Corbett Puts Brake On Common Core — Penn Delco School Director Lisa Esler reports that Gov. Tom Corbett has put the brake on the implementation of Common Core — a corporation-conceived national educational curriculum being pushed by Washington.
Good for the Governor.
Mrs. Esler also says that the below resolution will be proposed at the next Penn Delco School Board meeting:
The Penn-Delco School District
Aston, PA 19014
Resolution Opposing Common Core State Standards Initiative
May 2013
Whereas, a solid education of children is the responsibility of the parents, supported by the locally elected Penn Delco School Board based on a strong foundation of accountability and transparency, that is built by open communication about the policies, programs, curriculum and the funding of these education processes; and,
Whereas, the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) Initiative is not a state-led initiative, as it is being presented, but is instead a subpar and unproven experimental set of national standards lacking empirical data to support them, that are still in the early stages of development, and local school board members, school leaders, teachers and most importantly parents were not included in the discussion, evaluation and preparation of the Common Core; and,
Whereas, through a collaboration between three non-governmental organizations, National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers, both of which are Washington D C based trade associations with zero grant of legislative authority from states to draft national standards. The primary drafters, Achieve, Inc., is a non-profit progressive education group with a political bias based in Washington DC; and,
Whereas, Common Core State Standards Initiative was financed by private groups that stand to profit from the sales of textbooks and testing equipment to support these new experimental standards which by-passed our state legislature and impose these controls over the Pennsylvania Content Standards and Testing; and,
Whereas, Common Core State Standard Initiative binds us to an established copyright over standards, from which we cannot delete, replace or add beyond an additional 15% even if parents, teachers, and the local school board all agree, ignoring academic freedom, teacher autonomy, stifling creativity, innovation, eliminating a laboratory environment & best practices; and,
Whereas, General Educational Provisions Act prohibits federal authority over curriculum and testing; however, the U.S. Department of Education’s Cooperative Agreement confirms Common Core’s test-building and data collection is federally managed, thereby violating Federal Law; and,
Whereas, Common Core State Standards Initiative violates Constitutional and statutory prohibitions, pressuring states to adopt the standards, even before they were written, and tied financial incentives to “Race to the Top”. If States did not adopt the Common Core Standards they faced penalties, and loss of funds; and,
Whereas, the federal government is imposing an unfunded mandate on our state for unproven Common Core instruction, training, and testing platforms without any pledge of financial support from federal, state or local government; and,
Whereas, neither the Pennsylvania Secretary of Education nor the Governor of Pennsylvania are authorized by the Pennsylvania State Constitution to change public education standards and curricula without prior passage of legislation in the Pennsylvania General Assembly whose mandated responsibility in Article III, Section 14 is “to provide for the maintenance and support of a thorough and efficient system of public education to serve the needs of the Commonwealth.”; and,
Whereas, the CCSS requires collection and sharing of massive amounts of personal student and teacher data creating substantial risk of privacy breach; Now Therefore be it
RESOLVED, That The Penn Delco School District does not subscribe to a one size fits all top down approach to education and recognizes that CCSS as an inappropriate overreach of untested, experimental education standards that are not developed from the results based evidence of their efficacy nor on demonstrated best practices;
RESOLVED, that the Penn Delco School District rejects the collection of personal student data for any non-educational purpose without the prior written consent of a parent;
RESOLVED, That the Board of School Directors of Penn Delco School District hereby officially advises the State Board of Education, the Pennsylvania Secretary of Education, the Governor of Pennsylvania, the Senate and House of Representatives’ Education Committees and the Independent Regulatory Review Commission that it opposes the Common Core Standard Initiative.
Corbett Puts Brake On Common Core
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