Debunking the Common Core “The Emperor’s New Clothes” Narrative….

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AAASA Journal of Scholarship and Practice, Benchmarking for Success, Christopher H. Tienken, Common Core State Standards

…and why are education reformers/politicians ascribing to fairy tales for policy?

by Gretchen Logue

Should Common Core State Standards (CCSS) be considered an educational version of the story “The Emperor’s New Clothes”? The standards are the promise of new clothes for education but is there basis for believing there are any clothes at all? From Wikipedia:

“The Emperor’s New Clothes” (Danish: Kejserens nye Klæder) is a short tale by Hans Christian Andersen about two weavers who promise an Emperor a new suit of clothes that is invisible to those unfit for their positions, stupid, or incompetent. When the Emperor parades before his subjects in his new clothes, a child cries out, “But he isn’t wearing anything at all!” The tale has been translated into over a hundred languages.[1]

Christopher H. Tienken, Editor of AAASA Journal of Scholarship and Practice provided commentary in the Winter 2011 publication entitled Common Core State Standards: An Example of Data-less Decision Making.

His research may just expose the standards to be unfit and fallacy to those who are critical thinkers asking for data determining their stated validity. This article should be studied by educators, politicians, taxpayers, to understand the colossal farce Common Core standards are in terms of providing promises of educational improvement for American students as they are unproven and untested.

Tienken writes the standards have not been validated empirically and no metric has been set to monitor the intended and unintended consequences they will have on the education system and children (Mathis, 2010). So why would governors and private trade organizations spend millions of taxpayer dollars on theories instead of verifiable researched data? The CCSS proponents have bought into these two arguments:

• America’s children are “lagging” behind international peers in terms of academic achievement, and
• the economic vibrancy and future of the United States relies upon American students outranking their global peers on international tests of academic achievement because of the mythical relationship between ranks on those tests and a country’s economic competitiveness.

Where’s the data supporting the CCSS proponents’ arguments? There isn’t much put forth by the education reformers. So why are states and school districts implementing unproven and untested theories? He defines the acceptance/lack of data for the unproven and untested CCSS assessments and implementation allegedly designed to enable students to become “globally competitive” with such sentences/phrases as:

• An unbelievable suspension of logic and evidence
• To believe that economic strength of the United States relies on how students rank on the Trends in International Math and Science Study (TIMSS) or the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), rather than reliance on policy (tax, trade, health, labor, finance, monetary, housing, natural resources policy)… “is like believing in the tooth fairy”
• The “critical skills necessary to compete in the 21st century” are repackaged 19th century ideas and skills…they are “inert, sterile, socially static”…the CCSS are stuck in a curricular time machine set in 1858
• Connecting an individual’s education achievement on a standardized test to a nation’s economic future is not empirically or logically acceptable and using that mythical connection for large-scale policymaking is civically reckless … when school administrators implement programs and policies built on those faulty arguments, they commit education malpractice
• More countries with national standards underperformed the US than did countries without national standards
• To think that every student in this country should be made to learn the same thing is illogical—it lacks face validity … we should have learned from the Soviet Union that central planning does not work in the long-run
• Standardization and testing are so entrenched in Singapore that every attempt to diversity the system has failed, leaving Singapore a country that has high test scores but no creativity
• (CCSS) creates a standardizing apparatus…we should respect differences among children, not try to extinguish them…there is a lot more going on here on the societal level than meets the eye … it’s more complex than the creators and vendors of the standards either understand or wish to present
• Children have a right to a quality education. School leaders, those who prepare them, and the people who lead our professional organizations have a duty to help provide the quality … if some education leaders choose to drink the snake oil then they should expect to get sick. If some help sell it, they should resign.

He backs up his findings with 48 independent referenced sources. It is worth your time to read his commentary that destroys the CCSS proponents’ arguments with methodical precision based on actual data. Compare/contrast his research/reference with the data CCSSO and the NGA use:

“Many school districts or schools have “data committees” that make school-widedecisions based on some type of data. Surely there must be quality data available publically to support the use of the CCSS to transform, standardize, centralize and essentially delocalize America’s public education system. The official website for the CCSS claims to provide such evidence. The site alleges that the standards are “evidence based” and lists two homegrown documents to “prove” it: Myths vs Facts (NGA, 2010) and the Joint International Benchmarking Report (NGA, 2008).

“The Myths document presents claims that the standards have “made use of a large and growing body of knowledge” (p. 3). Knowledge derives in part from carefully controlled scientific experiments and observations so one would expect to find references to high quality empirical research to support the standards.

“When I reviewed that “large and growing body of knowledge” offered by the NGA, I found that it was not large, and in fact built mostly on one report, Benchmarking for Success, created by the NGA and the CCSSO, the same groups that created these standards; Hardly independent research.

The Benchmarking report has over 135 end notes, some of which are repetitive references. Only four of the cited pieces of evidence could be considered empirical studies related directly to the topic of national standards and student achievement.

The remaining citations were newspaper stories, armchair magazine articles, op-ed pieces, book chapters, notes from telephone interviews, and several tangential studies.

Many of the citations were linked to a small group of standardization advocates and did not represent the larger body of empirical thought on the topic”.

Tienken’s report needs to be sent to school boards, superintendents, state educational agencies, educational reform groups, governors and state legislators for their response to his research and conclusions. These private and/or public entities need to asked why they support common core standards and provide the data to back up their beliefs and use of the standards. If you get shocked faces and declarations from these groups/politicians such as “I do whatever _________ tells me to” (fill in the blank: state agency, federal government, governor, etc), you know the right to direct your school’s educational direction is in dire jeopardy.

Read more HERE

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Best Research Award Winner Says Common Core is Data-less Decision Making

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AASA Journal of Scholarship and Practice, Christopher Tienken, Common Core Standards, Institute of Education Sciences

Christopher Tienken, Ed.D. is the editor of the AASA Journal of Scholarship and Practice. He is an assistant professor of Education Administration at Seton Hall University. He has public school administration experience as a PK-12 assistant superintendent, middle school principal, and elementary school assistant principal. He began his career in education as an elementary school teacher. Dr Tienken’s research interests include the effect and influence of professional development on teacher practice and student achievement, the construct validity of high-stakes standardized tests as decision-making tools about student achievement and school effectiveness, and curricular interventions used in schools to improve achievement. His research about the effects of professional development on student achievement has been recognized by the Institute of Education Sciences and the National Staff Development Council awarded him the Best Research Award in 2008.”

As a top researcher in academic practice and student achievement, Dr. Tienken looked at the claims of those who support the Common Core Standards and wrote about his findings in the Winter 2011 edition of the Journal of Scholarship & Practice. You can read his full report “Common Core State Standards: An Example of Data-less Decision Making” here. What follows are some key highlights from it.

On the claim that the standards are evidence based and internationally benchmarked.

“The standards have not been validated empirically and no metric has been set to monitor the intended and unintended consequences they will have on the education system and children (Mathis, 2010)”

“The site alleges that the standards are “evidence based” and lists two homegrown documents to “prove” it: Myths vs Facts (NGA, 2010) and the Joint International Benchmarking Report (NGA, 2008).

The Myths document presents claims that the standards have “made use of a large and growing body of knowledge” (p. 3). Knowledge derives in part from carefully controlled scientific experiments and observations so one would expect to find references to high quality empirical research to support the standards.

When I reviewed that “large and growing body of knowledge” offered by the NGA, I found that it was not large, and in fact built mostly on one report, Benchmarking for Success, created by the NGA and the CCSSO, the same groups that created these standards; Hardly independent research.”

The need for the standards has been justified by claiming that, (a) America’s children are “lagging” behind international peers in terms of academic achievement, and (b) the economic vibrancy and future of the United States relies upon American students outranking their global peers on international tests of academic achievement.

Tienken’s response –

“Unfortunately for proponents of this empirically vapid argument it is well established that a rank on an international test of academic skills and knowledge does not have the power to predict future economic competitiveness and is otherwise meaningless for a host of reasons (Baker, 2007; Bracey, 2009; Tienken, 2008).”

He sites these examples to support his statement.

“The fact is China and its continued manipulation of its currency, the Yuan, and iron-fisted control of its labor pool, has a greater effect on our economic strength than if every American child scored at the top of every international test, the SAT, the ACT, the GRE, or the MAT.” (emphasis added)

“Japan‘s stock market, the Nikkei 225 Average, closed at a high of 38,915 points on December 31, 1989 and on October 15, 2010 it closed at 9,500 points, approximately 75% lower, but Japan ranked in the Top 10 on international tests of mathematics since the 1980‘s and has always ranked higher than the U.S. on such tests. Yet Japan‘s stock market and its economy have been in shambles for almost two decades. They have national curriculum standards and testing, and have for over 30 years. Japanese students outrank students from most other nations on math and science tests.”

“Economic strength of the G20 countries relies more on policy, than education achievement.”

“To believe otherwise is like believing in the tooth-fairy.”

Even if the standards were a good idea, they would not lead to the results that their proponents promise. Given their tremendous cost, it seems reasonable to question whether they are really needed. At the very least we should ask, is this a good investment of America’s capital?

READ MORE HERE

BLOGGER’S NOTE: As an educator, it is just plain foolishness to think any kind of collectivity, lumping all students into one giant classroom, dispensing pre-designed curricula and calling it Common Core Standards is simply idiotic! YES, our education system needs some serious help, but this is over-simplifying the problem AND an imagined solution. Nothing short of a radical re-design of what curriculum means and how to TEACH individual students (rather than “groups” of children) is going to improve the learning curve in American schools! Collectivity is NOT the answer in education any more than it is in anything else. As much as Americans want to believe in equality, we must understand that equality does NOT refer to our individual giftings and abilities. In those, we are divinely created unique individuals!