I would like to start this article with an introduction. My wife and I work in the education field. She is a curriculum specialist and I teach after school classes while I am finishing my degree. We have two children that we are planning on homeschooling through a philosophy of unschooling. This article is purely to inform parents who send their children to schools that adhere to the common core standards (private, public, or homeschool).

1) Common Core are National Standards

By having compulsory education and then dictating what every single child should know we are reducing the individuality of a child. Education is not like a factory line where we want all the products (students) to eventually look the same. There should be diversity among schools in what they are teaching, how they are teaching, and why they are teaching. Every student is different and a cookie cutter education leaves the children on the fringe to be thrown away.

 2) Parents, State politicians nor Teachers Had a Say  in Common Core

Common Core was presented to governors as part of an educational package to replace No Child Left Behind. This new program is called Race to the Top (RttT). Only governors reviewed this deal. It was never presented to the state legislation or the people. If we are being fair the governors actually did not even get to see common core, because it had not been completed at the time they accepted, yet it was still part of the deal. It was one of those government programs where you have to adopt the standards in order to find out what is in them.

 3) Common Core is Part of Race to the Top

Race to the Top is an incentivized educational program that basically says that if a school is performing well and meeting the criteria then they will get federal grants. This program costs the tax payers $4.35 billion a year. Common Core is just one facet to RttT. The other facets are: Longitudinal Student Data System, Teacher and Principal Evaluations, and becoming a National Assessment Consortium member.

 4) Race to the Top is Data Mining Students

The data mining part of Race to the Top is where the schools supply the federal government with all the information about all of the students. The department of education focuses on collecting data about “health-care history (which bypasses HIPAA laws), disciplinary record, family income range, family voting status, and religious affiliation,”. This data information will be available to the school, government and future employers.

 5) Common Core is Entirely Experimental

According to a journal article by ReThinking Schools, “Written mostly by academics and assessment experts—many with ties to testing companies—the Common Core standards have never been fully implemented and tested in real schools anywhere. Of the 135 members on the official Common Core review panels convened by Achieve Inc., the consulting firm that has directed the Common Core project for the NGA, few were classroom teachers or current administrators. Parents were entirely missing. K–12 educators were mostly brought in after the fact to tweak and endorse the standards—and lend legitimacy to the results.”

 6) Common Core was Designed by Bill Gates’ Foundations 

Most people know Bill Gates to be a strong liberal billionaire. His Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation provided all the funding for the three organizations that produced Common Core: the National Governors Association, the Council for Chief State School officers, and Achieve, Inc. There was no diversification when it came to the minds that were producing these standards.

 7) Common Core Has Major Flaws in English Language Standards

The core problem with the English standards in Common Core is that they take away the critical thinking skills that we all grew up learning. Reading texts that made us think and have to develop an opinion and then articulate that opinion through writing. Now with Common Core standards they are more focused on informational texts and content-free skills. Many of the “standards” are several objectives bundled into one statement. They also are putting a more prominent stress on writing than reading at every grade level.

 8) Common Core Takes Away Parental Feedback

Under Common Core there is no process for parents, teachers, and school boards to provide feedback or gain flexibility on all or part of the Common Core as students begin encountering it.

 9) Common Core Math Delays

Using Common Core students will not learn traditional methods of adding and subtracting double or triple digit numbers until they are in 4th grade (9-10yrs old). The philosophy behind Common Core is to have the students understand the why in mathematics. This is a great idea, but in practice most children do not have the capacity to understand the why until they are older. Click here to see a list of 10 example math problems from a curriculum that adheres to Common Core.

10) Quote from Marc Tucker (designer) on the Purpose of Common Core

“to remold the entire American system” into “a seamless web that literally extends from cradle to grave and is the same system for everyone,” coordinated by “a system of labor market boards at the local, state and federal levels” where curriculum and “job matching” will be handled by counselors “accessing the integrated computer-based program.”