Common Core meeting

CTU To Host Common Core Forum
By Jim Vail


The Chicago Teachers Union will be holding a very important meeting to help formulate its position on the Common Core curriculum next Friday, January 24, 2014 at Wells High School, 936 N. Ashland Ave. from 5 - 6:30 pm.

A flyer distributed at the CTU delegates meeting last week stated that teachers can discuss the new Common Core state standards and its implications on the teaching profession.

The forum will include discussing its impact on its developmental appropriateness, implementation issues, implications for teachers and students, and solutions-oriented next steps to support teachers and students, the CTU flyer stated.

The Common Core has been highly touted by the Obama administration and Race to the Top to implement a standard curriculum across the country.

Education Secretary Arne Duncan has had to bribe many states to implement the Common Core by dangling financial incentives.  

Still several states have held out.

Interestingly enough, there are some republicans against the Common Core because they think it is an intrusive federal policy dictating what the states should teach.

Pro public education expert Diane Ravitch has been mostly critical of the Common Core curriculum because it is untested, using the children as guinea pigs in an experiment.  She has written that it also seems to take away the teachers' autonomy in the classroom.

The American Federation of Teachers (AFT), the parent union of the CTU, have been one of the biggest cheerleaders for the Common Core. 

AFT president Randi Weingarten has called it "revolutionary."

The Common Core is demanding a more rigorous curriculum tied to "college and career readiness."

Common Core is a corporate-driven curriculum touted by the likes of Chicago mayor Rahm Emanuel.

In fact, its architects are repeating the lie that the United States is falling behind the rest of the world in academics.  

The facts are the middle and upper class children in this country score among the top nations in math and reading, while the poor class fall way behind international norms.

Recent Common Core tests in New York were abysmal.