We DO need that education!

I used to be a teacher.

I don’t know who felt more ineffective.  Was it me as a first year English teacher? What about the stuck-up administrators of the small charter school I was in that thought kids needed lectures (Can you imagine 30 inner city 6th graders lectured to 5 days a week)?  Was it the PASS objectives that were so long no one could actually remember what they were supposed to teach?  Was it our State government who was consistently inconsistent with their message and their expectations?  Was it the parents who showed us teachers so little respect in front of their children that the kids learned we were powerless?  Was it the children?  Had our system of privilege and funding for some and poverty and missed opportunities for others left this group of kids out of the scope of my mission for the 186 days I had them?  Was it a question I hadn’t even thought of yet because I was so frustrated with my life as an educator that I didn’t even have a concept of what or whom to blame?
I used to be a teacher.  And I’ll be damned if I vote for anyone who won’t make their jobs better, because the ones that stayed in the trenches were made of tougher stuff than me.

Neither Joe Dorman or Mary Fallin are currently in support of the Common Core initiatives, but I feel due to their recent importance in Oklahoma and the Fallin Flip-Flop Effect (a scientific term detailing the fact that we may never know what she actually wants) deems it necessary that we go over what the Common Core is, where it came from, and what it means to the country.  From there, I will look at the education platforms of both candidates and critique all of it with a mix of my usual razor sharp wit and middle school snark.

Common Core

The year is 2009.  The governors and state commissioners of education, two American territories, and the District of Columbia launched an effort to create a unified code of education standards through the Nation Governors Association (NGA) and the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO).  This effort was not led by the federal government nor was it informed by it.  State officials, themselves, struggling with slipping grades and broken standards wanted to use research and evidence to create a teaching standard that was common to all the states of America. They wanted us to share core educational values. A Common Core, if you will.
On their website, you can find a download file (.pdf) for their Standards-Setting Criteria.  The goal was to develop standards that were “fewer, clearer, higher” (see previous PASS Objective comments, I hated that stupid book).  They hoped that the standards would align with what work and higher education demands from students, wanted these standards to be internationally benchmarked (so our kids can compete anywhere), and wanted these standards to actually be based on research.  These are lofty goals considering that the end result would be one system from 50+.

I’m not saying these standards are perfect (I know a lot of people think that they lead teachers to teach to the tests), but currently 43 states, D. C., four territories, and the Department of Defense Education Activity (DoDEA) have implemented them.  So, once did we.  But no more…
June 5th, 2014, Governor Fallin signed HB 3399 killing the baby she once took a lot of guff to raise from her Republican family.  Common Core has gone from a collective of governors hoping for a positive change to yet another weapon of partisan politics.  It is an example of federal outreach, of a federal government with a liberal agenda attempting to usurp even more power from the downtrodden states.  It has become a political litmus test used to determine if you are federalist or antifederalist.

I would have preferred us stay a member of the Common Core with its faults.  Once a common educational system could be developed in America, we could change it, upgrade it.  Now we are floating, almost alone, hoping we can convince enough people (through legislation or fear-mongering) to leave the ship and float alone too.  We’re not offering an alternative, unified plan.  We just want you to sink the Titanic and chill on the life rafts (something something something Obama grumble grumble).

I think I have a real problem with extended metaphors today.
I’m going to stop this tirade.  It’s time to let you guys see what you really care about.  Let’s look at the GooberNation.  I started with Dorman for the bios, so I’ll let the lady go first this time out of sake for fairness.

Mary Fallin

Her website still lists implementing Common Cores under her achievements.  I’m sure this will be rectified at the next Paint yourself Redder Fundraiser Dinner but as of now it is touted as an achievement before it wasn’t.  I’ve gone over the line by line of Fallin’s education accomplishments in my profile post, so I won’t bore with the details.  And since a lot of the above is about her since she is a sitting governor, I will just close with this: Fallin is the chair of the NGA.  She sat over the roll out and a major part of the implementation.  She was a champion for it before it became an issue of partisan politics.  I simply cannot trust someone on an issue if it seems like their political strategy comes before their individual idea of what is right and wrong.  That is the most troubling thing about her as a candidate.  This politics-first mentality seems disingenuous and contrary to the character I look for in a leader.

Joe Dorman

As Ryan Gentzler pointed out, when I talked about Dorman’s platform, I gave him the short end of the stick on education.  I will admit to that.  It was done on purpose, however, because my goal was to use each candidates website to describe their plan (because I doubt even most informed constituents do much more unless they have a vested interest) and Dorman links his education plan off of his platform.  In this section, I’m going to go over that in more detail.

Dorman, like Fallin, does not believe in the Common Core.  He believes that a one-size-fits-all approach is not appropriate for education.  I tend to disagree here.  He is implying that the entire country (hell, maybe someday planet) having the same benchmarks is the same as requiring everyone to teach those in the same ways.  Teaching methods will vary state to state, let alone classroom by classroom, but that doesn't mean that a kid in Oklahoma doesn't need to know the exact same things as a kid in California (or Sweden, besides Swedish) because they will be competing for the same jobs.

Dorman wants to raise revenue for schools and give it a dedicated stream out of touch of politicians.  This is good news as schools need guaranteed funding, but I wonder where the funding is planned to come from.

Dorman wants to move away from traditional testing companies in favor of using the ACT as a standard of measure for all of Oklahoma's juniors.  This seems like a good thing because he wants to use the money that we spend on testing to fully fund all of Oklahoma's juniors to take the test and use the leftover for test prep.  This to me says that we will move away from teaching to a test to (you guessed it!) teaching to a test...  at least this test is required by many colleges and may convince those unsure of a college future to apply since they have one less step (although it may be too little, too late as progressive colleges are moving away from standardized test scores since they favor the "affluent").  The plan also allows for senior retesting if scores lag.

Other testing changes include an emphasis on thoughtful testing for special needs students and a pre and post test to replace the high stakes 3rd grade test.

Dorman coins the term "Fal-esi" (Fallin - Barresi) to talk about their failed educational policies.  This scores a lot of points with me and I'd love to see this and the flip-flop comments stick with voters.  Dorman likely has my vote if it comes down to this issue alone.  I'm less disturbed by his education initiatives because he at least has them.