Is Common Core cutting-edge education or just use of a dull blade?
By John Young
Posted 4/21/2013
The Denver Post
Jinnie Spiegler, left, mother of Nacala Spiegler-Frederick, right, is worried that the standardized tests third-through-eighth graders will take will be harder than ever before. Educators have issued warnings that math and English tests are aligned to Common Core standards that most schools have not implemented yet. (John Minchillo/AP)
Talk to Melissa Colsman and you know she’s a teacher, even before she tells you she once taught math. The executive director of the Colorado Department of Education’s Teaching and Learning Unit makes a compelling case for what public schools need.
But discourse is one thing. Execution is another — execution, as in blindfolds and firing squads, nooses and scaffolds. That’s where “school accountability” invariably leads despite the loftiest of sentiments.
In physics we have action, reaction. In school reform we have action, overreaction.
Hearing Colsman explain what’s next for Colorado schools would have just about anyone at the buffet line saying, “I’ll have that.” So, too, with the entreaties of players like the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
