Common Core Education And More About Federal Government Control

[Diane Amberg]

For the LAST tme. Ross, I said I understand what Common Core is trying to do, and I do.. I NEVER SAID I APPROVE! It is very unweildy in the lower grades and takes more classroom time than a standard math (arithmetic) approach.
  Some parts of it arw not very friendly to any but the brightest students. Kids who have a hard time for any reason can fall behind. BUT, the classroom now has many tools to help that were not available to me.    Remember, I said I didn't care for the "new" math when it was introduced either...for much the same reasons. Once the kids get the basics of base 10 and base two, the way the questions are developed is much more user friendly.Keep in mind most of the kids are pecking away on a calculator or computer at least part of the time.
Now that really is all I have to say about it. For me it is not fun.  Hope your wife is feeling better.

[Ross]

Educators at all levels of the local level,
cheating for bonuses!
Isn;t that corruption?
Isn't there enough trouble at local levels?
What do you suppose might happen at the National Level?

Education More:

Law and Order Atlanta
An epic and extremely rare cheating trial is coming to an end,
and it could send teachers to prison for 20 years

ERIN FUCHS
MAR. 18, 2015, 11:32 AM

An incredibly rare criminal cheating trial in Atlanta is coming to an end, and it could send school teachers to prison for allegedly violating a law originally enacted to go after mobsters.

Former Atlanta Public Schools executive secretary Barbara
Jackson testifies during the test-cheating trial at the Fulton
County Superior Court in Atlanta on Wednesday, Oct. 29,
2014 afternoon.

Prosecutors are using Georgia's Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) to accuse former principals, teachers, and administrators of trying to boost their bonuses by conspiring to artificially raise kids' test scores. The dozen educators on trial could go to prison for up to 20 years.

During closing arguments on Tuesday, a lawyer for the defense suggested that it was a ludicrous abuse of power to bring racketeering charges against school teachers, as the Atlanta-Journal Constitution reported.

"Never have I seen the power of the state wielded like I have in this case," defense lawyer Akil Secret reportedly said. "They are liars, cheaters and thieves who came up here to testify to save their own skins. This RICO stuff is overreaching. ... It's an abuse of discretion. Teachers? Racketeers? Really?"

While only 12 ex-educators are on trial in Atlanta, dozens of teachers and administrators were initially charged and many have since pleaded guilty in exchange for their cooperation in exposing a scandal that captured national attention. A lawyer for one of the teachers on trial, Angela Williamson, previously suggested to Business Insider that her willingness to go to trial was a sign of her innocence.

"For the individuals that were falsely accused no level of plea reduction would work because their names have been associated with this scandal, and they want to clear their names," her lawyer, Gerald Griggs, told Business Insider last year.

Beverly Hall holds up her award after she was named the 2009 Superintendent of the Year. She was
later indicted for cheating before dying of cancer in 2015.

That scandal might not have been uncovered if it weren't for a pair of ambitious reporters at The Atlanta Journal-Constitution (AJC). Back in 2008, Heather Vogell, now a reporter for ProPublica, noticed unusual gains at some schools on a standardized test called the Criterion-Referenced Competency Test (CRCT). As she explained to the Huffington Post, the gains seemed unbelievable even to the naked eye.

The article she ended up publishing in December 2008 with computer-assisted reporting specialist John Perry is alarming. That initial article looked at unlikely gains at several schools, including Atherton Elementary School, where nearly 88% of the kids were living in poverty as of 2010. Half of the school's fifth-graders had failed the CRCT in the spring of 2008. The 32 kids were all forced to retake the test. Every single one of them passed, and 26 scored at the highest level, Vogell and Perry wrote. More from that article:

A miracle occurred at Atherton Elementary this summer, if its standardized math test scores are to be believed ...

No other Georgia fifth grade pulled off such a feat in the past three years. It was, as one researcher put it, as extraordinary as a snowstorm in July. In Atlanta.

Of course, Atherton was only a small part of the story. Vogell told HuffPost that the story prompted a number of teachers to contact her about rampant cheating at Atlanta's schools under the leadership of Superintendent Beverly Hall, who was indicted along with dozens of others. (Hall died of breast cancer earlier this month, before she could take the stand at trial.)

While the AJC kept digging into the story, the state of Georgia conducted its own investigation, which in 2011 uncovered cheating at 44 schools that involved at least 178 educators, according to The New York Times.

That investigation relied largely on a third-grade teacher named Jackie Parks, who admitted to state investigator Richard Hyde that she had sat with six teachers in a windowless room to change test answers the week of state testing.

Parks agreed to wear a wire to school and record her fellow teachers.

"During his 35 years as a Georgia state investigator, Richard Hyde has persuaded all sorts of criminals — corrupt judges, drug dealers, money launderers, racketeers — to turn state's evidence, but until Jackie Parks, he had never tried to flip an elementary school teacher," The Times reported in March 2013. "It worked."

Closing arguments in the trial — one of the longest-ever criminal trials in Georgia's history — are expected to wrap up Wednesday, according to the Associated Press.

"What happened to our children, it was sad, it was ugly," prosecutor Clint Rucker told the jury, according to the AP. "They were cheating and it's not right and I'm asking y'all to do something about it."

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/closing-arguments-in-atlanta-cheating-trial-2015-3#ixzz3Ul60j1bE

[Ross]

Didn't the Feds basically bribe States and School Districts to accept "No Child Left Behind"?

Didn't "No Child Left Behind" force teachers to pass children even if they were failing ?

Do the Schools need continued interference from the Fed's?

[Ross]

Why should teachers be protected from the law?
Why should teachers be permitted to resign when they have violated students in any way?
Why are they offered to the opportunity to resign or be fired?
If they deserve to be fired it goes on their record making it difficult to continue cursing, hitting, shaking or sleeping with their students. If they resign they move on to another school district and continue their wrong doing. Isn't it time to stop offering the opportunity to resign or be fired?

SEXTRA CREDIT
TEACHER GETS LONG PRISON FOR SEX WITH TEEN

'Poor you. You did something you shouldn't have done'

Published: 3 hours ago

While some teachers get little or even no jail time for having sex with their students, a Michigan teacher will be spending a long time behind bars.

Kathryn Ronk, 30, of Birmingham, Michigan, was sentenced to 6 to 15 years in prison for having relations with a 15-year-old boy while she was a Spanish teacher at Bishop Foley Catholic High School in Madison Heights, Michigan.

According to the Detroit News, Ronk could have received up to life in prison under the original charges, but pleaded guilty last month to two counts of third-degree criminal sexual conduct under a sentencing agreement that ranged from no prison time to a maximum of 15 years. She'll be eligible for parole in 5 and a half years.

Judge Nanci Grant noted Ronk had graduated with the highest of grades from the University of Michigan on a scholarship.

Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2015/03/teacher-gets-long-prison-for-sex-with-teen/#FQT2iy13HErMf8A1.99


Read the WND story that started it all! The big list: Female teachers with students
The big list: Female teachers with students
Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2014/08/39783/#XQID5yUozUzz2hTf.99

My thoughts on this:
There are thirteen pages of these highly educated teachers.
It's a shame, smarts don't come automatically with those diploma's.

[Ross]

So when some educator says Common Core is a good thing
I pause and remember they are not all that smart
that is why a couple of post to prove it.

Virginia school suspends an 11-year-old
for one year
over a leaf
that wasn't marijuana

By Christopher Ingraham March 16

These are Japanese maple leaves, not marijuana leaves. Does your principal know the
difference? (Flickr user Hideyuki KAMON, CC)

Earlier this school year, a sixth-grader in the gifted-and-talented program at Bedford Middle School in Bedford, Virginia was suspended for one year after an assistant principal found something that looked like a marijuana leaf in his backpack.

The student, the 11-year-old son of two school teachers, had to enroll in the district's alternative education program and be homeschooled. He was evaluated by a psychiatrist for substance abuse problems, and charged with marijuana possession in juvenile court. In the months since September, he's become withdrawn, depressed, and he suffers from panic attacks. He is worried his life is over, according to his mother, and that he will never get into college.

The only problem? The "leaf" found in the student's backpack wasn't what authorities thought it was -- it tested negative for marijuana three separate times.




[DEA warns of stoned rabbits if Utah passes medical marijuana]

All of this is laid out in detail by Dan Casey in a column in the Roanoke Times today. While the juvenile court dropped its case against the student after the tests turned up negative, the school system, in a community located midway between Roanoke and Lynchburg, has been far less forgiving. That's because stringent anti-drug policies in school districts in Virginia and elsewhere consider "imitation" drugs to be identical to real ones for disciplinary purposes.

The school's lawyer, Jim Guynn, is quoted in the Roanoke Times article defending the policy on the basis that "it's a pretty standard policy across the Commonwealth." In 2011, for instance, four seventh-graders in Chesapeake, Virginia were suspended over bringing a bag of oregano to school. A quick Google search suggests similar policies are in effect in many other states as well.

It doesn't matter if your son or daughter brings a real pot leaf to school, or if he brings something that looks like a pot leaf -- okra, tomato, maple, buckeye, etc. If your kid calls it marijuana as a joke, or if another kid thinks it might be marijuana, that's grounds for expulsion.

[Marijuana may be safer than previously thought]

The Bedford sixth-grader has been allowed to return to school starting today. But he has to attend a different school, separate from his former friends and peers, and he's still under strict probation until this September. The terms of his original suspension letter state that he'll be searched for drugs at the beginning and end of every school day until his probation is over.

It's unclear what exactly transpired before the assistant principal discovered the leaf in the Bedford student's backpack. School authorities say the student was showing it to other kids and telling them it was pot. The student's parents say he never would have done such a thing, and that it was planted there as a joke by another kid.

Either scenario raises troubling questions given the severity of the punishment. Kids, especially at that age, joke about things all the time. When I was in sixth grade my friends and I would dump out Pixy Sticks on our desks and arrange the powdered sugar in neat little lines, like cocaine, although I don't think any of us was dumb enough to try to snort it. We only knew what cocaine was because of D.A.R.E., the ineffective school anti-drug campaign of the 80s and 90s.

Under rules in place today in Virginia and elsewhere, we would have been considered possessing "imitation cocaine" and subject to expulsion.

The Bedford case is a microcosm of drug policy -- especially marijuana policy -- at the national level. Most of the harm associated with marijuana use comes not from using marijuana, but from getting caught up in the  strict punishments meted out by the criminal justice system for using it.

The harm that the Bedford school district inflicted on this boy is far greater than any harm he could have incurred by eating an actual marijuana leaf, or even smoking it, or even smoking a dozen leaves.

Fortunately, kids are resilient. With any luck the student will start to bounce back once his year of probation and mandatory pat-downs is over. But as the parent of two boys, the prospect of this sort of ordeal terrifies me.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2015/03/16/virginia-school-suspends-an-11-year-old-for-one-year-over-a-leaf-that-wasnt-marijuana/

More marijuana policy from Wonkblog:

Your kid is 136 times more likely to be poisoned by diaper cream than by weed »

More adults are using weed in the states that legalized, but teen use is flat »

DEA warns of stoned rabbits if Utah passes medical marijuana »

After California decriminalized marijuana, teen arrest, overdose and dropout rates fell »

[redcliffsw]

The socialist and neocon agenda is more popular in America than smoking marijuana.

And one of these days they'll control marijuana by legalizing it for tax revenue to fund yer government schools to indoctrinate your kids.

[Ross]

 
-------Original Message-------

From: Kansas Campaign for Liberty
Date: 3/19/2015 2:37:14 PM
To:Ross
Subject: Worse Than Ebola In The Classroom

Campaign for Liberty

Dear ,

Opponents to H.B. 2292 – our Common Core Repeal bill - are making backroom deals to try to kill our bill!

H.B. 2292 is scheduled for debate and a vote TOMORROW, March 20, in the House Education Committee at 10:30 a.m. It's extremely urgent you take action now.

Please contact all of the House Education Committee members and demand they support a recorded vote on H.B. 2292 without amendment.

Tell them you will not forget their vote on H.B. 2292!

I'll provide the list of committee members and their contact information in a minute, or you can click here to find the details now.

We're hearing that opponents might try to gut our bill entirely and replace it with language to form a committee to simply "study" the issue.

This is nothing more than a tactic to kick the can down the road and attempt to avoid being put on the record.

Or they might try to amend away the important sections of H.B. 2292 and then vote for a neutered bill.

We've seen this sort of thing happen to Common Core Repeal bills in states across the nation.

South Carolina's bill went from repeal to replacing Common Core WITH Common Core – their "new" standards are 90% aligned with Common Core!

Opponents of our bill would love to be able to tell you they voted for our bill while knowing full well they've killed any chance of it being effective.

There is a reason H.B. 2292 was written the way it was.

Its authors did their homework.

Experts in Kansas and from across the country were consulted to learn what has and hasn't worked.

Clearly, getting rid of Common Core is not simple. One need only look to South Carolina to see that.

And now it's even harder for states like South Carolina to rid their schools of Common Core - everyone thinks it's already gone. . . but it isn't.

You and I can't let that happen in Kansas.

Common Core has been set up by its creators as a whack-a-mole game that always gets harder and never ends - unless you pull the plug on the WHOLE thing.

RIGHT NOW, politicians in Kansas are trying to convince the grassroots we have to settle for a partial repeal of Common Core or we won't get the votes.

Don't let them fool you.

Opponents of H.B. 2292 are threatening to kill the whole thing if you don't give in.

DON'T GIVE IN.

Don't let them off the hook.

Contact the House Education Committee members RIGHT NOW and DEMAND they vote "YES" on H.B. 2292 as written and send it to the House floor.

Ron Highland: 785-296-7310 ron.highland@house.ks.gov
Jerry Lunn: 785-296-7675 jerry.lunn@house.ks.gov
Valdenia Winn: 785-296-7657 valdenia.winn@house.ks.gov
John Barker: 785-296-7674 john.barker@house.ks.gov
Tony Barton: 785-296-7522 tony.barton@house.ks.gov
Sue Boldra: 785-296-4683 sue.boldra@house.ks.gov
John Bradford: 785-296-7653 john.bradford@house.ks.gov
Carolyn Bridges: 785-296-7649 carolyn.bridges@house.ks.gov
Rob Bruchman: 785-296-7644 rob.bruchman@house.ks.gov
Diana Dierks: 785-296-7642 diana.dierks@house.ks.gov
Willie Dove: 785-296-7658 willie.dove@house.ks.gov
John Ewy: 785-296-7105 john.ewy@house.ks.gov
Amanda Grosserode: 785-296-7659 amanda.grosserode@house.ks.gov
Dennis Hedke: 785-296-7699 dennis.hedke@house.ks.gov
Nancy Lusk: 785-296-7651 nancy.lusk@house.ks.gov
Charles Macheers: 785-296-7675 charles.macheers@house.ks.gov
Marc Rhoades: 785-296-7671 marc.rhoades@house.ks.gov
Charles Smith: 785-296-7522 chuck.smith@house.ks.gov
Ed Trimmer: 785-296-7122 ed.trimmer@house.ks.gov

Tell them the grassroots will not forget their votes on this bill, and who watered it down and who didn't!

Lloyd, a neutered bill will allow corrupt politicians to claim they repealed Common Core, when they really did not.

And just like in South Carolina, people will believe they won the war against Common Core.

There are no shortcuts on this one, only hard work.

Don't. Give. In.

Kansans deserve to have control over Kansas education.

That's why it's so important you contact all of the House Education Committee members RIGHT NOW and demand they support and vote "YES" on H.B. 2292 without amendment.

Insist on a recorded vote and tell them "no more shenanigans."

With your immediate help, we can end Common Core in Kansas.

In Liberty,

John Axtell
Kansas State Coordinator
Campaign for Liberty

P.S.  Tomorrow is the day!  H.B. 2292 is scheduled for debate and a vote at 10:30 a.m.

Contact all of the House Education Committee members RIGHT NOW and demand they support H.B. 2292 with no amendments!

************************************************************************************
My note:

Session of 2015
HOUSE BILL No. 2292
By Committee on Federal and State Affairs

Check it for yourself. It is a pdf at:
http://www.kslegislature.org/li/b2015_16/measures/documents/hb2292_00_0000.pdf

[Ross]

All Colored emphasis is mine.
It appears to me that poor judgement was used by their own admission.

Arabic version of
Pledge of Allegiance at
Pine Bush High School ignites furor

What began as an effort to celebrate national Foreign Language Week at Pine Bush High School has imploded into a raging controversy that has divided the school into angry factions.

JEREMIAH HORRIGAN/Times Herald-Record |  A Pine Bush High School student's car Thursday morning.

Posted Mar. 18, 2015 at 3:54 PM
Updated at 3:47 PM

PINE BUSH - An effort to celebrate national Foreign Language Week by reading the Pledge of Allegiance in Arabic Wednesday has polarized Pine Bush High School into angry factions.

The morning's regularly scheduled announcements included the Arabic reading of the pledge. According to students, the announcement was greeted by catcalls and angry denunciations in classrooms throughout the school by students who felt the reading was inappropriate.

The reading became the subject of angry talk throughout the school and a cascade of tweets both from students who criticized the reading and those who supported it.

The controversy has "divided the school in half," according to school Superintendent Joan Carbone. She described the reading as "something that was supposed to be good but turned out not to be."

Early Wednesday afternoon, high school Principal Aaron Hopmayer made a building-wide announcement explaining the reading's context and apologizing to students who took offense.

The apology appears to have done little to quell the situation; it may, in fact, have fueled resentment from students who feel the reading was appropriate.

Carbone said she had received complaints from district residents who had lost family members in Afghanistan and from Jewish parents who were equally outraged by the reading.

Pine Bush is no stranger to controversy. In 2013, Jewish parents sued the district and administrators in federal court, accusing them of being indifferent to chronic anti-Semitic behavior.

Carbone said she has learned that state Education Department regulations specifically say the Pledge of Allegiance should be read in English.

Students on both sides of the issue took to Twitter to voice their feelings. Said one, "People who don't like PB should take a vacation. I hear the Middle East is nice this time a year?"

Another student tweeted, "The pledge should always be said in English. They could've just said "Good Morning" in a different language each day."

A student who supported the reading, senior Miranda Monroe, said she felt it was "wrong to discriminate - the whole thing is wrong."

Andrew Zink, president of the student assembly and senior class president, ordinarily reads the morning announcements. When he was asked to allow the reading to take place in Arabic, he agreed, but added in a telephone interview later, "I knew exactly what would happen."

"I knew many wouldn't support it," he said.
Nevertheless, Zink said he'd do it again, "Because it's the right thing to do."
jhorrigan@th-record.com

http://www.recordonline.com/article/20150318/NEWS/150319327

[Ross]

For the LAST tme. Ross, I said I understand what Common Core is trying to do, and I do.. I NEVER SAID I APPROVE! It is very unweildy in the lower grades and takes more classroom time than a standard math (arithmetic) approach.

Common Core math goes way beyond unwieldy to ludicrous in m y opinion.

Common Core is  not only about screwing up math but history and literature.
What they are teaching about the Constitutional is totally re-worded to mean something else. Read it in an article posted on this thread.

And teaching the Muslim Religion while not permitting the teaching of Christianity or any other religion. Read it in an article posted on this thread.

Common Core as stated in a post above is "Worse Than Ebola In The Classroom".

I think you might understand that if you read all the articles posted here on this thread.

What is Delaware's involvement in Common Core are your schools happily using it?

Is Delaware fighting to repeal Common Core?

I'm adding this for you Diane: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Delaware-Against-Common-Core/141637639346274

[Ross]

An educator that really cares?

Retired Supterintendent Is Still on the Job

Billy Joe Ferguson decided to take underfunding of the Carroll County School District into his own hands, or his own pocketbook. He retired two years ago but remains on the job as the district superintendent of schools, drawing only his $18,000 a year retirement pension; the difference between that and his previous salary of $87,000 funnels back into schools to help overcome what he calls serious underfunding by the state of Mississippi.

Superintendent Ferguson began teaching in Carroll County in 1969. He's in his fourth term as superintendent and works at least 40 hours a week. He doesn't charge travel expenses and has no secretary.

In an open letter to Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant, Ferguson says his district is chronically underfunded and operates under "wretched conditions." The district covers 635 square miles and consists of one high school, one middle school, and one elementary school that together educate 1,009 students. The student poverty rate is roughly 90%.

Bus transportation is a major hurdle for Carroll County. The student population depends on 20 buses, ten of which are fifteen years old, running eighteen bus routes. Some of the bus routes are on dirt roads.

Ferguson says the "newest building at the elementary school was constructed in 1956 and has a 23-year-old roof." When the district lost ten employees last year, Ferguson replaced them with individuals who were willing to work for less than those they replaced.

What Gets Funded

Mississippi legislators have been unsuccessful in ditching Common Core standards. "Gov. Phil Bryant, Lt. Gov. Tate Reeves and House Speaker Philip Gunn — all Republicans — have expressed displeasure with Mississippi's use of Common Core academic standards. However, with an independent state superintendent of education and Board of Education, it's unclear how much influence the Legislature will have on repealing or revising the standards." (Hattiesburg American, 1-4-15)

Teaching Common Core standards has a huge financial impact on schools. They must spend to re-train teachers and must replace textbooks with those aligned to Common Core. In his letter to the governor, Ferguson stated: "We do not have enough money to fully upgrade textbooks." In some cases they are making do with printouts from the internet.

One huge expense was averted when Mississippi withdrew from the PARCC Common Core testing consortium. (Clarion-Ledger, 1-16-15) The state will now "seek competitive, multi-year bids."

But Gov. Bryant has committed $3 million to pay for early childhood education programs. In an interview with the Associated Press, Bryant laments that Mississippi can't afford a statewide pre-kindergarten program. He doesn't seem to have a high regard for parents' care for their preschool children when he states: "We just don't need to set 'em in front of a television and feed 'em Froot Loops."

The millions of dollars spent on the failed Head Start model of early childhood education would go a long way to helping districts like Carroll County.

Gov. Bryant also makes another blooper in his interview with the Associated Press. The reporter says: "People also wonder: Who's going to make money off charter schools?" Bryant replies: "If there is money to be made in charter schools, I haven't figured out how that happens." Gov. Bryant needs to read the article in this issue of Education Reporter about the North Carolina businessman who is doing just that.

The Hechinger Report says that in November of 2016, Mississippians will have a chance to vote on "a potential amendment to the constitution that would require the state to provide an 'adequate and efficient system of free public schools.'" (2-2-15)

Ferguson's letter to the governor reveals a ludicrous situation that could occur. He says state law mandates that if his district fails, the governor "will hire a $200,000 conservator to come and resurrect us!"

http://www.eagleforum.org/publications/educate/mar15/retired-supterintendent-is-still-on-the-job.html