This
week is School Choice Week across the nation. For a number of years
now, Republican-based organizations from Heritage Foundation to
Friedman Foundation to our own OCPA, have been calling for School
Choice.
We here at ROPE believe that parental choice is of
ULTIMATE importance in the creation of education that works for students
and families. Gone should be the days in which children are locked
into districts whose Board of Educations are NOT responsive to the needs
of their students and parents.
After much study, however, we also believe that until the COMMON CORE STATE STANDARDS
(CCSS) are removed from the states that have adopted them (including
OKLAHOMA) THERE CAN BE NO CHOICE IN EDUCATION! In fact, there is no
way Choice and the CCSS can exist simultaneously.
Why would you, as a parent, move your child from one school to another when the same COMMON standards shape
the curriculum at EVERY school in the district or city? Yes, one
school may have a better teaching staff, or one might be perceived to be
'safer', but if the teaching curricula of all schools are derived from
the same COMMON standards, how can one school produce a more exceptional
student than another? How can schools in states who have adopted the
CCSS really differentiate themselves one from
another when the basis of all educational knowledge is derived from the
same COMMON standards? Where is the ability for any school to create a
student that excels beyond what is "common"?
Sadly, it's not simply government schools that are effected by the COMMON CORE phenomena.
Did you know that private schools and charter schools
are turning to Common Core so they will have books to use that contain
"COMMON" curricula developed for the standards so private school
students will have the same advantage as government school kids on tests
such as ACT - which are being shaped to match the standards?
Many
large textbook companies like Pearson, threw their lot in with the
Council of Chief State School Officers (a private national association)
and the National Governor's Association (also a private association to
which NOT all governors belong) to create and insinuate the CCSS in
American government schools. The free market is wonderful, but in this
case, textbook companies with smaller market share are forced to mold
their materials to the CCSS or lose business to those companies
producing CCSS-aligned texts.
This also works with education retailers. Did you know that companies who sell to the home school market, like Mardel, are selling Common Core materials?
Not only that, but what if home school students are forced to test to the Common Core as they are implemented across states?
What if universities will no longer take transcripts of home school
students if they haven't been taught using the COMMON standards or they
haven't taken the CCSS standardized tests? In fact, the Home School Legal Defense Association has condemned the CCSS for these and other reasons.
In closing, why follow blindly behind School Choice advocates when there is really NO CHOICE in education as long as states are perpetuating the CCSS?
It
is important - no necessary - to make sure Republicans pushing these
Obama/Duncan overreaching education reforms understand that parents
understand the issue of Core vs Choice. Let's let legislators, the
media and School Choice advocates know we will NOT raise COMMON children
here in Oklahoma and that Common Core is NOT OK!
Every child deserves better than a COMMON
education!
