Letter: Common Core focuses on training, not education

Julian Smith

Hope

To the editor:

As out-of-state investors and pro-privatize education interest groups pour into our state with their deep pockets to advocate through media advertisements in favor of Common Core state standards, it would seem the practitioners commissioned to implement them should be consulted as well. As a teacher of 22 years in our public schools, concerns exist with the newest fad sweeping the nation.

Does anyone need to be reminded of the last national “fad” to be imposed by Washington? It was a bipartisan initiative called No Child Left Behind, and there are few that believe it did anything to improve the educational environment or the instructional climate in our state or nation. In fact every attempt to “fix” education with more federal involvement has only served to harm it.

Here, I would like to point out four of the most compelling concerns with Common Core:

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