Common Core-istas: We Don’t Ever Care What the Kids’ Opinions Are
May 25, 2014
By Sara Noble
SHEEPLE OF THE US
The Blaze is posting a series of interviews with people who are fighting Common Core. Common Core standards are being used as the basis for a totalitarian system of instruction and testing being forced into state after state using money as bait and claiming there is a mandate to do it because of the initial acceptance by state governors.
They interviewed one fifth grade teacher from Arizona, Brad McQueen, who became disgusted and wrote his own book, “The Cult of Common Core.”
Benjamin Weingarten of the blaze conducted an email interview with Mr. McQueen. His answers are shocking and deeply concerning.
Mr. McQueen was sent by the AZ Department of Education to Chicago to work on evaluating the writing/reading rubrics for the Common Core/PARCC test. This was March 2013. He had no opinion of the standards either way at the time.
He said the Common Core tests were not like anything he dealt with before. They had “50 more shades of bureaucracy.” His handlers, he said, weren’t interested in his questions about where the standards came from or who wrote the test questions. They would sometimes say, “Teachers were involved.” He said something didn’t feel right.
He had a question about a student writing sample and his handler said, “We don’t ever care what the kids’ opinions are. If they write what they think or put forth their opinion then they will fail the test.”
Mr. McQueen explained that he always taught his students to think for themselves after giving them multiple points of view. That is the old way of writing,” the Common Core handler sighed. “We want students to repeat the opinions of the ‘experts’ that we expose them to on the test. This is the ‘new’ way of writing with the Common Core.”
He began to see that this was the philosophy and not some rogue handler. He told his handler that it is not the way teachers teach in the classroom. Her response: “We expect that when the test comes out the teachers in the classroom will imitate the skills emphasized on the test (teach to the test) and employ this new way of writing and thinking.” This was a complete kick in the stomach moment for me.
He was sent back a second time in November and experienced the same thing. No one cared what he thought. He and the other teachers were window dressing so they could say “teachers were involved.”
Parents are treated the same way. No one cares what they think.
What should people fear the most, McQueen was asked. He said this:
The Common Core is much bigger than just a set of standards, a test, or a data gathering machine. Like a virus, the Common Core tricks its victims into lowering their guard by pretending to be something it is not. But the Common Core isn’t just a mindless infection of our society; rather it is an intentional takeover of our education delivery system and therefore a takeover of our children’s minds. It is a one-size-fits-all, homogenized, centrally controlled education delivery system steeped in Progressive ideology. It is antithetical to everything that makes our country exceptional. This cult is relentlessly pulling our children under its control, with a seemingly endless supply of money, and uses intimidation to silence its opponents.
By taking over how our kids think the Common Core will be used to shape future generations of citizens and their relationship with their own true history and their government. Sovereignty over education was always too decentralized into the states to do this in the past.
Many people are focusing on the incompetent implementation of the Common Core tests or the need to rework the standards. The reality is that the entire Common Core beast, including the never-before-tested-standards that were created in secret, the tests which were based on those standards, and the data suctioning systems which were put in place to track our children’s personal information and monitor teacher compliance with Common Core Central, should be slayed and buried in total. States’ Governors and Superintendents of Education were elected to protect the interests of our children, yet they let this Common Core beast through the gates. There should be a call for them to resign and/or not seek re-election in light of their educational malpractice.
Having said all this, the one concrete thing that Americans should fear most is the NSA-like data suctioning systems set in place by the Common Core groups to gather all manner of data about our children and their families starting in preschool and going up through college and career.
Mr. McQueen self-published and his book has been #1 on Amazon. It can be found here.
Our children will be brainwashed under a nationalized education program and we had better start paying attention. The testing is being kept top secret. Is it because they don’t want teachers to teach to the test or is it because they don’t want us to know what is on the test? I believe it’s the latter. Teachers have been threatened with fines in Utah if they reveal any information about the tests. Ask yourself, is this what we do in America?
One teacher said he helped write Common Core because of white privilege and it will give minorities the same opportunity as white kids. Of course that defense makes no sense whatsoever:
via eagnews
Common Core is an educational movement for complete and total government control of our children’s education. The Core was written by a handful of left-wing individuals like David Coleman who is now aligning the SAT’s with the Core to solidify the complete PK through college control that is in our futures.
Common Core standards are the basis for all curricula nationwide and they are being put into every text, video and workbook. They will be the basis for every test including college entrance exams. In addition, the government will be a repository for hundreds of pieces of data they collect on every child through to adulthood.
It is a rigid one-size fits all curricula and all must take the endless tests and know all the exact same information. There is no time left for creativity or individual thought processes. It is a global, collectivist education for all.
If that isn’t complete government control, you must tell me what is.
http://www.independentsentinel.com/common-core-istas-we-dont-ever-care-what-the-kids-opinions-are/
