A member of the leadership team at Stop Common Core in Michigan says their activists are “not fooled” by Trump education secretary pick Betsy DeVos’s she is not a supporter of Common Core.
Republican State of the Union first responder Gov. Nikki Haley criticized 2016 contender Jeb Bush for supporting the Common Core standards, even as – in her own state of South Carolina – the “new” state standards are 90 percent aligned with Common Core.
The Associated Press aptly defined Republican 2016 contender Gov. Chris Christie’s position on Common Core as “shifting,” a description that could easily be applied to many Republican governors who signed their states on to the standards only to be met by irate parents and teachers once it was discovered what Common Core was all about.
Sen. Ted Cruz and Sen. Marco Rubio are the only GOP 2016 candidates to have signed a Florida parent group’s pledge to end federal implementation of the Common Core standards if elected president. Out of 14 candidates who participated in
The Wall Street Journal has added the word “plague” to the list of death-inspired terms frequently used now to characterize the unpopular Common Core standards education reform.
In a recent interview at an Iowa Faith & Freedom Coalition event, GOP presidential contender and Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker said he “effectively repealed” the Common Core standards in his state.
At issue is the fact that while Walker proposed defunding the Common Core-aligned Smarter Balanced exam in his budget, the new “Badger Exam” that replaces it will also be aligned with the controversial standards, making it unlikely that many local school districts would opt for non-Common Core standards.
Walker, a likely 2016 contender, has recently affirmed what has been true of Wisconsin school districts all along – that they can choose their own standards. To his credit, he has also proposed defunding the Smarter Balanced test, a product of one of the federally funded, interstate Common Core test consortia. Grassroots parents groups, however, say Walker’s proposed new state exam – called the “Badger Exam,” is also aligned with the Common Core standards.
Christie said he signed his state’s Race to the Top application for federal funds in exchange for adopting the Common Core standards because his state needed the money, an admission many other governors are likely hesitant to make in light of the huge outcry from parents across the country against the standards and their associated testing and data collection.
The Louisiana lawmaker who has led the fight against Common Core for several years in his state says the final deal agreed to in the legislature “gives us everything we asked for” and proves that “passionate” engagement by citizens is what makes the difference.
Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker came out fighting for school vouchers Monday at a national conference of education reform advocates, where Walker said vouchers are a “moral and economic imperative.”
New Hampshire State Rep. Mel Myler (D) complained to the state House Education Committee Tuesday that he was “tired of receiving emails that are misinformed, that have wrong information in them” from parents and his constituents opposed to Common Core.
The Arizona Senate rejected a bill Monday that would have abolished the controversial Common Core standards in that state.
Though Republican Gov. Doug Ducey of Arizona ran as a candidate opposed to the Common Core standards in 2014, he claims a bill that would abolish the controversial initiative in his state is not “necessary” and wants, instead, to “fix” the standards.