Does The U.S. Need Common Core Education Standards?
It's early yet, but already the Common Core State Standards are becoming a major issue for the 2016 presidential campaign.
Developed by the National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers in 2009, the Common Core is supposed to give states a uniform set of goals for student academic achievement and "college and career readiness." Among the early Republican GOP frontrunners, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush has been outspoken in his support of the standards. But there has been no shortage of criticism from conservatives and liberals, who say the standards simply aren't as good as advertised and allow for too much federal meddling in classrooms.
Are Common Core Standards necessary? Should states be left to set their own academic standards? Ben Boychuk and Joel Mathis, the RedBlueAmerica columnists, weigh in.
JOEL MATHIS: Quick question to critics of Common Core standards: Does 2 plus 2 have a different answer in Kansas than it does in Pennsylvania? Is the English language written any differently in the two states? Is it read any differently in those two states? No? So what, exactly, is the problem? Is there some good reason we should let a perfectly smart kid in one state graduate from high school a little dumber than the equally smart kid in the next state with higher standards? What exactly is the virtue in that? Maybe it's a question of federal overreach. It shouldn't be, because states can opt out, but some conservatives continue to fret about Big Government's role in education.
In fact, Republicans have gone back and forth over the years whether they want the feds involved with education at all. Reagan-era conservatives vowed to shut down the Department of Education that was created during the Carter Administration, but conservatives of the George W. Bush era created (with the help of a few Democrats) the No Child Left Behind Act. Now they're back to distrusting the feds. Funny how the GOP waxes and wanes depending on whether a Democrat holds the White House. It's enough to make you think the party's small government principles are flimsy and highly situational.
Indeed, the fight over Common Core is mostly a battle within the GOP. The standards were created with the support of Republican governors, after all, and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush remains one of their chief defenders. Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal was for Common Core before he was against it. Once a conservative idea becomes mainstream these days, it seems, Republicans want nothing to do with it anymore. Think Obamacare.
Democrats are also split over Common Core - with opposition coming mostly from teachers unions - though they haven't made a chest-beating spectacle of it like Republicans. This is mostly a battle of how much "Big Government" the GOP will permit itself. It's an ideological fight that has almost nothing to do with education. And that's a tedious disservice to our kids.
BEN BOYCHUK: If the Common Core standards were simply about ensuring that the sum of 2 and 2 is the same in all 50 states, they wouldn't be the least bit controversial.
And if the Common Core were really what its best advocates claim - a rigorous set of benchmarks that builds on a common foundation of knowledge - then conservatives would have little quarrel.
In reality, the Common Core is just a fresh gloss on decades-old progressive pedagogy. Some of the jargon has changed - you hear a lot these days about "critical thinking skills," but precious little about content - but the teaching is as loosey-goosey as ever.
What's more, the Common Core paves the way for a national curriculum - something the federal government has neither the constitutional authority nor the competence to impose. But once the standards are set, molding a curriculum to Common Core's tests won't be far behind.
Republicans got themselves into a real pickle with the Common Core. Because this set of standards had the blessing of state school superintendents and the National Governors Association, Republican elected officials could plausibly claim that Common Core was a bottom-up initiative, rather than yet another federal imposition.
That changed in 2009, when the Obama administration made $4.35 billion in federal Race to the Top funds contingent on states adopting the standards. Even then, the president and his education secretary, Arne Duncan, insisted that the standards remained voluntary.
It's no secret, however, that supposedly conservative pols will abandon their principles when federal dollars are dangling. With a few exceptions, GOP governors and lawmakers happily signed on to the Common Core. Only later did they bother to look at the details.
Now it's a presidential campaign issue. A few would-be Republican candidates - notably former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush - steadfastly support the standards, proving yet again that stubborn consistency in the face of mounting evidence isn't a virtue.
But the rest see the Common Core as polls show many parents view it: as a confounding and expensive mess that leaves their children to flounder. For any Republican who wants to win, the right side is the parents' side.
This piece originally appeared in Newsday
This piece originally appeared in Newsday