attention, they beat Pence's machine by astonishingly wide margins: Judy ousted Heuer 57-43; Nisly defeated Kubacki 65-35.

 Well before the horrors of Common Core had penetrated cable TV and late-night comedy shows, Indiana parents led the lonely charge. They were at the vanguard of challenging the constitutionality, costs, substandard academic quality, privacy invasions and special interest lobbyists fueling Fed Ed. In 2012, Hoosiers Against Common Core spearheaded the stunning ouster of Tony Bennett -- the Indiana GOP's scandal-plagued former state education secretary who fled to Common Core-peddling former Gov. Jeb Bush's Florida for another educrat job. (See my August 2, 2013, column, "Rotten to the Core: Jeb Bush's Crony Republicans Against Higher Standards.")
 Read the full story:  www.townhall.com
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Thursday, May 8, 2014

And Now This...

May 08, 2014 And Now This... , Cartoonist Antonio Branco 0 Comments
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Federal Gov’t Issues Warning To State That Wants To Opt Out of Common Core --'Cuz the feds know best

May 08, 2014 Academia , Common Core 0 Comments
Indiana Gov. Mike Pence
By Fred Lucas, May 7, 2014, Theblaze.com

 The Obama administration has issued a clear warning to the first state to drop the Common Core State Standards.

 “Because the [Indiana Department of Education] will no longer implement those standards, IDOE must amend its [Elementary and Secondary Education Act] flexibility request and provide evidence that its new standards are certified by a state network of [Institutions of Higher Education] that students who meet the standards will not need remedial coursework at the postsecondary level,” the letter says.The U. S. Department of Education said in a letter to Indiana Superintendent of Public Instruction Glenda Ritz that the state must prove its own standards are just as challenging, or else risk of losing its waiver from the Bush-era No Child Left Behind law and have its federal funding in jeopardy.

 Indiana is the first of the 44 states that adopted Common Core to repeal the controversial K-12 math and English standards.

 Ritz said in a statement she is confident in the state’s new standards and said her department would “demonstrate full compliance with the flexibility waiver.”

 “To address the issue of college and career-ready assessments, the department has undertaken the most extensive review and overhaul of academic standards in Indiana’s history,” Ritz said. “Moving forward, we will respond to USED within the next two months with amendments that capture steps we have taken to ensure full compliance with our flexibility waiver.”

Read the full story:  www.theblaze.com

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Sunday, April 20, 2014

Pushback Continues: States Grow Increasingly Wary of Common Core --Dissent comes from left AND right

April 20, 2014 Academia , Brittany Corona 0 Comments
By Brittany Corona, Apr. 16, The Foundry

Common Core is on the ropes. More and more states are pulling back from the national standards as the 2014–15 school year implementation deadline looms near.

In Louisiana, Governor Bobby Jindal (R)—formerly a Common Core supporter—is now encouraging the legislature to remove the state from the Common Core aligned Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for Colleges and Careers (PARCC) test. And if they don’t act, he will.

Jindal’s new stance comes after eight members of the Louisiana State House of Representatives sent him a letter, informing him of his prerogative to opt out of the standards and encouraging him to do so. As The New Orleans Advocate reported:
"Gov. Bobby Jindal said Monday that a gubernatorial order for the state to drop controversial Common Core tests is a ‘very viable option’ if state lawmakers fail to act. Jindal made the comment in response to a letter from eight House members who said the governor can opt the state out of the exams and should do that… ‘We believe you have the authority, as governor, under the 2010 PARCC memorandum of understanding, to opt out of the consortium,’ state Rep. Brett Geymann, (R–Lake Charles), and seven other legislators wrote."
Read the full story:  www.blog.heritage.org

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Monday, March 31, 2014

Common Core MATH lesson Attacks Reagan, Lists Lincoln’s Religion As ‘Liberal’ --Ignores Reagan record on jobs, growth

March 31, 2014 Abraham Lincoln , Al Gore 0 Comments
By Eric Owens, Feb. 5, 2014, Daily Caller
Another week has gone by and, like clockwork, some more hilariously awful Common Core math lessons have oozed out of the woodwork.
This time, reports EAGnews.org and Liberty Unyielding, the culprit is Illuminations, an outfit created by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics and financially supported by the Verizon Foundation.
The Common Core-aligned lessons on offer at the Illuminations website are nothing if not illuminating.
Take, for example, the lesson plan entitled “How Could That Happen?” This math lesson for middle schoolers requires a math teacher to “engage students in a class discussion about whether or not they feel the results of” the 2000 presidential election were “‘fair.’”

Read the full story:  www.dailycaller.com


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