Indiana Backs Out of Common Core...

[Caroline]

In NJ, a big objection to CC implementation comes from teachers. A large part of their evaluations are based on test results.

 

Students across that state are compared in cohorts based on previous year's testing. So a students from, say, Newark, who may live in poverty, is being raised by a grandparent because his parents are in jail, etc will be compared to a student from, say, Glen Rock whose banker parents have a tutor for him during the year and enrichment camps during the summer, provided they had similar scores previously.  A teacher whose students improve above the state median gets a better eval than a teacher whose students do not.

 

To take another example, a teacher whose school is flooded out, by, say, Hurricane Sandy, would not have that factored into the test results, which, by law, make up a certain percentage of the teacher evaluation.

 

Btw, I like CC the curriculum. It's the testing & teacher eval that I find utterly confounding. 

 

So here is where the problem really lies.

 

Common Core is separate from Race to the Top and SLDS (State Longitudinal Data System.) However, to get SLDS and Race to the Top funding, the states had to agree to adopt Common Core. The evaluation system and the data collection are parts of Race to the Top and SLDS.Common Core was entwined in these grants. So while Common Core is a part of SLDS grants and Race to the Top grants, Common Core can be implemented without the new teacher evaluation system or the SLDS.

[Walking-Iris]

Yeah that seems likely.  My parents didn't think it was their place to question the educational "experts".  They were not at all involved with what I was doing at school beyond making sure I showed up on time.

 

 

Our parents (again I was in elementary school in the 80s) also didn't have instant access to information and various opinions about things like they do now.

 

Today's parents of school children can read about a  thousand educational issues, in differing countries, and various opinions about all of them in one afternoon online if they wanted to.

 

My mom would have only known what my teachers told her or what was big enough to make any sort of local news/newspaper headline. 

[wapiti]

Exactly! I'd love to see a side-by-side comparison of Indiana's pre-CC state standards with CC standards, and see what the fuss is actually about. 

 

FWIW, I happened to come across this article discussing Indiana's pre-CC standards, the CC standards, and proposed, draft new Indiana standards (as of March 8, the date of the article):  

http://truthinamericaneducation.com/common-core-state-standards/comparing-indianas-new-k-12-math-standards-with-common-core/

 

At the bottom are links to google docs that do a side-by-side comparison of all three.

 

Just skimming this article, it sounds like the old Indiana standards might be superior to either CC or the new proposed standards, though I haven't looked at the google docs.

 

Eta, thinking out loud, I wonder why it's so difficult to simply take the best, clearest standards from each and place them in a developmentally-appropriate sequence.  Working with so many already-written standards, couldn't some experienced standard-reviewers (such as Stotsky and Milgram types) do that in a single afternoon (LOL just kidding) - or certainly within some reasonable timeframe like a few months?

[Butter]

You know... I'm not sure doing Common Core in a state makes a difference or not.  Texas doesn't and yet our math and stuff looks *just like* some of the crazy CC stuff that gets sent around.

[8filltheheart]

So here is where the problem really lies.

Common Core is separate from Race to the Top and SLDS (State Longitudinal Data System.) However, to get SLDS and Race to the Top funding, the states had to agree to adopt Common Core. The evaluation system and the data collection are parts of Race to the Top and SLDS.Common Core was entwined in these grants. So while Common Core is a part of SLDS grants and Race to the Top grants, Common Core can be implemented without the new teacher evaluation system or the SLDS.

In addition to this you have throw in the PARCC testing and the requirement that students passing the PARCC tests are guaranteed to be placed in non-remedial, for college credit classes.

[SKL]

I am not against a common core of really, truly core concepts.  But some of the BS my kids bring home from school is NOT what I expected a common core of knowledge to look like.  It's not knowledge at all.

 

So I won't be sad if they drop it from every state.

[DarlaS]

I really doubt the dad didn't know how to answer that question. He was simply pointing out that there was no point for it. And I would agree with him if his child was not at a point developmentally to figure it out, which is likely given the student couldn't do it. I don't see that as a common core issue though unless common core is asking kids to conceptualize math before they are capable of doing so. I haven't studied cc so I don't know if it does,
 

 

The standards for each grade level are between 4-7 pages long for each grade level:

 

http://www.corestandards.org/wp-content/uploads/Math_Standards.pdf

[Caroline]

This is true, but why would a state implement CC without implementing all the nonsense that goes along with it (increased testing, linking teacher pay to tests, data uploading to a national database)? Let me re-phrase: In these tough economic times, no state is going to spend money to re-vamp their educational structure unless they are getting paid for it. If they are going to re-vamp their entire educational policies and requirements, they are going to want and need money, and lots of it. Enter RTTT. And to get that RTTT funding, the rest of the trash has to go along with CC. I actually don't think CC alone is the devil. I do think it needs tweaking, but I don't think it is the devil. It become the devil when linked to RTTT funds because of the strings attached to the funds, and because states are so attached to the government tit, they will do anything to collect that cash, even if it is against citizens' interests.

ETA: I think people use the CC and RTTT synonymously because there is no state that I know of that has implemented CC without the funds.

And I get that. However, getting rid of common core does not get rid of SLDS or RTTT initiatives. So if those are the things people want to get rid of, then they need to know that voting against common core does not get rid of SLDS or RTTT, which is where all the testing comes from. So Georgia backed out of PARCC. Georgia has threatened to back out of Common Core and any nationalized test. However, that still leaves SLDS and RTTT, which require the testing, but now it would be with state and district tests. So the testing part is still there. The teacher evaluation based on test scores is still there. The database is still there. Just the standards are gone. So the change people wanted wouldn't happen.

[JoJosMom]

You know... I'm not sure doing Common Core in a state makes a difference or not.  Texas doesn't and yet our math and stuff looks *just like* some of the crazy CC stuff that gets sent around.

 

Ah, and this highlights what is, for me, the worst impact of Common Core.  There are very few textbook providers for the public school market and they produce essentially generic material.  Doesn't really matter where you're located; you're going to get the generic material with possibly some minor tweaking.  I am one of those old-school types who think that the whole "laboratory of the States" idea was a good one.  In many different contexts. 

[NavyMommy]

Virginia did this.  Virginia rejected Common Core, but one teacher at my son's school said the teachers were required to teach math "as close to Common Core as possible without being Common Core" in order to secure RTTT funding.  Whatever Virginia is calling it, it's just as asinine as Common Core.  I believe the formal name for this is "turd polishing".  Kids aren't "common", and trying to wish it so isn't going to make it so, which is why the idiocy of Common Core will be gone in less than 10 years. You just can't standardize kids, and I wouldn't want mine standardized either. 

 

This isn't entirely true. The standards in VA have been in place for a long time, well before anyone was even thinking about a set of nationalized standards. I graduated from high school in VA 10 years ago and in order to graduate we had to pass a certain number of SOL (Standards of Learning) tests in each high school subject. VA has spent so much money and time in developing their own standards that I can't see them ever letting them go in favor of Common Core.

 

Not that I think the standards are all that great, and they highly motivate teachers to teach to the tests. I remember in 9th grade every morning we had to copy out a history fact in our journal and work on memorizing them to prepare for the SOL. They also lose a TON of teaching time to testing (it can take several weeks, especially in special education classrooms), and once testing is over (usually mid-May) the bad teachers slack off and turn every day into a movie day and the good ones use that as their chance to get in all the fun things they couldn't get to because of the testing.

 

I also haven't been following it super closely but I don't believe VA is getting any RTTT funding. I know they were initially denied because the standards weren't close enough and last fall they decided to not apply again so I can't see how that would affect your son's math instruction. I just think that "Common Core" is a great new buzzword people like throwing around.

[stripe]

Yes!  The people who "know" always spout off about this or that country that has done well with government health care or education and forget to mention that xyz country is a fairly homogeneous country that is a TON smaller in size and population than the United States. 

I'd just like to mention that Singapore is not at all ethnically homogeneous, and students there are being educated in a language other than their "mother tongue." China is not culturally homogeneous, either, although most Americans think they "all look the same." Same with any number of other countries. Including Canada, where over one-fifth of the population is foreign-born, the highest percentage of G8 countries. 

 

And what's wrong with seeing what other countries are doing? If we can only look at those who are exactly like us, then life would be pretty boring. And lead to a lot more pathetic and pointless bumbling around.

[Caroline]

Getting rid of Common Core sure will get rid of RTTT, unless you're in a state that has boatloads of cash to toss around.  If the state standards that replace Common Core are different enough from Common Core that the federal government will no longer dole out RTTT funds, then there is no more incentive to hook teacher pay to test scores, to collect and upload data, or to spend wads of money on new computerized systems to take the PARCC.  In fact, without those RTTT funds, the computer systems and PARCC tests would surely not happen (because the states won't pay for it themselves).  This happened to Virginia.  Virginia rejected Common Core and got permission for RTTT funds as long as their standards were "Common Core aligned".  The Virginia-drafted standards (standards truly drafted at the state level and not by corporations) were not close enough to Common Core for the government's taste, and Virginia was denied the RTTT funds.  So here in Virginia, we have no PARCC testing and no uploading of data to InBloom. 

 

Not only that, there is the really serious matter that 8Fill mentioned above and that nobody is really discussing, which refers to the Common Core altering admission standards and math course progression at the college level.  It would be worth getting rid of Common Core for that reason alone (unless there was some tweaking on those math standards, as well).  While most people do equate Common Core with the associated testing and don't even realize the difference, most people do see the difference while also realizing that rejecting Common Core will have the effect of killing the testing and data uploading, as well.

 

VLDS, the statewide longitudinal data system, is still in place. Data is being uploaded. You don't need PARCC to have the data system.

[NavyMommy]

Yes, what I wrote is 100% true; and what you wrote is 100% true, also.  Absolutely, SOL standards were in existence for many years before Common Core - they came into being in the 90s, well before Common Core.  Common Core standards were birthed in the late aughts - 2009-ish, if I recall).  So while SOL standards have been in place for much longer, those standards were significantly altered in 2011-2012 to reflect an attempt to align with Common Core; they are still called SOLs because they are still Virginia state standards.  That's why math scores were so abysmal on the 2012 SOLs, as compared to previous years.  This change affected my daughter in 2012 because that was the year they switched to the tests that "attempted" to mimic Common Core.  They are currently affecting my younger son because the tests have not been changed back to the original-style tests that you took years ago. 

 

Virginia refused to give up its SOLs because they felt their math standards were superior (I agree with Virginia's assessment on that), but they did alter the SOLs in an attempt to get RTTT money, which they ultimately did not do because the standards were not close enough to Common Core.  The altered tests remain, there are no new computer programs being used for these tests because no RTTT money was granted for the tests.  That's exactly the point I was making above when I said a lack of money due to non-CC-aligned standards would kill the whole 9 yards (CC, PARCC, data collection).

 

Ah that makes sense.  I didn't realize they had redone the standards. I was just referring to your statement they were as close to CC as possible to get RTTT funding. Since they failed at getting the funding I didn't realize they had gone back in and changed things around.

 

I also totally agree with PP who said it doesn't really matter if just a couple of states abstain from CC. The textbook publishers aren't going to publish a special non CC book for VA and a different one for Indiana. Basically with this number of states accepting it there will be a very limited number of texts for schools to select from so there will be schools in non CC states following CC curriculum.

[In The Great White North]

 

 

I don't recall my parents complaining about what the schools were doing when I was a kid.  Was it always this chaotic, or did my parents really just not have anything to complain about? 

 

My parents complained.  And moved me from school to school.  (I guess homeschooling never occurred to them/ wasn't legal yet.)

 

The first issue I remember was the "open classroom".  They took out the walls between the classrooms, leaving one large room where four had been before.  In each corner was a class (35-40 3rd graders), with each class doing different things. 

 

They moved us in the middle of second grade, after 5th grade, after 8th, and after 9th.

[nature girl]

A little sidenote: We've talked a lot about math, but has anyone here read The Story-Killers? He talks about CC LA and social studies changes...I've only read part of the book so far, but what I've read is more than a little disturbing. Recommend it to anyone who's interested, especially if your children are in ps high schools. Albeit I'm biased as an author, but I know that if my kid(s) end up in public hs I'm going to be assigning them additional books to read, in a desperate attempt to keep them well-rounded, and give them the understanding of the world and themselves that seems to have been drained from current standards.

[stripe]

I don't recall my parents complaining about what the schools were doing when I was a kid. 

I don't recall my parents sharing their opinion about what "the schools" were doing when I was a kid, but, in addition to ensuring that I was in a good (public) school and in higher level classes, they very much had an opinion about what my school was doing and what I was being taught.

[Korrale]

I read about parents that were protesting CC by not allowing their children to do the testing for CC. It was 4-year-old kids doing bubble tests.
They were 4, doing bubble tests. Well, I guess protesting wasn't their primary motivation, but it was throwing a kink in the CC implementation because they didn't have a large enough percentage of test results to show.
I have a friend who has a 3.5 year-old that has decided he is dumb because he isn't good at memorizing the whole-word flash cards they use at his school.

Why are they 4? Kindergarten doesn't even start until a child is 5. Common core doesn't even cover anything before Kindergarten.

[Korrale]

Here's something else.....
http://shine.yahoo.com/healthy-living/common-core-parent-facebook-post-indiana-school-181841158.html

I love the dad's letter.

The issue here is not common core. It is just one method to teach subtraction. Blaming it on common core is very misleading.

[Korrale]

I'm in Indiana. I'm about as anti-Common Core as a person can be, but I don't think we've made it better by "pausing" and then "backing out" all through the school year. It seems to me that nobody has a clue whether they're coming or going (least of all the teachers who started the year with one set of plans and then were expected to be on a different track once the school year had begun!)...and now God-knows-what our standards are going to be now.

One of the primary anti-CC arguments in this state were that the CC English and Math standards were so stinkin' far BELOW what we already had (and those standards had been overhauled and updated recently, and proven good)...but could we just put them back when we decided the CC we agreed to was not for us? Noooooo.

There's only one direction in modern ps and that is forward, forward, forward. In the history of public education, nobody has ever once (to my knowledge) said, "You know what, we really busted it this time. Let's put back all the stuff we broke and be smarter about making changes in the future." Nope. Gone is gone.

So the new standards, some of which were crafted in less than a week, are a hodge podge of CC, former standards, stuff borrowed from other states, and stuff pulled out of the top of somebody's head. Untried? Untested? Not created by experts? Not enough time spent creating and evaluating the standards; instead, they're just pulling them together briefly and calling it good? HELLO. Those were the arguments against CC.

I know people who are pulling their kids out of ps because of Common Core shenanigans, but in our particular state I know many more who are pulling the dc out just because they are tired of the games. What are our standards? No idea. What should our teacher training be like for this year? Well, let's take their whole summer to teach them something new and then pull the rug out from under them the second week of the school year! And our governor and school board superintendent can't work together at all? Fabulous.

No thanks.

I know people want to be happy that Indiana is no longer CC but I find it impossible to be glad about this big ol' mess that has been made.

We have National CC herein our stare. And we have state core standards that are slightly higher. CC are minimum standards there is no reason why more rigor can't be added by the school district or teacher.

[nature girl]

We have National CC herein our stare. And we have state core standards that are slightly higher. CC are minimum standards there is no reason why more rigor can't be added by the school district or teacher.

 

 

Did I read somewhere that CC doesn't allow for/foster the differentiation that former standards did? Or am I completely making that up?

[nature girl]

The issue here is not common core. It is just one method to teach subtraction. Blaming it on common core is very misleading.

 

Korrale, take a look at this s/o thread: http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/509401-so-of-indiana-and-common-core-thread-cc-authors-response-to-the-dad-letter/

[bethben]

I've been thinking about this - mostly because my dh brought it up as a "did you know..."  Let's say Indiana rejects the federal common core and puts in place standards that look very much like common core (which seems to be the consensus here).  There's a huge difference in what happens even if the standards and everything looks similar.  Indiana as a state regains control over it's own educational system.  If the teachers as a whole decide it's just not working and rebel, they can go to their own state and promote change.  If the parents rebel as a whole, they can go to their state and promote change.  If any state, not just Indiana, keeps common core at the federal level, there can be no change within the state no matter if people like it or hate it and changing the standards becomes near impossible.  I think when you get down to the core of this whole mess, it really has to do with the parents and teachers of the children in their state actually having a say in what happens.  Standards come and go, but the real issue is who is holding the reins.  

 

Beth

[a27mom]

I don't know exactly what Indiana's motivation was. But I have been under the impression that the actual standards list is not the major objection to Common Core. (Though I know there are lots of issues with them)

I thought the data collection and testing are the big issues for most people. So, even is Indiana adopted the exact same standards as common core, they get to choose if they want to change them, how they want to assess them, and what reporting they want to do.

[RosieCotton]

Good news!

I hope many states will follow suit.

 

The educational policy of this country is in serious trouble.

Much of this was about money, publishers, and test scores yes and of course the odd data collection/privacy issues.

But the much bigger picture was more indoctrination leading to the loss of our freedoms. Parents should not sit down and be told our children are not our children.

 

It only takes one generation to lose freedom.

 

 

[RosieCotton]

FWIW, I happened to come across this article discussing Indiana's pre-CC standards, the CC standards, and proposed, draft new Indiana standards (as of March 8, the date of the article):  

http://truthinamericaneducation.com/common-core-state-standards/comparing-indianas-new-k-12-math-standards-with-common-core/

 

At the bottom are links to google docs that do a side-by-side comparison of all three.

 

Just skimming this article, it sounds like the old Indiana standards might be superior to either CC or the new proposed standards, though I haven't looked at the google docs.

 

Eta, thinking out loud, I wonder why it's so difficult to simply take the best, clearest standards from each and place them in a developmentally-appropriate sequence.  Working with so many already-written standards, couldn't some experienced standard-reviewers (such as Stotsky and Milgram types) do that in a single afternoon (LOL just kidding) - or certainly within some reasonable timeframe like a few months?

 

Of course they could. Giving the best education to our children has never been the motive. Unfortunately it's about money.

 

Aside from maintaining the power of state rights which I believe is highly relevant:  They won't do it because that would make logical sense, not cost us a fortune, would streamline learning objectives, simplify the classroom and not be worth it at all, oh yeah -   but the govt is involved. (and they like to make money off every piece of this they can all in the name of "helping the children and raising the bar." while dumbing us down. Talk about good fiction writing!)

 

In another few years it will be yet another failed program attempt with another cool name or slogan, lotsa funding and lotsa hands out.

 

Interesting fact: Since the founding of the US Dept of Education in 1979, each year children have gotten less education and worse test scores.

 

 

 

 

 

Interesting fact: Since the founding of the US Dept of Education in 1979, each year children have gotten less education and worse test scores.

 

Do you have a reference for the above?  A quick check shows that US timss scores are higher in 2011 than 2007 for math, and SAT math scores last year where higher than 1979, but verbal were lower.

 The military literacy rate in future years was as follows:

 

Korean War- 81% (received their schooling in the 1940s )

Vietnam War-73% literacy rate (at end of the Vietnam War in 1973, when all states had mandatory schooling through 12th).

 

 

Note that this is very different from claiming that some (unnamed) test scores have fallen every single year since 1979, as a result of the creation of the Department of Education.  Moreover, given than many, many men got deferments from the Vietnam draft by being in college, I would expect the literacy rate to be lower for those draftees.

[RosieCotton]

Do you have a reference for the above?  A quick check shows that US timss scores are higher in 2011 than 2007 for math, and SAT math scores last year where higher than 1979, but verbal were lower.

 

I can look around and see what's public knowledge. I should have been more giving in my background.

 

I worked for Pearson Education for 9 years and was given access to state longitudinal data that was profoundly shocking to me. Not only did it show the decline in literacy across the boards since the early 1970's (male group was the biggest loser), but also the decline of education for the urban areas in math, LA, and science over the rural areas. The districts that had the most money per student were teaching them the least. The programs that were decidedly "not modern enough" were thrown out in the 70s and early 80s, and this pattern continues to repeat itself and the substance gets thinner and thinner in the classrooms replacing it with more color, more fun, less structure, less learning. I personally watched districts lower standards repeatedly, so as to maintain the level they needed for funding.

 

This is one of the big reasaons I love the WTM philosphy. we've lost something so simple. And made it so much more difficult.

 

It's something I had no clue about until I worked for an large Ed company. I thought hey schools do the best they can and yes there are issues, but they are doing their best. I was naive, I had no idea what went on behind the scenes of the school boards, the reg agencies, and others, of course special interest groups, and that there was so much more involved than just finding the best way to teach all students so we could succeed in life.

 

I researched the reg ed programs Pearson, HM, Harcourt, and the programs Pearson had designed to raise students AYP (yearly progress scores in general), but the result was we were preparing students for better test taking, not helping them to learn to learn  --or any of the basic things like the WTM ideals and others with similar ideals impart.

 

6th graders showing up unable to write and form a proper 4 sentence paragraph, and 7th graders not have the ability to start pre-Algebra, but the test scores were going up so hurray we are having success type of thinking so advance to the next grade.

 

Personal side note: I find it interesting that schools can spend weeks and weeks practising for a play about whatever social or political topic is deemed teachable, and that material is completely ingrained in students because of their efforts, but those same students in that school suffer greatly in basic reading, writing, and math. We've become "so smart" that we are becoming more stupid. This attitude is rampant among public districts. I've met with over 30 supers who saw this, but were unable to move to make the changes needed to really impart real change for the better. Sad and depressing.

 

I will check my old work laptop and see what statistics I can find for you and post again. There may be some I can cross ref online to share as well. I apologize my post was not as concise as I could have made it, I take for granted the knowledge I have taken in from my past exposures and assume others to have the same, or at least deduced the same from reading sources in the media and watching over the years with open eyes as one a failed program is replaced by another one, more watered down than the last expecting better results. Rinse lather repeat.

 

I hope some of this clears up my perspective, and brings a little light into the darkness.