by: Diane Benjamin
The kids at Normal Community organized their own protest against the Common Core PARCC test. I congratulate the students who have not allowed public school to indoctrinate the FREEDOM loving spirit out of them!
Kids and young adults know the country is on an unsustainable path. My generation has allowed government to bury them in debt, unsustainable spending, regulations, and laws with no common sense. They took a stand and proudly declared:
I will not comply!
Hug your Normal Community kids a little tighter tonight parents. The kids locked out of the school in freezing weather are the ones who will lead us out of tyranny. Parents should have been out with them.
The Unit 5 budget shows estimated Revenues of more than $145,000,000 to educate around 13,600 students. That is almost $11,000 per student. For a class of 25, that’s $275,000! Sustainable?
Source: https://v3.boardbook.org/Public/PublicItemDownload.aspx?ik=35966719 Page 2 – Line 11
The PARCC test is a requirement for federal funding. Some schools have quit normal school work to prepare for the test. The length of the test is a ridiculous 9.75 and 11.25 hours. PARCC was never about education, keep reading.
Read this letter written by a teacher in Colorado who is refusing to administer the test: (source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2014/09/23/colorado-teacher-i-refuse-to-administer-the-parcc-common-core-test-to-my-students/)
Dear Citizens of Colorado,
I am a teacher in the Aurora Public School District. I am writing to let you know that I will be refusing to administer the PARCC in the 2014-2015 school year. I do not stand alone in my refusal of this high-stakes test. I join the ranks of educators across the country who are fighting back against policies and mandates that ultimately harm our children and destroy our children’s opportunities to become confident, active, problem solving citizens.
I have watched the testing increase over my 18 years of teaching in the public schools. I have watched what it has done to my ability to meet children’s needs and to allow children the opportunities to engage in learning that is authentic – learning that furthers the purpose of these children’s lives. This year, in particular, I am watching an onslaught of Common Core curriculum infiltrate our schools, along with additional tests and test prep to add to the test load which permeates every minute of every school day. I hear again and again that I should find the “good” in this curriculum and make the best of it. I am a literacy coach, therefore, I work with many teachers and children in our building. I believe our children deserve better than simply, my ability to find the “good” in this Common Core test prep curriculum. I believe our children deserve what President Obama’s children have at Sidwell [Friends School in Washington D.C.], where teachers have autonomy to teach without scripted Common Core curriculum and common core high stakes testing. I take objection to the fact that our children are being used as guinea pigs in an experiment to implement standards which were never field tested, are copyrighted, were not created using a democratic process, and were not created with the serious input of classroom teachers. Furthermore, the Common Core standards have placed unrealistic expectations on our youngest learners, many who now view themselves as failures because they are unable to meet the developmentally inappropriate expectations set by the Common Core standards.
I also refuse to administer the PARCC because I believe that participation in such testing gives the test credibility – of which it has none. The PARCC test was designed to assess the Common Core standards, which are not grounded in research, nor are they internationally benchmarked. Furthermore, thereis no evidence that the Common Core standards, Common Core curriculum and Common Core testing, will in any way close the achievement gap. It will do the opposite. By funneling all of our tax dollars to corporations for curriculum, tests and technology to implement the test, we have ignored the elephant standing in the middle of the room – the number of homeless school children in Colorado, which has more than tripled in the last decade. The poverty rate of black children stands at approximately 40 percent while the poverty rate of Latino children is approximately 30 percent. Colorado also has the third fastest growing rate of childhood poverty in the nation. We know quite clearly that children who have quality nutrition, healthcare, as well as access to books via libraries with certified librarians, and all the other resources provided to children in particular zip codes, actually, have done quite well on standardized tests in the past. Yet, we continue to ignore this fact, and we continue to feed our children living in poverty only tests. In order to pay for these tests, technology, and curriculum, we strip our schools of much needed resources such as books, small class size, librarians, nurses, counselors and more. Closing the achievement gap requires closing the resource gap.
As we consider closing the achievement gap, it’s important to recognize that New York has administered Common Core tests two years in a row, both years resulting in approximately a 70 percent failure rate state-wide. Our achievement gap is increasing. And we continue to funnel our money away from the schools and directly into the pockets of profiteers.
I am responsible for making pedagogical decisions to support the learning of students and adult learners on a daily basis; the state and federal mandates currently in place hamper my ability to do what is best for learners. There are better ways to assess children. Currently, the assessments being used assess only narrow learning, derived through continual test prep in our classrooms. They assess what matters least, and such learning will not create innovative thinkers or citizens who can salvage our democracy.
I believe that refusing PARCC is the first step in taking down the Common Core boondoggle … and in saving our profession, which is being hijacked in numerous ways by those who know a lot about increasing profit, but who know nothing about teaching children.
Our children are not gaining from the Common Core standards, curriculum, and testing; instead, I see corporations profiting immensely, along with politicians and various other individuals who have jumped on the Common Core train. The link between the Common Core standards, curriculum, and testing is inextricable…. Public education is the new cash cow; privatization is the end goal. We must begin to take down this profit machine by beginning with the data the corporations so dearly love. No data. No profit. I will not hand over Colorado’s children (and their data) to the corporations via federal mandates.
I encourage everyone who stands with me to sign in the comment section below. I also encourage everyone to share the letter with national and state leaders. However, I do not believe that change will come from the top, which is why I have addressed this letter to you, the citizens of Colorado. We must be the change. Sometimes change requires risk.
I must do right by the children of Colorado and the teachers of Colorado, therefore, I refuse to administer the PARCC.
Peggy Robertson
Public School Teacher
Aurora, Colorado
Both of my kids will not be participating in the test. and both the Principals are not “fighting” me on it. although the one said they will not let my child do an alternative activity during that time. she will have to sit there and do nothing while others take the test. She cant even sit quietly and read a book.
A lawsuit threat may help. Proud of you for standing up though. Send me the principal’s email, if you want. That is ridiculous.
Ken on, I don’t believe the principal has the power or the law behind his or her actions. I’d talk to legal assistance about it. Sounds like bullying tactics! I have 13 grandkids & I’ve found out quite a bit about Common Core. Stay strong…
Ken, I am a school administrator…and your kid doesn’t have to take the test. The rules only say the student must be presented with the test. There is a letter penned by someone in the ISBE that is the recommended response for parents such as you. I have read it – its full of twisted crap and basically says nothing. I hate this test – and the way public schools are heading. I work with at risk high school students a stone’s throw from Bloomington. I will be leaving the profession and doing something where I can REALLY make a difference and my own hands aren’t tide by bureaucratic mandates…I will be homeschooling my own children! Good luck to you….and stick to your guns!
I can remember being on a school board and we got into a discussion about standardized test way back then too. You know are teachers teaching just to help students pass some test or helping students learn.
I always thought it was a joke myself. Seems like we had a few students that just didn’t care and just marked up the answer sheets with any answer. Of course that skewed the test results.
I’d say PARCC will be the same, even worse. 10-12 hours of testing? I’d be filling in anything just to get it over with.
They split the time within a week. Rather than our children learning something, they are being tested. Another funny thing I don’t know if all of you know……typically, our kids did the math section without a calculator, the last few years they can use one but only in this test, not on school tests. My kids are coming home with teachers commenting that they don’t even know how to do the problems. It’s sad.
Like ending the Ethanol fraud, banishing the PARCC test may be one of those very few opportunities for Conservative/Leftist cooperation. We hate the indoctrination/big brother quality of the test, and its’ disruption of the educational process. The Left hates all standardized testing, because it will always show variations in performance levels between different groups, which they absolutely refuse to accept, or even consider. But the outcome sometimes makes it is worthwhile to “cut cards with the Devil”. Hope this is one of those times.
Who said the left hates test? A lot of ado about nothing. Apparently you people are depending on misinformation about Common Core which is just common standards for all students to achieve before they enter a 2 or a 4 college. PARCC will take the place ISAT and PSAE tests.
The PARCC system aligns college and career readiness expectations from
kindergarten through grade 12 for the first time in Illinois.
In ELA/literacy, many states don’t assess writing and few assess critical thinking skills. PARCC will do both. In math, most current assessments are fill-the-blank
blank “bubble tests.” PARCC will give students a chance to solve real
problems. Plus, they’ll not only have to solve complex problems, but show
how they solved them. The assessments measure whether or not students have the academic knowledge and skills necessary to succeed after high school.
The PARCC assessments take advantage of technology to include questions
and other tasks that emulate the type of work that students will encounter
in their classrooms on a regular basis and after high school. These assessments help to
encourage schools to use technology as a day-to-day tool to enhance learning.
Apparently you want your kids to answer rote questions and be unprepared for college and work.
I’m posting your comments only so other readers can tell you where you are wrong. I don’t have time to teach today.
Teach me what? That common core is the great boogie man? It isn’t. That testing so your children actually KNOW something isn’t a bad thing? Yeah, sure Diane, come back to me when your child is an studying engineering or chemistry in college.
Gee, my son is already a mechanical engineer – without common core. Wonder how that happened!
Gee, my son is already a mechanical engineer – without common core. Wonder how that happened!
So if he was in grade school you would actually destroy his chances to have academic success because of your misunderstanding of what common core is and is not. It’s an educational tool, noting more, a set of academic standards.
It seems like you run on misinformation distortions and you never let actual facts get in you way.
National education standards teach to the lowest students. Advanced placement will be gone. You are uniformed.
Common Core aren’t national standards and they don’t teach to the lowest student. Common Core is a state level initiative adapted by states. States like Indiana who have opted out of Common Core have adapted standards that are suspiciously just like common core without the name. The fact is that students were and ARE taking tests and passing on to the next grade without basic knowledge. This resulted in students reaching college with huge holes in their in their math and English proficiency. This led to colleges having to offer remediation courses to their students to catch up to College standards. This is what Common Core is addressing, making student more ready for college or a workplace environment.
La la land must be a nice place for you. Enjoy your stay!
La la land must be a nice place for you. Enjoy your stay!
Yeah, sure Diane. Are you going to tell me again how the owner of the bookstore in Bloomington is going out of business because of high taxes? He isn’t, he is retiring after 25 years in business. Talk about La La Land. You talk about being “new media”. How are you ANY media if you can’t be bothered to do basic research? That’s this blog in a nutshell all opinion passing as “facts”.
You’re a perfect example of someone who has a one note position on everything with no thought to what is true or false. From Common Core to the realities of Climate Change you are consistently and empirically wrong.
The bookstore guy was a rapid supporter of uptown. Is it beyond your ability to believe he won’t admit it. The rest the readers can handle.
Still trying to pretend to be smarter than you actually are, eh?
Here are your sources which you quoted verbatim without citing (or did you just happen to find a book in your vast library which just so happened to use the same words?)
Copy of a letter sent by the Illinois Board of Education:
http://www.hawthorn73.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/PARCC_Fact_Sheet.pdf
Your other source is:
http://www.parcconline.org/sites/parcc/files/PARCCFAQ_9-18-2013.pdf
If you can’t write an opinion using your own words, then your opinion holds no weight because you’re just regurgitating biased propaganda – which is simply boring.
R Kennedy, BIG OL’ Troll…
Aren’t we all giving our opinions??
The kids voice opinions more than their parents. I think adults don’t want to believe what is happening.
EVERY teacher that I know that has been teaching for the last 30-40 years does not like common core. Even the new teachers going through college shake their heads but that’s what they have to do to get their degree. RK how much do you get paid to troll? If more than minimum wage you’re over paid.
Nice catch on the trolling
Mr. Kennady – 1. The truth is that over the course of the past 15 years, students entering college have less education than their predecessors. 2. States were coerced into adopting Common Core by promising funding but ONLY if it was adopted (OR states could spend thousands writing their own draft – sure whatever!) 3. I ask you to search Google to your heart’s content to find ONE college that relies upon the PARCC for enrollment. (the ACT/SAT is where its at!). 4. If you don’t want to believe me – an educator in the trenches – then do your own research. By research, I mean you actually LOOK up and READ reputable source….people with PhDs and others who KNOW because they live it. I am not in the habit of believing things because the are “on the internet.” Rather, I am a firm believer in doing the leg work in order to make an educated decision….a skill that Common Core and PARCC are crushing in favor of spoon-fed answers to questions that aren’t really relevant to surviving life after high school. I dare you, Mr. Kennady, to find a sample PARCC exam and take it…The WHOLE thing – as you would if you were in high school. (Don’t tell me you don’t have time…if you feel so strongly about it….then doing so would only add fuel to your argument!)
How am I a troll? Because I don’t agree with the writer of this blog? Opponents say that the Common Core standards are a nationally mandated curriculum even though they are not national, states have opted out, states like Virginia and Texas, Indiana have chosen different standards. Common Core is not a curriculum. State standards, whether Common Core or otherwise, define the outcomes while locally determined curriculum helps teachers figure out how to get there. The role of PARCC is not to test whether someone is going to college, but to measure the knowledge a student has AT THE TIME of testing in the grade the student is in at the time. if you were actually a “principle” you actually would know that piece of information.
Every single teacher? Really? You’ve gone to every single teacher in Illinois and asked 100’s of thousands of them and they said to a PERSON that they do not like Common Core, there was no disagreement not single one. Yeah, right, just like Ms. Benjamin “knows” that a used bookstore is going out of business because of high taxes. You people sit around agreeing on everything even when it’s empirically untrue. Common Core are standards that are adapted statewide and enacted locally. Teachers can teach what they want. To say ALL teachers are against Common Cores is a lie. BTW, Who pays you to sit around agreeing to everything on this “blog” are you like Gent on Ms. Benjamin’s payroll?
Your level of being uniformed is astonishing! Did you read the article written by a teacher? Google for more – a LOT of teacher of quit because of common core.
Your level of being uninformed ellipses mine. An article written by ONE teach isn’t ALL teachers. A lots of teachers were never cut out to be teachers from the very start, that is a major factor in teachers quitting, not Common Core. Another factor is teacher burnout which was around since the beginning of time, years and years before Common Core. When you state all teachers do not like Common Core that’s far from true. Telling me to “Google” for more is laughable, not everything on the Internet is true, your blog being a case in point. You use faulty logic to bolster your all arguments, the first one being that your opinion and your opinion alone is true, if you believe your propaganda, then you are lost.
Why does the Chicago Teacher’s Union want out?
Here is an example of being uniformed.. This is a conversation betweeen principal and one of the students who protested:
What were you protesting this morning? “The PARCC test.”
Yes, I know, but what about the test is a problem? “I don’t know.”
Do you know what the PARCC test is about? “No”
Why did you go outside? “Because a couple of my friends did.”
What math and English classes are you in? “Algebra and English I”
Do you realize that you don’t take the PARCC test this year? “really?”
So what are you protesting? “I don’t know.”
Wouldn’t it be a good idea to have some answers to some of these questions before you involve yourself in a protest? “Yes, I guess so.”
Proof?
So, no one can give a coherent reason to be against Common Core or a reason to be against the testing. The reason according to people on this blog are: “It’s too hard”, “I don’t want to take it just because”. Which aren’t reasons but excuses. Are you children going to opt out of all standard testing? Are they not going to take SAT’s or ACT’s? Is the son of this blogger who supposedly has a degree in mechanical engineering not going to take the PE examination because it’s a standard exam? Totally ridiculous. Life has all kinds of hard exams from examinations that you have to take to get into good school to examines you have to take to be doctors, teachers, engineers, plumbers etc. To opt you child out of an exam is short sighted.
Just a BIG Ol’ Troll…
Outstanding letter, HUURRAH!!!
I think children sometimes don’t know how to understand it and some teachers don’t know how to teach it. I look at the math (2nd) grade and at first I was astonished. But, I’m one of those kids that had problems with math in high school and college and look at common core at first like the devil, but now it makes total sense, I’d been doing it all along. The long testing I don’t agree with 3 weeks to get ready, 1 week to test. It’s too much for our kids.
I normally don’t waste my time commenting on stuff like this, but OMG R. Kennedy. You are truly the worst debater I’ve ever seen (virtually). NOTHING you have said has any merit whatsoever. When reading your comments you remind me of State Superintendent Chris Koch. Oh wait, maybe this is Chris Koch in disguise. I won’t go any further with this nor will I respond back to you again when you try to get a rise out of me. The only other thing I’d like to point out to everyone here is that R. Kennedy is so intelligent that he/she doesn’t even know the correct use of the word principal vs. principle. If you don’t believe me then go back and look at his/her response to Principal Carrie’s comment and look at how he/she challenges if she is really a “principle” spelling it incorrectly.
Excuse me, I meant Principal, after I posted I realized my very human error. There is no edit button on this blog so there was no way that I could correct my mistake. I was not debating Common Core but trying to inject some reality into some of the comments which are filled with misinformation.
I believe that Common Core is being conflated by its detractors with wild conspiracy theories that are not support by facts. There are people who have an extreme agenda who really rather that children not learn science because of their radical worldviews.
There are lots of things that students need to be exposed to by the time they’re 18 to prevent our society as a whole from falling behind the rest of the world, and that’s what’s happening right now: our public education is stagnating or declining while other countries’ education is improving. That’s one danger; a corollary is the prevalence of motivated ignorance, i.e. choosing to ignore recently-acquired knowledge for ideological reasons. The danger of motivated ignorance is clear from the pseudo-debates surrounding climate science and evolutionary biology, but motivated ignorance cannot gain a foothold when the vast majority of kids are exposed to up-to-date knowledge of math and science and, in a different sense, history and language. Leaving the teaching of the fundamentals of these subjects to the whims of local governments is asking for a society in which poor, rural kids have no chance to do better than they have done in the past. A kid in rural Mississippi should have access to the same quality public education that a kid in Beverly Hills has, and that education should be commensurate with the education that Finnish and Korean kids are getting, but that’s not going to happen without national curriculum standards.
You are really going to hate tomorrow’s post!
What? Are you going to declare that gravity is a commie conspiracy by perpetrated b Renner and the City Council??? Or maybe you’ll write a screed about how the Earth is really flat.
You really want to be permanently banned, right? Anyway, I won’t have the information until tomorrow, so you will have to wait.