Originally Posted by BenjaminL
Speaking as someone who parses Diane Ravitch's site daily I'd disagree a bit with that characterization. The common core standards were written by an idiosyncratic small group of experts mostly hand picked by the Gates Foundation rather than a systematic or representative group of accepted leaders in the fields affected. The process was also mostly opaque and did not have an adequate revision process.

Diane Ravitch is lying. See this piece on the development of the standards. Quotes here:


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The National Governors Association (NGA) and the Council Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) received nearly 10,000 comments on the standards during two public comment periods. Many of the comments from teachers, parents, school administrators, and other citizens concerned with education policy helped shape the final version of the standards.

Two periods of public comments that garnered 10K comments that were used to shape the standards is hardly "opaque," nor does it constitute "inadequate revision."

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The Common Core State Standards drafting process relied on teachers and standards experts from across the country. Teachers were involved in the development process in four ways:

  • They served on the Work Groups and Feedback Groups for the ELA and math standards.They served on the Work Groups and Feedback Groups for the ELA and math standards.
  • The National Education Association (NEA), American Federation of Teachers (AFT), National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM), and National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE), among other organizations were instrumental in bringing together teachers to provide specific, constructive feedback on the standards.
  • Teachers were members of teams [that] states convened to provide regular feedback on drafts of the standards.
  • Teachers provided input on the Common Core State Standards during the two public comment periods.

Again, none of this is opaque and it all speaks to extensive revision by a lot of people who were thinking carefully.

I found this information after a brief Google search. The same page I linked to has a detailed timeline describing how the standards were conceived, designed, and written. There were so many organizations involved, I can't list them all here. Did the Gates Foundation handpick umpteen organizations?

The Common Core has been politicized, and people like Diane Ravitch obfuscate rather than clarify. Speaking politely, this is unethical.