A concluded battle in the curriculum wars
Mark BauerleinIn the Hoover Institution’s Defining Ideas journal, Tom Loveless has a brief, measured examination of today’s curriculum debates.
We all have a stake in ensuring the Common Core debate rests on facts
Kathleen Porter-MageeYesterday, National Review Online posted an article entitled, “The Eleven Dumbest Common Core Problems.” This is the latest in a series of posts making their way around the internet aimed at demonstrating how the Common Core ELA and math standards are &
There’s a new sheriff in town: Louisiana judges Common Core alignment
Kathleen Porter-MageeAs followers of the Common Core debate know all too well, when it comes to the veracity of publishers’ claims of “Common Core alignment,” the most we supporters have been able to offer in the way of advice is: “buyer beware.”
Common Core 'spring training': Maintain realistic expectations
Amber M. Northern, Ph.D., Michael J. PetrilliEveryone knows that the Common Core State Standards initiative has turned into a political football. But a more apt analogy might be baseball—spring training, to be exact. That’s because, for all the colorful commentary, the Common Core is still in the very earliest phases of implementation.
How Well Aligned Are Textbooks to the Common Core Standards in Mathematics?
Alyssa SchwenkJust because the label on that pint of ice cream says it’s “fat free” doesn’t mean it won’t expand your waistline—and just because a textbook is labeled “Common Core aligned” doesn’t mean it actually covers the material it’s supposed to.
The invaluableness of 'obscure' words and the SAT
“Vanity and pride are different things, though the words are often used synonymously. A person may be proud without being vain. Pride relates more to our opinion of ourselves, vanity to what we would have others think of us.”
The most important resolution: STEM education
Our nation’s education crisis is not exaggerated, nor is the risk to our economic prosperity and national security.
Knowledge at the Core
Chester E. Finn, Jr., Michael J. PetrilliOur slim new book Knowledge at the Core: Don Hirsch, Core Knowledge, and the Future of the Common Core has three large aims. First, it pays tribute to three decades of scholarship and service to American education by E. D. (Don) Hirsch, Jr., author of Cultural Literacy (and three other prescient books on education reform) and founder of the Core Knowledge Foundation.
Policymakers: Stop being agnostic about curriculum
Pop quiz! Which of the following statements is in the Common Core State Standards?(a) Through extensive reading of stories, dramas, poems, and myths from diverse cultures and different time periods, students gain literary and cultural knowledge.
Who in the world is Carmen Fariña?
Sol SternIn his press conference introducing Carmen Fariña as New York City’s next schools chancellor, Mayor Bill de Blasio suggested that he had picked her over several other candidates because she was on the same page with him in opposing his predecessor Michael Bloomberg’s education reforms.
Public accountability & private-school choice
Adam EmersonThe Fordham Institute supports school choice, done right. That means designing voucher and tax-credit policies that provide an array of high-quality education options for kids that are also accountable to parents and taxpayers.