Now that 46 states, plus three other U.S. jurisdictions, have committed to forging ahead with common academic standards, is the reaction all rosy?
Not necessarily. In the blogsphere, anyway, it’s easy to find a healthy dose of skepticism and realism.
ASCD’s InService blog reminds us that all 50 states pledged a similar thing a few years ago, when they decided to adopt a common graduation rate. Well, that hasn’t panned out exactly like it was supposed to.
Eduflack previews fights to come by providing us this letter from California. The state, which was apparently one of the last-minute holdouts to the standards effort, would not agree to the requirement in the memorandum of agreement that 85 percent of the standards reflect the common core. And, they want to make sure they get their own picks on the “validation” committee that will provide an independent check on the standards.
The Core Knowledge blog warns that after all is said and done, the result could be “replacing 46 sets of squishy, nonspecific standards with one set of squishy, nonspecific standards.”