Common Core & How Our Schools Have Been HiJacked by the Educrats

A few years ago, with the youngest of my own children still in elementary school, I started getting emails from youthful teachers at his public 'gifted' school.. letting me know that all was well in our New York school, as now the 'curriculum was being aligned by Common Core Standards'.

Since I was enrolled in a MEd program, and had been teaching in schools in the city as a regular licensed substitute... I quickly did some research and quickly realized that we (parents, students and teachers) were all being mocked. And that our children's education had been hijacked by the Bloomberg/Klein/Gates Gang of Educrats... In particular, I realized that people who knew nothing about Education except as a business (hence, the term I coined Educrats) had usurped our public schools...and the fight that is just beginning to take back those schools and classrooms was but a distant whisper.

So it begins... And now some few years later, after watching my own child's education reduced to nothing but drills and tests, even in subjects still presumably considered part of an Arts ... Nothing but drills, Teacher-as-Sargent like classroom antics ... And emails from the Principal with nothing more than 'test and assessment' news... I began my own private anti Common Core, anti Bloomberg DOE, and anti test prep classrooms campaign.

That I've had no effect is not news to me, a single voice in a sea of powerful Educratic figures with billions behind them. At some point, because I could live without the job, I left teaching as the tsunami of test crazed public schools fell upon larger and larger sections of the school term... Except  that I still had ( and have) my youngest who is still in 6th grade - NESTm. And so I continued to be confronted with the sea of teachers letting me know how well the Common Core was 'aligned' with college preparatory learning. That so many teachers brought in by Bloomberg's Dept of Education knew so little also continued to shock and amaze me. That the principal at our school, herself a veteran of NYC schools, seemed to find NO voice of protest, shocked me even more.

And the Common Core ? Well, most recently, I saw some particularly heinous and time wasting 'exercises' from what was presumed to be a theatre class. And, rather than blaming the teacher, who certainly herself is not even old enough to recall what a real and NONtest based class on the subject would be like, I know better. And I regularly tell my sixth grader than school wasnt always like this. I tell my child and all the friends and acquaintances who increasingly want to know if this, the test mad, common 'low denominator' core school system that it is today, if this is all our schools represent.

And a bit of recent history : Back in 2008, I had wished more for Hillary (Clinton) than for Obama... Who even before he was resoundingly elected the first time, I just thought him overly cautious and 'academic'. So I am not surprised then that he simply missed the education debate altogether. That he appointed and then re-appointed Arne Duncan as Education Secy, a friend who also lacked sorely any real education background, was only a reinforcement of my impression - Obama had no clue about rescuing public schools. And more, I admit that I have become bitter, as I see that his own precious children are enrolled in a lovely, Private school with NO standardized test whatsoever, and certainly nothing approximating the nonsense of the so called Common Core.

There is NOTHING common about a good education. yet here in New York, that is exactly what more than a million young thinkers are receiving. The Educrats who put profit over education, MONEY and private contracts over teaching and learning... they have usurped the classrooms so many fought for since the early 1900's. And nearly managed to bring the public schools to their banged and bruised up knees...

Common Core is not the single enemy. Rather I would say the true culprits include the architects of the state mandates for tests, companies such as Pearson who have ties to Bloomberg, Murdoch and Klein, Bill Gates and his teacher evaluation 'systems' .... aptly referred to as the Billionaires Boys Club by Diane Ravitch. In other words, the so called Reformers are raping the public schools of great and good educators and principled principals... And who by promoting for-profit charters, and random test-based 'reforms', leave the true learning and teaching at the very back of the line.

So this article can go on ... Public schools in big cities such as New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, Los Angeles ... And in towns around the country - these schools are now under fire, while big business with no educational knowledge literally play with our kids minds... Common Core is a glaring and obvious case.

I am recently heartened by news of conferences being held and organizations being formed for the sole purpose to rid schools of these useless tests and plans and 'commonest' of curricula infiltrations.  Many articles, even in the reluctant NY Times and NY Daily News, are getting full press coverage, as more parents seem to be figuring it out; Common Core is just another part of the sham that adds no value whatsoever to schools.