When
Common Core Standards were introduced/implemented, schools "aligned" their curriculum to the standards.
- If curriculum was moved DOWN one or more grade levels,
...that school's prior standards had been lower or easier, and became more rigorous under Common Core,
...as the lessons and materials would now be taught earlier.
- If the curriculum was moved UP one or more grade levels,
...that school's prior standards had been more challenging or rigorous, and became lower under Common Core,
...as the lessons and materials would now be taught later.
The
US Department of Education's
Race To The Top Executive Summary (2009) discusses implementation of Common Core "
standards together with all of their supporting components."
(page 8/15)
The
supporting components include
assessments and extreme
data collection into a longitudinal database.
Supporting components underpin the goals (page 6/15) including:
- closing achievement gaps
- increasing high school graduation rates
- increasing college enrollment
Unfortunately, these goals may not necessarily reflect an increase in knowledge.
Achieving uniform outcomes may occur by lowering the measurement ceiling.
Achieving uniform outcomes may also depend upon manipulating pupil grades and reporting.
Increasing high school graduation rates and increasing college enrollment may depend upon lowering requirements. One of the
supporting components, data collection, is also outlined in the
US Department of Education's Factsheet on
Statewide Longitudinal Data Systems (2009).
Given that the 10th Amendment to the US Constitution constrains federalism ("
The powers not delegated to the United States[/i] [i]by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people"), some have expressed belief that the creation and existence of the
US Department of Education, and all its decrees, represent federal exertion of a power not granted to it by the US Constitution, and therefore as unconstitutional.
I've NOT seen the implementation of Common Core result in increasing pupil knowledge and/or pupils' sense of "internal locus of control." I have seen the implementation of Common Core dismantle programming which provided appropriate
placement, curriculum, pacing, and intellectual peers for gifted pupils, in favor of
equal outcomes among all pupils in classrooms of students varying considerably in ability and readiness.
Overall, not a fan.
