This map dated 2.26.13 shows the many states that are pulling back from the Common Core Standards.
Legislators in Alabama today are holding a public hearing on HB 254 (companion bill SB 190) that would repeal Alabama’s commitment to the Common Core Standards.
Some of the Alabama legislators are using scare tactics to say that if Alabama decided to leave the Common Core Standards, they would become an “island” all alone among the other states.
This map shows that that is absolutely not true. Numerous states are pulling back from the Common Core Standards:
https://www.box.com/s/0jcz6zo5otf0ojtfe3tu
In fact, more and more states are pulling back from Common Core Standards once they know how terribly expensive it is going to be for states’ taxpayers to pay for the cost of the national assessments. The federal government will not pay for the cost of administering and implementing the national assessments; the states’ taxpayers will.
For instance, Alabama taxpayers will have to come up with $282 Million to implement the Common Core Standards assessments built upon Common Core curriculum standards that have never even been piloted nor internationally benchmarked.
Nobody knows definitively whether or not the Common Core Standards and the accompanying national assessments will increase students’ academic achievement in any way.
In fact, students’ academic achievement could well go down since the Common Core Standards do not include a systematic approach to the teaching of reading nor grammar/usage/spelling/cursive writing – the most important skills that a student must master to be successful in all other courses.
Former Texas Commissioner of Education Robert Scott has recently testified that he was pressured to commit Texas to the Common Core Standards before they were even written. The same thing undoubtedly occurred in other states, too. (Thankfully Commissioner Scott and Gov. Rick Perry rejected the Common Core Standards early-on, and Texas has adopted its own curriculum standards and state tests. Since Texas used public dollars to adopt its own curriculum standards (TEKS), those standards can be utilized by other states free of charge.)
California has received $104 Million in federal funds but would have to spend $2.1 Billion to implement the inferior Common Core Standards assessments built upon the inferior national curriculum standards that are not as rigorous as the ones California has in place right now!
The cost to states’ taxpayers for the implementation of the Common Core Standards assessments is no secret. Henry W. Burke has published a report that details the costs for each of the states:
10.15.13 – “States’ Taxpayers Cannot Afford Common Core Standards” by Henry W. Burke --
http://educationviews.org/states-taxpayers-cannot-afford-common-core-standards/
For taxpayers to spend such atrocious amounts of money on these non-proven/unresearched national standards, national curriculum, national assessments, national teacher evaluations, and a nationally intrusive database of all students/teachers/families is as foolish as “spitting in the wind.”
Donna Garner
Wgarner1@hot.rr.com