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Saturday, March 22, 2014

So much for common core in Florida or does anybody in Tallahassee know what common actually means or yeah it’s all about Jeb Bush!

These pro-common core guys like Bush, Chartrand and Csar of the JPEF screamed from the rooftops we need Common Core so we can see how we are doing compared to other states, strangely at least for the first two (not sure about Csar) the same accountability comparison was unnecessary between voucher and public school kids.

Well now that we have spent hundreds of millions of dollars and are likely to spend hundreds of millions more and friends this is money diverted from schools and classrooms, it turns out common core in Florida won’t be all that common after all.

You see not only has Florida tweaked the standards but also they have chosen a different test than most of the states will use, to use as well. A test that by the way hasn’t been written or field-tested yet; I know what could go wrong.

I have maintained all along, like may people in the field who aren’t trying to get rich off of education that we have a poverty problem not a standards problem and now with this move we can see that common core won’t be all that common after all and since that is the case then why are we doing it? Well to no ones surprise it is about making friends of Jeb Bush money.

From Florida Today: It’s no surprise that Florida Secretary of Education Pam Stewart chose the American Institute of Research (AIR) to produce the next high-stakes test for Florida’s children.
This research company has long partnered with Jeb Bush’s Education Foundation in the former governor’s misguided quest to reform our schools. Just as FCAT was a test printed by a company with financial ties to the Bush family, the new test has Bush fingerprints all over it. AIR produces raw teacher value-added model (VAM) scores, with little explanation to educators. These unreliable and invalid measures are part of the public frustration leading to the public’s lack of trust in public school accountability.
Meanwhile, Bush’s foundation pushes forward. Its website offers model legislation for state legislators looking to gut public school funding. This includes the recipe for corporate tax scholarships that divert money away from neighborhood schools, and personal funding accounts to bait parents of disabled children to keep their children home. The Foundation honors its top reformers, including the legislators who have carried the Jeb Bush agenda, as well as Stewart and her disgraced predecessor Tony Bennett.
It’s time to end the era of high-stakes testing and reject Bush’s reform movement.

Friends the bottom line is Florida rarely makes decisions based on what’s good for children preferring instead to make decisions based on what is good for Jeb Bush and his friends.

To read more click the links:


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