Mythbusting the US Chamber

The US Chamber of Commerce is all in on the push for Common Core, and they throwing money at the push for the Core with unbridled enthusiasm. They have created an entire website (well, paid somebody to create, anyway) devoted to their devotion to CCSS. It has many nifty features, including links to some fine video production, but today we're visiting the tab labeled "Myths vs. Facts" because it offers the highest concentration of baloney-per-byte of any other portion of the site.

Myths vs. Facts is set up as a fun quiz, where they present a statement and then we have to decide whether it's a myth or a fact. So we'll look at their mythbusting, and then do our own mythbusting on their mythbusting. Buckle up, because there are many myths to bust.


The Common Core State Standards are owned by private entities which cannot be influenced by the public.

Myth: "The Common Core Standards are owned by the National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers. These groups are both made up of state officials who are accountable to the public." Sort of. The NGA and CCSSO both employ staffs to do the heavy lifting. Otherwise we're talking state governors and top school officials from the states, which is a mixed bag as far as "accountable to voters" is concerned.
Plausible-ish

The federal government will take over ownership of the Common Core State Standards Initiative.
Myth: The federal government won't do that. The NGA and CCSSO are committed to developing a long-term governance structure.
Which is a pretty thought. Personally, I'm committed to developing more hair on my head. Don't know if I'll ever get around to it.
Busted

The Common Core State Standards were developed by the federal government.
Myth: "These new standards were not Washington's idea and the federal government was not involved in their development." They were totally commissioned by NGA and CCSSO.
I smell flop sweat. See, it should be enough to use the regular weasel-word talking point about the states leading through the oft-cited NGA/CCSSO. But here they had to reach for the big lie that DC had nothing to do with it.
"Look what we did," said the NGA/CCSSO, presenting the standards on stone tablets.
"Woah!" exclaimed the feds. "That is amazingly awesome. I had no idea you guys were up to any such thing. We are totes surprised!"
No, nobody anywhere believes that one.
Busted

The CCSS expose students' private data to the federal government.
Myth: "Data collection is at the state level, based on laws having nothing to do with the Common Core. Implementation of the Common Core does not change current practices."
That, my friends, is some first class baloney. Technically correct, just as it's technically correct that Stalin did not personally kill millions of Russians, this doesn't do a thing to deny the essential truth of this "myth." It just skips over "and sells that data to corporations" or "as they've wanted to do for twenty years."
Busted


The presence of CCSS will result in less innovation in state and local curricula.
Myth: "Because the standards are more focused than previous state standards, teachers and localities actually have more flexibility to be creative and responsive to community priorities and individual students."
Also a bicycle, because a vest has no sleeves. I mean, that one doesn't even make sense. By clamping the athletes' ankles together, we will allow them to run faster.
Busted

The CCSS are a national curriculum.
Myth: Oh, you can already write this one yourself. Same old baloney-- the states and local districts and teachers are free as birds in the sky.
Presuming those birds have been wrapped up in binding twine and shot out of a cannon. It makes me sad to think that, this far into implementation, there are people who believe that this is true. I wash my hands of them. I would rather do something more productive, like convince the Flat Earth Society that we live on a globe.
Busted, repeatedly.

The CCSS don't have enough emphasis on fiction/literature.
Myth: Okay, they completely fumble here. This is actually a win for CCSS fans; CCSS calls for certain percentages for fiction/informational through the whole program, not just the English class. But instead the Chamber goes with some waffly business about how they're keeping important American documents and stuff by that Shakespeare fella. Oh, and local control!
Draw

Many states only adopted Common Core Standards to qualify for new grants being offered by the federal government.
Myth:"States across the country adopted CCSS because they recognized the clear need to improve their education systems and better prepare America's students for college." Now they're just making shit up. This malarkey is followed up with the claim that CCSS only made up 8% on the RttR Final Exam anyway. And for some reason, people on both side of the issue like to gloss over the NCLB piece of this. Non-race states still needed a waiver because right now every state in the union is in violation of the No Child Left Behind laws. "Many states adopted CCSS because there was a gun to their heads" is also not a myth.
Busted, and also busted

Private schools, religious schools, and homeschooling will be required to follow Common Core Standards.
Myth: "As they have in the past, private, faith-based, and home schools will continue to have flexibility on how and what they teach, as long as it comports with state guidelines." Perhaps this is a software glitch, because this seems to be the answer to some other question.
Did not respond to prompt

There was only one math content expert involved in reviewing the Common Core Standards, and he withheld his approval for the standards.
Myth: There were eight, and six approved it. 75% is passing, right? Also, seventy experts were on the team. They missed an important lesson here; it's easier to bust myths that are made out of straw.
A Win

Common Core Standards do little more than prepare students for entry-level and low-level jobs.
Myth: "According to a 2011 ACT study, just one in four American students who graduate high school are ready for college. Only 52% of graduates were prepared for college level reading courses, 45% were ready for college level math courses. In fact, only about half of students entering college finish any degree within 6 years." Yes,the only possible explanation for any of those (suspect) statistics is high school education. Oh no, wait--Here's the link to my other explanations.
Busted

The Common Core State Standards are internationally benchmarked.
Oooh! Fact!! "International benchmarking played a significant role in both sets of standards." Specifically, the part of something that people talked about as necessary marketing. Not, unfortunately, the part of a real thing that actually happened. But hey-- have you seen that big appendix at the end of the Standards? That totally proves that benchmarking occurs, just like the works cited page in a freshman English college paper proves the student really read all those sources.
Not Actually a Fact


The Common Core State Standards are not research or evidence based.
Myth:"The standards have made careful use of a large and growing body of evidence. The evidence base includes scholarly research; surveys on what skills are required of students entering college and workforce training programs; assessment data identifying college‐ and career‐ready performance; and comparisons to standards from high‐performing states and nations." There you have it. Evidence! Surveys! Comparisons to the state standards which-- wait-- what? How did we compare them if they weren't written yet? I think somebody confused their market research with other research.
Busted

The Common Core dictates the process for evaluating teachers.
Myth: "Only states decide how to evaluate teacher, principals, and other educators." Fair enough. The Standards themselves say nothing about evaluating teachers. Those instructions came crazy-glued onto the standards when they arrived from the feds. But the states can use any method they want, as long as it's approved by the feds. And Henry Ford offered the Model T in any color, as long as it was black.
Confirmed

The Common Core State Standards tell teachers what to teach.
Myth: "The best understanding of what works in the classroom comes from the teachers who are in them." That's why the CCSS were developed in close consultation with--oh, no, wait. Never mind. Anyway, we won't tell teachers how to teach. We've hired Pearson to do that. 
Busted

Teachers were involved in writing the Common Core State Standards.
Fact! Once again, the Chamber overreaches. They could have gone with the usual waffle-wording that says teachers were "involved" because many got to see and make comments on the finished product. But the Chamber goes in whole hog: " The drafting process relied on teachers from across the country." "Relied"!! But in for a penny's worth of baloney, in for a pound. Lots of experts came together "to create the most thoughtful and transparent process of standard setting." Yes, those secret meeting with non-disclosure agreements to be signed by each participant, and involving no public comment or input-- that's the model for a thoughtful and transparent process. Maybe the theory was that since the non-participation of teachers has been so thoroughly documented, they needed to go with a Big Lie here.
Busted with fire into a million pieces

I hope you appreciate this busting, because this is the closest I've ever come to doing actual work on this blog. The myths are on a random rotation (like those amazing facts on Mental Floss) and I had to look at some of these a zillion times to get to the rest. For all I know there are still some like "The CCSS were found among the bullrushes in a wicker boat" or "The CCSS will make all students tall, slender and attractive." But I couldn't go on.

The US Chamber's devotion to the core is inspirational, but it's worth paying attention to because while these are the folks who believe you can't fix education by throwing money at it, they apparently are all too willing to fix education reform by throwing money at advertising about it.  
 

Five Myths About Tenure and FILO

There's plenty of discussion and argument to be had in the debate about doing away with tenure and FILO. But here are five points that don't need to be brought up any more, ever, because they are bunk.

1. Teachers want to protect bad teachers.

The prevailing myth is that when a bad teacher hits a school, other teachers circle the wagons and do their best to protect that lousy teacher from any consequences.

But when Mr. Dimbulb McSucksalot moves into the classroom next door, you know who suffers 2nd most (right behind the students)? I do. I have to put up with his out-of-control hubub. I have to listen to "Why are you making us work today? Mr. McSucksalot gave his kids a study hall!" Next year, I'll be the one who has to teach his former students when they arrive in my classroom a full year behind. And I'm the one out in the community having my professional standing smeared because Mr.McSucksalot drags down the reputation of all teachers at my school.

You think I don't want him to shape up? Think again. I curse my administrators for hiring him, I curse them for keeping him, and I curse them for letting him do a crappy job without remediation or discipline. Fix him or fire him, help him or counsel him out-- I guarantee you that Mr. Sucksalot's colleagues would love to see somebody deal with the issue.

2. Tenure Guarantees a Job for Life

A zombie argument that won't die no matter how many times it is shot in the head. Tenure guarantees due process. Tenure guarantees that districts can only fire teachers for some good reason. That is it.

Teachers are fired for incompetence all the time. Heck, teachers still get fired for moral turpitude. Here's a coach/teacher who was fired for a photo showing her fiance touching her clothed breast. Here's a teacher who was fired for posting photos from her European vacation that show her holding alcohol. Tenure does not prevent the firing of teachers. Period.

3. Administrators Hands Are Tied

We are frequently led to believe that schools are filled with administrators who would love to get rid of Mr. McSucksalot, but gosh, union rules just keep them from doing so. Baloney.

It is true that in some huge urban districts, officials have allowed the growth of byzantine rules and regulations for firing teachers, but they still have room to move (and with public pressure on their side, they could de-byzantine themselves as well).

The vast majority of districts have no such complicated issues. In most districts, administrators like to say, "My hands are tied" because it's so much more palatable than saying, "I could, but it would be a lot like work and I don't wanna" or "I hired this guy and I'd rather not publicly admit that I blew it."  Or even "Do you have any idea how much work it would be to fill that position?" And they definitely don't want to say, "Turns out some of our teachers aren't very good."

The problem with administrators' hands is not that they are tied; it's that the administrators are sitting on them. Behind every bad teacher who still has a job is an administrator who isn't doing his.

4. Young Teachers Are Being Shut Out of the Profession

Current numbers are hard to find for this issue, but here's what we know.

Something like 50% of all new teachers leave the profession within five years (and only a few leave to become investment bankers of education thought leaders). And between 1988 and 2008 the mode of teacher years of experience shifted from 14 to 1. In other words (if you don't speak statistics), in 1988, it was most likely a child would have a teacher with fourteen years of experience; in 2008, it was most likely a child's teacher would have one year of experience.


It is true that in recent years states have been shedding jobs like my dog sheds hair (that's "a lot," for those of you who don't know my dog). But it is also true that enrollment in college education programs has been dropping; my local sampling finds a decline of around 50% over those years. Young people aren't just leaving the profession; they're avoiding it in the first place.

The anti-tenure, anti-FILO narrative is that our schools are glutted with old, worn-out teachers who need to step aside for young, quality teachers. But in fact we don't have a glut of crusty old teachers; we have a glut of shiny new ones.

5. Teachers Don't Want To Be Evaluated

This part of the narrative says, "Teachers resist all forms of evaluation because they don't want to be held accountable." Baloney.

I don't know a single teacher, locally or across the country, who does not expect to be held accountable for his job performance. But here are the minimum two factors that any accountability measure should include.

First, it should actually measure how well I do my job. If we polled the taxpayers of my district, how many do you think would say, "We hire teachers to have our kids get good scores on standardized tests. That's it. That's all we hire them to do. Nothing else." No, the taxpayers of my district pay me good money to do a large and complex job, and they deserve to know how well I'm doing that job. ALL of that job. Evaluating teacher entirely or in part by student standardized test scores is like evaluating physicians on their prescription handwriting.

Second, it should not be alterable by the whims of my boss. My evaluation should not reflect how well he likes me, how many times I've pissed him off, how often I've flunked a star football player, how regularly I attend church, or how well he approves of my choice in spousal units.

Teachers absolutely recognize the right of taxpayers to know what kind of work they're getting in return for their tax dollars. That's why we think an evaluation system should be used that actually reflects our actual job performance, not one that is about as reliable as a blind man flinging darts over his shoulder at a dart board.

Bubble Answers for an Essay World

I have had the same conversation multiple times in the last week. I have had it with elementary teachers, secondary teachers, someone who works with young teachers, someone who works with college students. The crux of the conversation is something like this:

I do not know what to do with these [persons]. They do not want to understand. They do not want to discuss or explore. They just want to know what they're supposed to say or do so they can give the right answer and be rewarded.

We talk a great deal, especially during Testing Season, about the short-term damage done by the Cult of Standardized Testing. The tears, the fears, the frustration, the damaged psyches, the wasted time, the sheer stupid uselessness of the test results.

But we also need to pay attention to the more insidious, more far-reaching long-term damage being done by the Cult of Testing. It is changing a generation's very concept of what education is, of what it means to be an intelligent person, of how a learned person engages the world.

Standardized testing creates its own model of the world. In Testing Land, all answers to all questions already exist, and a Learned Person is proficient at hunting them down and bringing them back. In Testing Land, everything is already known. In Testing Land, a good student is one who can say what the Testmakers want her to say.

In elementary school, students learn How To Take Tests, which includes learning How To Do What The Testmakers Want. Children have to be taught to stop exploring, stop following their curiosity, stop running off whatever direction their lively minds take them. Stop chasing butterflies; sit down at your desk and do this practice sheet. Stop telling stories in that rambling circuitous narrative manner of a child, and start making your paragraphs exactly-four-sentence-long paragraph.

By high school, students have learned the purpose of education-- to teach you how to pass The Test. And you do that by looking at the choices you're given and picking the Right One. You look at the constructed response question and you follow the Right Formula for turning it into the response that you are supposed to write. Cheating becomes more prevalent because it's not cheating-- the task is to Get The Right Answer and turn it in, not to understand or comprehend or grapple with your brain-muscles. Just turn in the right answers.

Do not think. Do not engage. Your own thoughts and opinions will only slow you down. Go find the right answer.

When these students arrive at college, they meet a new expectation. Do some research. Write a paper. And in the process, construct a new piece of information. Create and present some knowledge that has never been presented before. The college student gapes. The professor might as well say, "Glorp a fleegle in blurgdorple." The college student asks a thousand variations on the same basic question-- "What am I supposed to do? What am I supposed to say?"

Some college programs are happy to provide that kind of lockstep guidance, and education programs, because they are preparing teachers for this Brave New Bubble World, are among the worst.

Folks, there are teachers out there in classrooms who have never created a single original teaching unit in their careers. They have taught from the book. They have used the packet of materials. When they need a worksheet or study guide, they go get one from the internet (students appreciate this a great deal because it makes it so easy to Get The Right Answer).

We are producing a generation of Bubblers, people whose understanding of understanding is bizarrely stunted. Yes, I know these sorts of students have always been with us, and I know old farts like me have always complained [insert Socratic quote about Kid These Days here]. But this is different.

We deliver nods to synthesis, curiosity, inquiry, exploration, the full range of Bloom-- but not really. We talk about higher order critical thinking skills-- but as only as techniques for divining what One Answer must be Bubbled. By presenting higher order thinking as just a way to solve the bubbling problem, we are systematically shutting down curiosity, inquiry, exploration, synthesis, construction, intellectual independence-- and it is working! At every level, we are seeing more and more people who are falling into lockstep, and not because they have been beaten into it, but because they think that's how it's supposed to be.

Life is not a bubble test. It's rich and complex and only reveals its full intricacy when observed from a million different vantage points. We are losing that, and as a culture we are poorer for it. I know that the education debates are often given to hyperbole, but I truly believe that when we fight the Cult of Testing, we aren't just fighting for quality of education, but for the very spirit and soul of what it means to be human, to understand and be in the world.

Open Ended and Close Minded

We cage students to protect ourselves.

Too many teachers (and others) are way too afraid of open-ended exploration for any number of reasons. Perhaps most commonly, the problem is not knowing the territory.

If I want to allow my students true open-ended exploration of a novel, then I have to know the territory. It's a big sprawling place, like a great forest, and if I'm going to let my students wander around in it, I need to know each stream, each hollow, each hidden pit, all the flora and fauna. I can only be effective as "the guide on the side" if I'm familiar with all the places we might go. I have to know the material far better than my students do. What if they ask questions I can't answer? What if they come up with ideas I'm not prepared to discuss?

There are other potential problems with open-ended instruction. Some are practical; if our discussion of symbolic threads in Song of Solomon is open-ended, we might run out of steam in twenty minutes, or the discussion might run for a week. How do I cover that in my lesson plans? How do I keep my class on a particular schedule and still allow the students to roam about the grounds till they're truly finished?

There's also the problem of letting go of The Answer. If your belief is that there's really only one way to see "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening," you're going to stink at open-ended exploration. I know people who think they do this, who really believe that their students are free to explore any ideas about literature "as long as the students can rationally support them." But their measure of rational support is whether or not it leads to the conclusion they've already settled on.

Biggest problem? Standardization. If we are going to be able to measure and tag and compare across the country the responses and reactions to the literature, we can't have 143,257 responses scattered across the landscape. True open-ended answers are too diffuse to quantify.

So to make our lives easier, we leash the students. We build a trail and command them to stay on it. We drive them through the forest on a tour bus we won't let them leave. We build a big pavillion and tell them that's the only destination they are allowed to reach. We eliminate options, reduce their choices, reign in their ability to explore and discover.

For standardized testing, we do even worse. We lie. We say, "You can open-endedly explore this forest (well, on most tests, a small garden)." And then we judge their constructed response on whether they arrived at the one "correct" destination; a multiple choice question for which they have to write their own answers. Or we ignore the destination they reached and judge them on something simple that we can quantify. We don't care if they land on gold or in a pile of poop, as long as their boots are properly laced. On a "Give three reasons for..." question, we don't care if the reasons are brilliant or stupid; we just want them to have three of them. What pretends to be a reading question is really only testing compliance and counting.

The continued push to create teacher-proof programs, programs that can be taught by any content delivery specialist, ignores a crucial facet of this approach-- it lives or dies, rests completely upon the degree to which we limit the intellectual freedom of students. The best teachers are wiser and more knowledgeable than their students. The only system in which that is not true is a system in which students are not allowed to be smart, curious or knowledgeable.

Drones can only teach other drones. Intelligent human beings can only be taught by other intelligent human beings. When you create a system that tries to turn intelligent human beings into drones, everybody suffers.

Re: Building the Machine

I have just watched the Home School Legal Defense association's documentary, Building the Machine.

I must tell you that I approached this with some reservations. In my mind, there is an important distinction between different sorts of Common Core Testy Regime opponents. On one hand, we have people who are fighting the high stakes test-driven corporate agenda because they want to rescue the heart and soul of American public education. On the other hand, we have people who are fighting because they believe that all this reformy mess actually reveals the heart and soul of American public education. Where one group says, "We have to stop the corporate-federal takeover of schools," the other says, "See! I knew it! This is just what they've always been planning to do."

So when I saw the trailer, and that the film is produced by the Home School Legal Defense Association (not fans of public school) my first reaction was extreme caution. Every time a colleague posted the trailer, I popped up to say, "Let's not get too excited here." I believe my quotable line was "Sometimes the enemy of my enemy is still my enemy, too."

But tonight I watched, because I try to watch and read everything I can. Because I want to know. Because we have to judge truth and untruth and half-truth based on its own character, and not its source. I wanted you to know all my biases going into this review of the film. Okay? Let's begin.

The film is slick-- Hollywood documentary slick, with well-filmed interviews and music cues that stir whatever emotions the film-makers want to stir. Here an ominous humming, like the deadly gas is in the basement. There a anxious pulse, like the clutch in your gut that somethings not right in your home.

The film depends on a wide assortment of filmed interviews. Michael McShane, Wayne Brasler, Andrew Hacker, Ze'ev Wurman, Paul Horton, to name just a few. Mike Petrilli and Chester Finn are there to speak on the Core's behalf, and given a fair chance to present their usual assortment of lies and marketing spin. Sandra Stotsky and Jim Milgram are given ample room to tell their stories of their fall from grace as CCSS validators. Several CCSS crafters were given a chance to speak, but declined, and so David Coleman appears only by film clip. This is not the highly progressive crowd, but nobody is wearing his Tea Party Tin Hat, either. It's a well-rounded roster of knowledgeable grown-ups.

The films pace is slow and deliberate. The interviewed experts are given more than tiny sound bites. There is plenty of chance to hear the arguments, to let them make their points. The film is slick, but not used-car-salesman dazzling. It's a glossy magazine with long, serious articles.

It covers the genesis of the Core, the broad outlines of its placement in power (though curiously fails to connect the dots between NCLB and the pressure to buy a waiver with CCSS compliance). It fully notes the stealth and speed involved in CCSS adoption. Its experts are all highly articulate, and while they make points that many opponents of Reformy Stuff make with regularity, they make them with passion and clarity. This is a film that assembles some evidence, but also depends heavily on crafting convincing arguments aimed at least as much at your brains as at your heart.

I listened for the dog whistle of "This is why you must tear your kids out of public school and never look back." I never heard it. The film does fire some arrows straight at homeschool hearts. In particular, it notes that this reform agenda is reshaping colleges, and so homeschooling your K-12 child won't save you. It noted that we know after decades of research that the biggest single affect on a child's education is the parents. And it asked the question of whether it's the government's right to teach your child what it wants your child to know. Does the child belong to her family, or is her education to serve the needs of the government?

Yes, that's all pretty standard homeschool rhetoric, but I have just typed every single instance of those arguments in a forty-minute movie. In fact, the film seems at moments to acknowledge that homeschoolers and supporters of traditional public ed are allies in this fight.

There are many great moments in this film. An articulate explanation of why "college and career ready" is guaranteed to produce unsatisfactory standards. An impassioned chapter about how children are humans and not assembly line machines. It even addresses the usual reformy complaint-- if you don't want CCSS, what do you want? What are you for? And it has this quote by Wayne Brasler in response to the idea of a race in education:

What race? The race is to keep the Democracy alive and vibrant and safe, and to have thinking, caring, intelligent students.

The film includes many highly quotable moments. It is passionate and scary, but not angry or mean. It goes out of its way not to attack anybody's character or motives. It portrays this battle not as a crusade against evil-doers, but a fight against well-meaning but misguided men who believe in a centrally planned one-size-fits-all system. They are dead wrong, but they are not Satan incarnate.

This is a film you should watch, and this is a film that you should get others to watch-- particularly those who are still learning about the issues. It has some darkly "All the President's Men" moments, but it's not overwrought or crazy-sounding. It explains some of the facts and explains most of the issues clearly and directly. People who have been in this fight for a while will nod their heads, but civilians new to the field will understand easily, and they'll know better than they did what is going, who the players are, and what they've done.

So, as someone who was prepared to keep this film at arm's length, I'll be passing it on to colleagues, to friends, to family. I suggest you watch it and then do the same.

P.S. I've already heard from folks who want to let me know that there's a point stated somewhere in this film that they disagree with. All I can say is, if you're waiting for the film that says exactly what you want to say exactly the way you want it said, there's only one filmmaker who could create that film, and you'll find that person in your mirror. In the meantime, be a critical viewer and sift through what you see with your intellect and conscience.

More Poll-Based Marketing

Want to see how pollsters can keep finding widespread support for the Common Core? Today we've got a perfect example to look at.

I am not a statistics or polling guy. I cannot, with any shred of authority, discuss n-curves and sampling error and any of those fancy statsy stuff. But I am a language guy, and I know when language is being used to game a system. And when it comes to polling, asking the right questions means it's not even necessary to game the statistics.

This particular poll was released last week by the Collaborative for Student Success, a CCSS promotion group that is tied directly to The Hunt Institute, which is in turn "an affiliate center" of  the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and lists the usual suspects as collaborators-- Gates Foundation, Achieve, NEA, The Broad Foundation, et al. (You can find Hunt on the Osborne/Schneider Big Chart of Gates Beneficiaries-- they're one of the Core's godparents).

The pollsters gathering the numbers were The Tarrance Group and David Binder Research, and the big headline that went with their research when it appeared in USNews, among other CCSS-loving news outlets, was "Poll: Most Voters Would Support a Common Core Candidate." USNews had a quote to underline the results.

"When Americans hear accurate, straightforward information about the Common Core standards, they overwhelmingly support them because they recognize higher standards are an important part of helping kids succeed in college and in their careers," Karen Nussle, executive director of the Collaborative for Student Success, said in a statement.

The press release from March 21 is available on line (h/t to juliannnc for the link). So let's take a look at the "accurate, straightforward information" that the pollsters used to collect this data.

After hearing the following sentence, respondents were asked if they support or oppose the Common Core Standard.
"To ensure that all students are prepared for success after graduation, the Common Core Standards establish a set of clear, consistent guidelines for what students should know and be able to do at each grade level across subjects."

Following that statement, the poll found total support of 64%, total opposition of 24%. And you know what? If that's what the CCSS actually were, I'd probably support them myself. Hell, like many current opponents, back when I thought that this was all that CCSS were, I did support them. But back then it didn't occur to me that the absence of phrases like "research based" or "teacher tested" might mean that the standards, while clear and consistent, were also created by non-teachers without a basis in research or best practices. And as has been noted elsewhere, these standards do not meet the standards of standard standard standards.

Again-- no manipulation of statistics needed. If I wanted fewer people to express support for the Core, I might have them hear this statement:

The federal government has forced states to accept the Common Core Standards, which were written in secret by people with no educational experience, in order to create large, profitable testing programs.

If the pollsters wanted to get even better numbers, they might have had their respondents hear this statement:

The Common Core Standards will guarantee that every small child will get a free pony.

The poll also exposed the responders to three specific statements:

The standards emphasize real understanding of mathematical concepts-- not just memorization.

The standards focus on fewer topics and allow teachers to cover them all in greater depth.

The English Language Arts standards focus on critical analysis and thoughtful complicated ideas.

These also resulted in large CCSS support. "The more information that the public has about the Common Core State State Standards, the better off those standards are viewed," Brian Tringali, a partner at The Tarrance Group, said. I'm pretty sure he meant to say, "The more carefully selected hand-picked scrubbed and filtered information that the public has..." The only miracle here is that a percentage were still opposed to the CCSS. Pure conjecture on my part, but I'm going to guess that those numbers represent "People Who Believed That The Pollster's Statements Were Not The Whole Truth."

But why construct a poll like this? Why ask questions that are so completely guaranteed to draw a particular response? I'm betting the answer is in the last question:

Respondents were also asked if they would be more likely or less likely “to support a candidate for public office that supported the use of Common Core Standards in your area?”

There are polls that are meant to gain insight and understanding of what is actually happening, to glean some clearer picture of the truth. But sometimes polls are set up to send one message, "Hey! Our side is winning!!" These are meant to swing momentum, rally the faithful, encourage the pack. These types of polls can be dangerous-- just ask any GOP stalwart who was certain that Romney was going to win the White House.

This poll appears to be a focused version of the latter. The message here? Politicians who want to win should back our brand! The poll made particular note of Ohio, Florida, Colorado, Michigan or Illinois, states that need all the CCSS rallying they can get.

This is not polling. This is not even remotely an attempt to discover what the truth on the ground is. This is, once again, CCSS well-financed salespersons attempting to build momentum by buying the illusion of public support. People tend to have a magical belief in polls (kind of like their magical belief in standardized tests) and will assume that even if someone has monkeyed around with the statistical analysis, the poll itself was sound. This poll is a reminder that if you take the truth out of your questions, you don't have to lie about the answers at all.

Results! Right!! Now!!!

There has been a great deal written about the content of the current testing regime, concentrating on what The Test covers, and how little depth of complexity can be measured. But there's another dimension of The Test that deserves the same sort of attention and criticism.

Time.

The obvious issue is the time spent on the test itself. The weakness of writing components is often noted and the clearest example of what's wrong here. Best practices in writing instruction involves a process-- pre-writing, rough drafting, editing, and re-writing. We spend years in school trying to drive home the idea that writing is not a process of joy down something quickly then hand it in as if it's a polished final product. In my own class I usually put a day's time between pre-writing and rough drafting so that students can have time to discuss, ruminate, reflect and otherwise prepare themselves to express what they have to say. Likewise, proofreading right after drafting is rarely productive-- that soon after writing, one tends to see what one meant to say instead of what one actually said.

Test writing, of course, requires students to approach the process exactly wrong. Don't think about what you have to say, and don't rewrite, because you don't have time. Just dash it off and hand it in. This is not a test of writing skill.

Likewise, seeing short questions for the first time and then trying to spit out or select answers quickly, without time for thought or reflection, is not how we humans generally do our best work. And when it comes to reading, we find one of the huge disconnects between The Test and CCSS. The Core at least nods its head to the notion that reading is best done with time to read, re-read, reflect, think, discuss, rinse, repeat. The Test once again insists that you must read and comprehend and answer Right! Now!!

But these are not the only ways in which we're mangling time management for testing's sake.

The other assumption behind testing is that education bears fruit Right! Now!! If I taught a kid something yesterday, then that kid should be a measurably different person today!!!! We are approaching education as if it were instant coffee and not the planting of a tree.

Standardized testing says, "We planted an apple tree here last week. I want to see the apple pie today! Now!!" It's true that we already frame some testing this way, but that's a short-term look at certain skills. When I give my students a quiz on this week's preposition unit, I do not pretend that the results tell me if they're college and career ready.

It's on that list of Things They Never Tell You In Teacher School-- many of the results of our labors will finally bear fruit long after we're in a position to see it happen. We all treasure those moments when an old student tells us how a lesson from years ago in our class suddenly made a difference long after that student left our school.

I'm not saying that testing is a waste or that if Chris appears to have learned nothing we should just ignore that deficiency on the theory that Chris's education will just kick in in a decade or two. I am saying that assuming everything important about education will show its effects immediately is a bad idea, a foolish assumption.

Like a tree, an educated person takes years to reach full form. We can examine the early sprout to see if it's off to a healthy start, but we shouldn't imagine we know exactly how the apples will taste.