Parents: Blurry Boundaries Hurt Kids

Our guest on Wednesday, January 8th, was Kendra Wesson, Oklahoma State School Board member. Today, we talked about a whole LOT of things, but the one thing we talked about that is the most important to parents was this conversation about how allowing kids to have boundaries that blur the line between kid and adult can really cause the kid to get blindsided by things such as sexual molestation by a teacher or coach. Watch this short video and then find the full live video on our Rumble and YouTube channels.

State School Board Throws Out HB1775 (Critical Race Theory) Rules - But Says Teachers Must Follow

What in the world is going on at the Oklahoma State Department of Education - again? 

July 12th, the Oklahoma State School Board voted to accept the rules written to uphold HB1775, the bill that prohibits the teaching of divisive subjects often linked to Critical Theory, or Critical Race Training.

Oil and Water and Who Is Mautra Jones? Standards Re-Write Gets Started.

Today was the monthly meeting of the Oklahoma State Board of Education. Today, as with many days since the installment of Dr. Janet Barresi as State Superintendent, a band should have been hired to play the Star Spangled Banner during the fireworks.

OSSBA did an admirable job Tweeting out the most exciting portions, while the Tulsa World chronicled the entire meeting with equally-admirable restraint.

Unfortunately, this Board meeting did not allay concerns about the standards re-write process.

Oklahoma standards writing committee named 

HB3399 was signed June 5th. According to the bill's language, development of new standards must begin "upon the effective date of this act" and new Oklahoma standards must be in place "on or before August 1st, 2016". So far, not only are the standards not being written, but only today - 3 board meetings following signing - has the board acted upon the re-write process and named the majority of members to the Oklahoma Standards Writing Committee. They are:

• Ms. Amy Ford, Steering Committee Chair, Member of the State Board of Education
• General Lee Baxter, Member of the State Board of Education
• Mr. Bill Price, Member of the State Board of Education
• Dr. Glenn Johnson, Chancellor of the Oklahoma State Regents for Higher Education
• Mr. Larry Parman, Secretary of the Oklahoma Department of Commerce
• Dr. Marcie Mack, interim Director of the Department of Career and Technology Education
• Ms. Barbara Bayless - Reading Specialist, Choctaw-Nicoma Park Public Schools (Teacher of the Year finalist 2013)
• Ms. Elaine Hutchison - Math instructor, Fairview Public Schools and the Oklahoma School of Science and Mathematics Regional Center - Teacher of the Year (TOA's must be OEA member - mentions teaching with Common Core)
• Mr. Don Raleigh - Superintendent of Pryor Public Schools (school awarded a Google grant for robotics - has received STEM aid from the Department of Career and Technology Education
• Ms. Mautra Jones - Parent of an Oklahoma City Public Schools student and non-profit professional (apparently a Gubernatorial appointment as Director of Development to the Oklahoma Merit Protection Commission and has served as Development Director for The Foundation for Oklahoma City Public Schools. She has also is a member of the OKC Rotary and Leadership Oklahoma City)

Apparently, there is to be a member of the State Department of Education included - and an Executive Director position - but those have yet to be named.

Other than the Board members and Chancellor, I know only what I was able to find on the internet about the other committee members. How these people were selected is unclear. Amy Ford read off the nominations and they were accepted by the Board - apparently there was no discussion regarding any of the appointments at the public meeting - seeming as though this had all been arranged previously, via another process.

Two members are OEA-affiliated and OEA is the arm of the NEA; large Common Core supporters. Mr. Parman was appointed by the Governor and has been/is a member of the Professional Economic Development Council which works closely with the Chamber.  Mr. Raleigh has gotten his school into bed with Google (bad for parents who are concerned about student privacy). 

Jones, however, is the straw that broke the came's back.

Who Is Mautra Jones?

According to the press release concerning the Committee appointments, the only thing mentioned about Jones is that she is a "parent of an Oklahoma City Public Schools Student and non-profit professional". Interestingly, they overlook the fact that this woman is already a gubernatorial appointment (to the Oklahoma Merit Protection Commission). She is also listed in Leadership Oklahoma (2010-2011) as having been Development Director for The Foundation for Oklahoma City Public Schools. Certainly, Jones is NOT a 'plain old mom' as she is made to sound - which feels disingenuous. This one committee member - when added to to others makes me feel as though these nominations were preconceived notions.They seem to me like 'echo-chamber' nominations - and by that I mean, nominations taken from a pool of the same nomination pool in the same circle of public/private associations utilized most frequently by those in power - there is nothing 'new' here and that concerns me. Certainly we know that Mr. Parman and Ms. Jones have the DIRECT ear of the Governor. They, as the Board members, will do what the Governor wants - as the General alluded to today. This is disconcerting because I don't trust the Chairman of the National Governor's Association NOT to re-write/re-brand the Common Core and put them back into place. Not only that, but what happened to those of us that filled out applications to serve in this process? Where are THOSE names? 

Politics Trump Reason

Dr. Barresi wanted to add SDE standards process guru,Terri Brecheen to the Committee today, but she was ignored and the slate approved without Brecheen's addition. This situation does not turn the dial on my comfort level to 11. For all Barresi's faults - and she has innumerable of them - the appointment of Terri Brecheen would have been the best thing the Board could have done at this point. But, because Barresi is a lame duck of the highest order who can't stop doing ridiculous stuff (like creating a new Assistant Superintendent position for the husband of her Chief counsel - Kim Richey - 3 months before she relinquishes her office and referring to General Baxter a son-of-a-b*** in public - during the Board meeting), the Board is going to ignore her completely no matter what she says. It also doesn't help that Teri Brecheen is the mother of Senator Josh Brecheen and using her in this role could appear politically one-sided (not that current gubernatorial appointment and teacher's union nominees don't?).

Who Is Sandra Stotsky?

Sandra Stotsky is professor Emerita at the University of Arkansas, but her biggest claim to fame is as the developer of not only the standards themselves, but of the process which created, the best educational standards in the country prior to 2004 - that of Massachusetts. She has many other qualifications provided at the link above, but I want to focus on the standards issue.

Dr. Stotsky Skyped in testimony for Gus Blackwell's interim study on Common Core in 2013 and has written numerous research documents in order to support the pullout of Oklahoma from CC to the point that she is certainly also a credit in our win.

Several months ago, Dr. Stotsky committed her directions for creating the standards-writing process to paper and sent them to me. I sent this process on to General Baxter and Terri Brecheen. Since that time, Terri Brecheen and Dr. Stotsky have spoken numerous times about what was done in Massachusetts. This is why Brecheen would make an excellent addition to the Committee - she has firsthand knowledge of the standards creation process from the horse's mouth. 

Why in the world, wouldn't Oklahoma want to avail ourselves of the standards writing process used to form the best standards in the country? We get it for FREE. We get it from a woman who knows about which she speaks - she's the foremost authority in fact. Neither Dr. Stotsky nor her plan are joined at the hip to Janet Barresi. There's no political (or otherwise) 'toxicity' associated with this woman and she needs to be heard. She is willing to fly out and discuss her plan with anyone who will listen - she is COMMITTED to making sure that states get excellent standards and if anyone knows what excellent standards are, it's Stotsky.

Where do we go now?

I've spoken to General Baxter - he has been kind enough to take the time to speak with me. I'm not faulting him, nor am I pointing fingers at the Board, nor am I casting aspersions on the new Committee members. Lame ducks make for crummy politics and tend to impede progress. Unfortunately, however, Oklahoma doesn't have eons to get this standards thing right - we, by law, have until August 1st, 2016. We have to get this show on the road. Already the process could be complicated by the fact that - though Stotsky has shared her plan with the General and Brecheen - the process hasn't begun the way Dr. Stotsky suggested. Though the Committee itself doesn't write the standards, they name those that will. The composition of the Board is a very important first step in the getting this process right, and we haven't gotten off on the right foot according to Stotsky's plan.

At this point, I'm going to suggest we send emails/make phone calls to our legislators and ask them to speak with state school board members (general OSDE phone number 405-521-3301) AND ask them:

1. to make sure Stotsky is invited to present her plan to the entire Committee for their consideration.
2. that Terri Brecheen be added to the committee because of her familiarity with Stotsky's plan.
3. to attend the testing interim study, Wednesday, October the 1st from 3:15 to hear Representative Brumbaugh discuss testing options for Oklahoma

Though a bit off point here, another decision at the Board meeting today was NOT to use McGraw/Hill as our source for state testing. There ARE other options that are NOT aligned to Common Core - one of these is the IOWA test. We need to get everyone possible to come and be educated on this topic in order for Oklahoma to make the right choice on testing - and not one, like ACT Aspire, that is aligned with the Common Core. 

As parents - and concerned citizens - we must continue to keep abreast of the standards re-write process. We worked so hard to get Common Core out of Oklahoma, let's continue to participate in the process - to the extent we can - and make sure the result is not only good for kids and parents, but great for Oklahoma as well.

Common Core Comment To State School Board From Rope President Jenni White

Remarks to the Board Regarding the Common Core State Standards

Jenni White, President, Restore Oklahoma Public Education

Oklahoma’s legislature passed SB2033, codifying the Common Core State Standards into law in 2010.

Since that time, ROPE has studied this initiative and witnessed what can only generously be called a campaign of misinformation emanate from the State Department of Education regarding the Common Core in Oklahoma.  For instance;

• The idea that Common Core is ‘state led’.  This is a marketing term used to make people believe the standards come from within their states.  They do not.  They were written by several people, including a man named David Coleman – now head of the College Board and responsible for the effort to align the SAT with the Common Core – at a Washington, D.C. non-profit called Student Achievement Partners (http://www.achievethecore.org/about-student-achievement-partners/principles-work)  who gave them to an organization called Achieve, who then passed them on to the National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers to sell states in a nationally concerted effort via  their Governors and Superintendents (http://achieve.org/history-achieve ).

• Prior to the Common Core, Oklahoma had PASS standards.  After Dr. Barresi entered the Superintendent’s office, we were given C3 standards – the very term for the national (Common Core) Social Studies standards by the Council of Chief School Officers, who pushed them out for Achieve (http://truthinamericaneducation.com/c3-state-social-studies-standards/ccsso-releases-c3-framework-social-studies-state-standards/).  Since Vision 2020, these standards are now called Oklahoma Academic standards which Dr. Barresi has referred to in her regular newspaper column for 7/19/13 as including, “Oklahoma approved standards in the Common Core for English and math and Oklahoma developed standards in social studies, science and other subjects.”

Brad Henry, however, filed a Race To The Top addendum in 2010 adopting EVERY ‘common core’ standard including Social Studies and Science as found in Chapter 15 Subchapter 4 (http://ok.gov/sde/node/3651) of the Department’s own rules.

If the social studies standards were Oklahoma’s, wouldn’t the Department be breaking its own rules?  Is that why Oklahoma’s Social Studies standards are nearly identical to the C3 Common Core standards put out by the CCSSO (http://restoreoklahomapubliceducation.blogspot.com/2013/06/oklahoma-history-standards-could-very.html )?  Why do they match up exactly in content to those prescribed by the RTT addendum?  Why would David Barton tell us directly – and on a broadcast of Glenn Beck’s The Blaze program – that he had nothing to do with the standards  other than showing up at a meeting – though Dr. Barresi has touted him as having had input.  Why do Oklahoma’s standards and the C3 standards call America a Constitutional Democracy and not a Constitutional Republic as is actually the case? (http://restoreoklahomapubliceducation.blogspot.com/2013/03/a-republic-maam-if-you-can-keep-it.html)

• Why are other Common Core adoptive states such as Pennsylvania and Alabama spontaneously doing the same thing – re-naming their Common Core standards (http://restoreoklahomapubliceducation.blogspot.com/2013/07/does-state-department-of-education.html)

• The Guiding Principles for the Arts posted on the State’s website (http://www.ok.gov/sde/sites/ok.gov.sde/files/CCore%20guidingprinciples-arts.pdf) are Common Core standards written by David Coleman - the man who told a group of computer programmers at a seminar that he went around ‘selling’ the standards to state leaders and had to ‘dupe’ Republicans into buying them by leaving out that President Obama supported them.

• Just this month, Dr. Barresi penned a letter meant for distribution to state superintendents telling them she was removing Oklahoma from PARRC testing, yet a letter written by Georgia’s state superintendent was almost exactly the same (http://restoreoklahomapubliceducation.blogspot.com/2013/07/states-dumping-parrc-is-orchestrated.html)

The Fordham Institute – Common Core proponents - gave both Oklahoma’s PASS in English and Math a grade of B+ and said they were clearer and easier to understand than the Common Core.   

Oklahomans pay state taxes to support Oklahoma public schools NOT organizations and companies OUTSIDE our state who want to put us on a path to nationalized standards predicated on a lie.

Common Core Comment To State School Board From Rope Board Member Julia Seay

 

State School Board Meeting Remarks for July 2013

James Lankford, July 19:  “When the (NCLB) waiver authority is given, now the Department  of Education becomes a National School Board telling each district, each state what they have to do to meet the new requirements that they can literally make up as they go because there is no law or statute that they are behind.  That’s why we desperately need to pass a replacement to that NCLB so states and school districts know how to function within the law, and not just something that changes from year to year based on the whims of the Department of Education or the decisions they bring down this year according to their waiver.”

On Congressman Jim Bridenstine’s Facebook Page, he boldly posts our Common Core is not OK logo with this heading: "The goal of good education should be the pursuit of what is true and just and right and real… not the protection or propagation of what is common. ”Dr. Everett Piper, President of Wesleyan University.  Share if you agree.”  This post received 736 Likes and 361 shares… In social media lingo, it went viral.

Both Senators Coburn and Inhofe signed an official Senatorial letter against Common Core.

Groups such as Heritage Foundation, Americans for Prosperity, Concerned Women of America, David Barton and Wallbuilders, Cato Institute, Family Research Council, Act for America, The Oklahoma Republican Party and the Republican National Committee have come out AGAINST Common Core, even if it is renamed Oklahoma Academic Standards.

Why do we insist on “educating” our children if what is being taught is counter to a productive society?  

Charlotte Iserbyt, former Senior Policy Advisor in the U.S. Department of Education under President Ronald Reagan said that even if the Federal Government wanted to educate children on the 10 Commandments, it is still wrong, because education is NOT the Federal Government’s job. 

For the last 50 years, the Federal Government has interfered with education by offering a pittance of tax dollars, which they take from Oklahomans only to give back if we beg just right and comply with all the strings attached.

If the Standards themselves are not bad enough – and they are -- we have Data Collection on our children to be shared across state lines, then nationally, then globally with “Stakeholders” (a term that can be defined as needed). 

With headlines in the news such as

• Congress, lewd photos and NYC's mayoral race 
• IRS targets conservative groups
• House rejects effort to cut off NSA surveillance program
• Obama's Safe Schools Czar Tied to Lewd Readings for 7th Graders
• Grassley seeks to Defund Common Core

 We do not have to worry about hackers.  The very entity collecting the data is dangerous and corrupt.  Corruption in government is at an all-time high.   For Oklahoma to collect data on students in this climate is insane.  
 

WHY?  What is the rush?  Our children can be sold for a few federal dollars?  Teachers will not teach more effectively by knowing how parents vote or what time a student arrives at his bus stop, or their blood type.  Before you say, “We won’t do that” you should know that the P-20 Council set up by this department burst into laughter when John Kramen said, “Just because the data model is set up to collect that data doesn’t mean they will.”

With state after state trying to pass laws to slow or stop this train wreck, why can we not slow down long enough to examine what we are doing?  What kind of money, either federal OR from “stakeholders,” is worth endangering our children and making them the prey of Big Government and Big Business, and interested private organizations? 

STOP THE LONGITUDINAL DATA SYSTEM and STOP COMMON CORE at least until we have a chance to evaluate the cost, not only to our pocketbooks, but to our children and society.

I have attached a report by the Cato Institute that I believe should be of interest to you.  It speaks to the deception of the implementation of Common Core.   

The drive to impose uniform curriculum standards on the nation’s schools has been one of stealth, and at times, seemingly intentional deception. Most egregious has been the mantra of Common Core proponents that the effort has been “state-led and voluntary,” despite Washington coercing state adoption through the Race to the Top program and No Child Left Behind waivers; standards creators encouraging just such federal “incentives”; and Washington selecting and funding the two groups creating the tests to go with the standards. And now, more than a week after the U.S. Department of Education announced the creation of a “technical review” panel to assess the assessments, it seems increasingly certain that the panel’s work will be done behind closed doors.

(You can find more here:

http://www.cato.org/blog/americans-deserve-know-federal-role-national-tests)

Sincerely,
Julia Seay
Board Member
Restore Oklahoma Public Education

Common Core Comment To State School Board From A Mom

July 25, 2013

Superintendent Barresi and Board Members,

Throughout history, education in the United States has always emphasized local control of schools, standards, curriculum, and testing.  The principle of subsidiarity states that functions which local organizations perform effectively belong more properly to them than to a dominant central organization (Merriam-Webster).  In other words, a matter ought to be handled by the smallest, lowest, or least centralized authority capable of addressing that matter effectively (Wikipedia).

When local control is handed over to a larger, centralized, distant authority, the more likely it is that decisions made by that authority are not in the best interest of those affected by it.  Local control means local involvement. Local involvement ensures the best educational outcome.

Common Core, or the Oklahoma Academic Standards as they are now called, is the opposite of local control. These standards were produced by the National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers.  These standards are owned and copyrighted by private organizations that are not accountable to the people of Oklahoma.  Not a single elected legislative body has had any input into these standards.  There were no local meetings, public input or debate about these standards prior to their adoption by the Oklahoma state legislature.  Where is the local control?  In addition, it is my understanding that we must adopt and implement Common Core word for word, and can add no more than 15% of the material taught.  Again I ask, where is the local control?

Our state adopted these standards before they were even completed.  That makes as much sense as when Nancy Pelosi said, when referring to the Affordable Care Act, “We have to pass it to see what’s in it.”  I know the legislature had not read the standards before adopting them, but I ask, have any of you?  We are implementing a program that no one has read and that has not been field-tested.  We are drastically changing the way we educate in Oklahoma, and no one knows what the impact will be on our children.

If our state no longer has control over education, neither will the parents in our state.  This clearly violates the right of parents to direct the education of their children.

A quote from Thomas Jefferson seems quite appropriate here: “Were we directed from Washington when to sow and when to reap, we should all want for bread.”

Please don’t give away our local control.

Respectfully submitted,

LeAnn 
Edmond, Oklahoma