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Usige
Guest
One of the many reasons we will continue to home school. Common core isn’t about education, but rather training.
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Joe_5859
Guest
Adopting use of the Common Core is not equivalent to letting the federal government control the school.
Schools in my diocese are using it and they would never have done so if there was one whiff of government takeover.
Schools in my diocese are using it and they would never have done so if there was one whiff of government takeover.
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bitznbitez
Guest
The notion of standardizing instruction across the nation, and measuring students against a single national testing norm to me sounds like a good idea.
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Julianna
Guest
It sure does if you believe every child learns the same way.
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pnewton
Guest
Much ado about, well, very little anyway. There is no federal takeover. The title of this article is overly alarmist and extremely inaccurate. On the other hand, the name of the magazine is “Crisis”. Perhaps that explains this title. 
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Ridgerunner
Guest
From the article:
“Reflecting these concerns, Phyllis Schlafly, President of the Eagle Forum wrote a letter to the Catholic bishops warning them that in the Common Core, “conceptual math has replaced fundamentals,” and “Euclidian geometry was displaced.” She also asserted that in language arts, students are forced to read texts “in a vacuum” without contextual information, and lamented the reductions in classical literature that accompanied the Common Core.”
Understanding that Phyllis Schlafly is a person many love to hate, if what she says is true, it really is a cause for concern.
It almost seems to me that Common Core is designed to prepare a lot of kids for “the trades”, or at least prepare them for little else, and to reward those who would have gone to college anyway for having good memories.
If, indeed, classical literature is being reduced further (hard to imagine how it could be reduced without disappearing altogether) it will be replaced by writings that have not passed the test of time and, frankly, are probably acceptably “politically correct”.
We are already being surpassed by a lot of countries in the quality of public education. I fail to see why we should want it to sink even lower.
Many Catholic schools have an unrecognized blessing in that their states have “Blaine Amendments”. In those states, Catholic schools are ignored and considered “nonexistent”, thus not part of the system managed by the state. In other words, they can do what they want. That advantage should not be thrown away lightly.
“Reflecting these concerns, Phyllis Schlafly, President of the Eagle Forum wrote a letter to the Catholic bishops warning them that in the Common Core, “conceptual math has replaced fundamentals,” and “Euclidian geometry was displaced.” She also asserted that in language arts, students are forced to read texts “in a vacuum” without contextual information, and lamented the reductions in classical literature that accompanied the Common Core.”
Understanding that Phyllis Schlafly is a person many love to hate, if what she says is true, it really is a cause for concern.
It almost seems to me that Common Core is designed to prepare a lot of kids for “the trades”, or at least prepare them for little else, and to reward those who would have gone to college anyway for having good memories.
If, indeed, classical literature is being reduced further (hard to imagine how it could be reduced without disappearing altogether) it will be replaced by writings that have not passed the test of time and, frankly, are probably acceptably “politically correct”.
We are already being surpassed by a lot of countries in the quality of public education. I fail to see why we should want it to sink even lower.
Many Catholic schools have an unrecognized blessing in that their states have “Blaine Amendments”. In those states, Catholic schools are ignored and considered “nonexistent”, thus not part of the system managed by the state. In other words, they can do what they want. That advantage should not be thrown away lightly.
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pnewton
Guest
I have heard complaints about “new math” for about 40 years now. Education changes and everyone always has dire predictions or conspiracy theories. Some changes really fall flat, some work. Education right now is far from perfect.
As for the above observation that all kids don’t learn the same, education curricula has been a “one size fits all” pretty much since the beginning of public education. It is teachers that have to adapt, or not.
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petra22
Guest
OOOOH! Didn’t we do this 30 years ago???
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Julianna
Guest
Correct…the teachers have to adapt, especially in the public schools
…Catholic schools…well not so mucn.
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Mike_tn
Guest
If the new common core curriculum is something everyone agrees on it has to be the equivalent of The Weather Channel, the most popular free live show on earth, and watered down with precipitation. However, unlike her husband, I heard Melinda Gates, a fund founder, is a Catholic, that’s encouraging… maybe.
I distrust any huge enterprise of human origin. It’s doomed.
I distrust any huge enterprise of human origin. It’s doomed.
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Robert_Bay
Guest
Opinion
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