The Common Core State Standards were designed by educator teams from 48 states.

Really? This sounds great, as does most of the promotional blather. Who are those educator teams? Is there a list of names somewhere? Please share it. I would like to see it. More frequently now I see statements saying that classroom teachers and school administrators wrote these standards. Information is available about who wrote these standards. You can download the list of people who were on the Work Teams (writing groups) and the Feedback Groups at this link https://www.box.com/s/41e5d1e428c3349bec2a. This information was released only after pressure was put on the NGA, CCSSO, and CCSSI to do so. How many regular classroom teachers do you see listed? How many of the people listed have had any significant experience teaching K-12? The CCSSI Public License page at http://corestandards.org/public-license
States: “NGA Center/CCSSO shall be acknowledged as the sole owners and developers of the Common Core State Standards, and no claims to the contrary shall be made.” Designing the standards and writing them may be two different things but I have never seen any evidence that educator teams from 48 states designed the standards. States were provided non-public drafts of the CCSS and at least some states had teachers provide feedback, probably under strict confidentiality agreements. Feedback, input, design, develop, and write may be the same to some people but not to me.

The same Public License page also states that the Common Core State Standards “are the property of the NGA Center and CCSSO, and NGA Center and CCSSO retain all right, title, and interest in and too the same.” They own and hold the copyright to the CCSS. They, not SBAC and PARCC, in addition to all other adopting states would have to agree to any changes to the standards. Or can the NGA Center and CCSSO make such changes without agreement of the adopting states? Hmmm.. as owners of this property, what if they decided to sell it to the highest bidder? Would Pearson be interested? Whie the names may sound otherwise, as well as decisions they make, the NGA and the CCSSO are both non-government entities.

I hear of people, including state officials and legislators, across the country saying they can change these standards as they see fit. I am not convinced having never seen any document authorizing states to make changes to these standards beyond adding 15% to them. This has been a clear agreement governors and state superintendents made for their states when they signed the Common Core Standards Memorandum of Agreement in May/June 2009. See
https://www.box.com/s/spg70f8l10zh3gic1cug. I would like to see the document(s) and the specific clause(s) that authorize states to modify the standards.

I hope teachers are not required to implement these standards with fidelity. To do so will short change the academic education of our youth. Teachers should be allowed to exercise their professional judgment to meet the needs of the students they work with and implementing the CCSS with fidelity will not allow them to do this.

I want to choose which car to buy and not be told by someone else, without my input, what I have to buy. I want the decisions about education in my community schools to be made locally. These decisions should not be directed, strongly advised, set up to be “voluntary” with pressure, coercion, force, or strings attached to implement the policy and practices desired by the federal government, private corporations, non-profits, and other non-government entities who are far removed from the classroom.

And the standards were not, according to factual reporting over the past two years, “well written” or “above board” and they cannot be considered “far superior” to most state standards until we see their results of our children’s learning.

Frankly, I always worry when someone argues for “fidelity of implementation.” That means sticking with a program even if it is not working because it’s bound to be human efforts that are failing, not the program’s design. Reform/fuzzy proponents have been making that claim for years: It’s all the teachers’ fault, not their weak and incoherent training nor the lousy curriculum materials.

This sweeping decision excluded classroom teachers and parents. That’s a fact. That means it has been an unproductive move for CHILDREN by politically-driven educators/leaders. So what else is new?

Please provide more details on the testing of the CC math standards in New York and Boston. I wasn’t aware of this. When was the testing done; who did it? Were the results published? Is there a website where it is discussed?

As for the standards being a state initiative and “completely voluntary”, many of us were paying strict attention to what was going on. But states were lured by the Race to the Top money. To qualify, states had to show that they were using standards by a consortium of states. Yes, states could have had the option of adopting California’s, or Massachusetts’ or Indiana’s very good math standards, but given the lure of the money and the fact that the CC standards were right there, that was the path of least resistance. See Erin Tuttle’s comment above yours for info on who wrote the standards.

1) These standards have been tested in both New York and Boston, where they had unprecedented success over a period of years.

2) The Common Core Standards are a state-to-state initiative and completely voluntary. We had just as much choice in their implementation as we do in the passage of any legislation in state governments. If you weren’t paying attention when they were passed, that’s a you issue, not a problem with the Standards.

3) Not sure what you’re referring to when you say that the only institutions that can make modifications are two non-government entities. I can only assume you’re talking about PARCC and SBAC, the assessment consortia, neither of which have anything to do with “modifications” to the Standards. All these groups do is write assessments. In fact, the Common Core Standards allow for modifications, made at the state level.

I’ll stop there, but nearly half the points you make are either misleading or flat out incorrect.

If this article reflects your genuine concern with the Common Core Standards, then I have good news: things aren’t nearly as bad as you think. With a little bit more research I’m confident that you’ll find that many of your notions are unfounded, and that the Common Core is above board, well written, and far superior to most current state education standards.

Seminars and webinars that are cropping up on how to implement the Common Core math standards spend the majority of time on these Standards of Math Practices. What happened to the content? It was trumped by process just as it was with NCTM’s standards.

Common Core math is mandated reform. But don’t worry. It comes with. The only extra money you’ll pay is for tutoring for your child.