Twitchy founder/CEO Michelle Malkin has tirelessly sought to take on advocates of the new “Common Core” school standards, even going so far as to challenge Jeb Bush and the New York Times’ Bill Keller to debate the merits of the standards. You might think that would keep people from foolishly trying to debate her on Twitter, but Common Core folks seem to lack common sense:
@kportermagee I have raised a stink about the crappy Houghton Mifflin #CCSS – aligned alegebra text now used in my kid's charter school.
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) October 9, 2013
@kportermagee http://t.co/ISRL4gf1yk
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) October 9, 2013
@kportermagee My school board was sold a bill of #CCSS goods, just as districts across the country are. Parents did not demand this.
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) October 9, 2013
@kportermagee Common Core-aligned texts have supplanted the academically superior, rigorous math curricula my kids' charter school used.
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) October 9, 2013
@kportermagee CCSS is a top-down, test-driven, tech boondoggle-driven juggernaut & nothing you say to denigrate parents' real-world
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) October 9, 2013
@kportermagee experiences will change that.
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) October 9, 2013
@kportermagee Common Core is just latest in long line of federally-concocted standards/testing schemes that are ANTITHESES of local control.
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) October 9, 2013
@kportermagee Why don't you click the link and read it for yourself?
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) October 9, 2013
@kportermagee You should amend your article, which presumptuously lectures me about need for me to have local conversations about rigor…
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) October 9, 2013
@kportermagee when I've been fighting all year against usurpation of my charter school's rigorous standards by #CCSS-aligned txtbk conglom
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) October 9, 2013
Here’s the insulting insinuation from Porter-Magee’s post:
And if Michelle Malkin is really worried about the assignments given to American schoolchildren, she will need to have a substantive conversation in local communities across the country about how to raise the rigor in their classrooms. Which, ironically, is exactly how Common Core State Standards Initiative got started in the first place.
@kportermagee Houghton Mifflin is no fly-by-night anomaly "claiming" CC alignment. They are a GIANT. They've watered down what made Saxon
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) October 9, 2013
@kportermagee such a success. And I'm not the only dumb parent saying so.
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) October 9, 2013
@kportermagee What part of my post are you not reading? It's filled with specific examples, screenshots & analysis. http://t.co/ISRL4gf1yk
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) October 9, 2013
@kportermagee Saxon WAS a solid program, until HM aligned it with CC. Now the algebra books are crap. Tip of iceberg. http://t.co/ISRL4gf1yk
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) October 9, 2013
@kportermagee My point is that CCSS alignment is corrupting high quality texts and THAT is why parents are protesting.
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) October 9, 2013
@kportermagee CCSS IS the problem. http://t.co/4ni3VQhfCo
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) October 9, 2013
.@kportermagee .@michellemalkin Stotsky & Bauerlein slam #CommonCore ELA for cutting classic lit, poetry, drama http://t.co/duLCESoCU5
— Pioneer Institute (@PioneerBoston) October 9, 2013
.@kportermagee .@michellemalkin Even Fordham's Gates-funded eval of Gates' CCSSI sez Indiana's better in ELA & Math http://t.co/YL4ETdhcty
— Pioneer Institute (@PioneerBoston) October 9, 2013
@kportermagee Entire conceptual approach is CC-driven: Focusing on explaining the "why" before mastering the what and how. Oppo of Saxon.
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) October 9, 2013
@kportermagee CCSS math is Everyday Math on steroids. Those of us who have fought both see it clearly.
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) October 9, 2013
@kportermagee Grand Canyon-sized gap btw your beliefs & reality of CCSS implementation in classroom. That's a feature, not bug, of FED ED.
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) October 9, 2013
.@kportermagee .@michellemalkin What's tested = what gets taught locally. Feds funded 2 nat'l testing groups http://t.co/nvqtfRe3J7
— Pioneer Institute (@PioneerBoston) October 9, 2013
@kportermagee Funny, I've heard from plenty of teachers across the country still teaching in the classroom who vehemently disagree with you.
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) October 9, 2013
@michellemalkin off to get my kids. Re: content, I suspect we're fighting for similar goals. Happy to continue the conversation
— Kathleen Porter-Magee (@kportermagee) October 9, 2013
@kportermagee Likewise. And next time you write an article on my educational views/experiences, feel free to contact me 1st. I'm here. 🙂
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) October 9, 2013
while #CommonCore is a convenient&politically expedient scapegoat…it is local leaders who choose curricula http://t.co/iisNQ8jS76
— Kathleen Porter-Magee (@kportermagee) October 9, 2013
In addition to being a fellow at the Fordham Institute, Porter-Magee works for the College Board, which is in the midst of redesigning its college-entrance tests to align with Common Core. The College Board’s president, David Coleman, served as a chief writer of the Common Core standards in English/language arts. In a profile of Coleman, the Atlantic wrote that Coleman hopes to “effect change from the top down”:
With the Common Core, Coleman worked to reshape public education from kindergarten up. Now, as the incoming president of the College Board—the nonprofit that administers the SAT, the Advanced Placement program, and a number of other testing regimens—he hopes to effect change from the top down, by shifting what is expected of students applying to college and, he hopes, by increasing the number of students who apply in the first place. Coleman’s most radical idea is to redesign the SAT, transforming it from an aptitude test intended to control for varying levels of school quality, to a knowledge test aligned with the Common Core. He describes this change as a way to put applicants on an equal playing field, a message to “poor children and all children that their finest practice will be rewarded.”
So — great news! — your kids can look forward to questions like these on the SAT. And there’s nothing you or your local school can do about it.
Isn’t local control wonderful?
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