Fed Outrage for Repealing Common Core

Those who are fighting Common Core, this is an ALERT!  Feds are Penalizing Oklahoma for Pursuing Superior College and Career Ready Academic Standards.  Both lead authors of the bill, Senator Josh Brecheen and Representative Jason Nelson are in the middle of running for re-election and I believe it is no coincidence that the Feds choose now to wreak havoc in our schools over the repeal of Common Core.   As an added kick to the shin, the court chose to reject Nelson’s Scholarship program for special needs children as unconstitutional.  Ridiculous.  They have no soul.   That case will be repealed, but this is about a power play.  Feds have decided to control how we use our education dollars via No Child Left Behind.  I would surmise that this is a tactic to make an example of the state and the wayward legislators who saw fit to represent the grassroots who elected them.

The stated reasoning behind their decision is that Oklahoma can no longer show that our standards are college and career ready.  Nonsense!   Not one student anywhere has ever been prepared for college or a career with Common Core.  Zero, zip, zilch, nada, none in the entire United States of America.  OK is to implement our previous standards until our new standards are written.  Those standards we are using in place of Common Core have sent thousands to college and to careers.  Oklahoma has one of the strongest economies in the United States.  Of course our previous standards were college and career ready. Common Core backers don’t care about facts, though.  That is no surprise.   This is about control.

Pictured are Sen. Brecheen and Rep. Nelson at their press conference today fighting back against attempted federal control of schools.

Senator Brecheen:  “Oklahomans, not Washington bureaucrats, are in the best position to determine how we teach our children. I am confident our repeal of Common Core will result in even higher standards and better educational outcomes, and it is an outrage that the federal government has chosen to punish us for our efforts to strengthen Oklahoma schools. The process for developing new academic standards specifically crafted to the needs of our students is advancing, and we are committed to fighting the federal government’s decision.”

Rep. Nelson said in his blog post today: Oklahoma officials received a letter today from the United States Department of Education stating they will not renew Oklahoma’s No Child Left Behind waiver. This heavy handed decision comes after the passage of House Bill 3399, a measure which repealed the untested Common Core State Standards and put in place a process to develop and adopt new, superior standards with the help of Oklahoma higher-education and CareerTech systems.

The rest of his excellent explanation of what is happening here: http://www.jasonnelson.org/2014/08/house-leaders-comment-on-feds.html