This article about a group of people with vested interest in education have decided that America needs to have standards. Last year many states adopted the Common Core Standards making the primary goals for every school in adopting states very much the same. This group of leaders wants to take that a few steps further and diagram exactly what each student should learn each year. This sounds a little to me like E. D. Hirsch. He was a educational philosopher from the 1980s who was an advisor to Ronald Reagan during his presidency. Have we really started to come back around to thinking that school is for skill building and not for creating citizens? Especially since today every bit of information you could ever want is on the internet. Our resources could be better served, teaching students how to create new resources, find the answers to life's mysteries and ask the hard questions.
This is so true, and the further along the "reform" bunny hole we fall, the worse it will get. But then again, why would the establishment want critically thinking citizens who can form their own opinions? The masses need to be kept quiet with their bread and circus drivel spoonfed by the networks, so they don't realize the direction we're heading ultimately leads to a rich-poor caste system with no way to leap the gap.
ReplyDeleteI think the establishment of common core standards could actually be a positive development in that it should lead to lessening the inequality in education. I've observed in several different 2nd grade classrooms this year and I can tell you that what the students are learning is vastly different. As a parent, I would like to know that my child is receiving the same quality education as the child in the class next door. Hopefully, these standards will work toward increasing equality in opportunities.
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