LETTER FROM
THE EDITOR
HUFFINGTON
02.02.14
Cracks in
the Core
N THIS WEEK’S ISSUE, Joy Resmovits
looks at how our new
national education
standards came to be, and explains why the system is only now
showing cracks.
The Common Core State Standards Initiative set out to make
sure American public school students are learning the proper
skills to help them compete in a
global economy. This meant establishing guidelines for schools
in every state — from placing a
greater emphasis on fractions and
fluency in arithmetic to assigning
more non-fiction texts.
“The standards were quietly
drafted and implemented over
ART STREIBER
I
the last five years by a relatively
small group of experts and officials around the country and with
limited public input,” Joy writes,
noting that only about a third of
Americans are even aware of the
Common Core. “This meant the
process went fairly smoothly —
initially, creators were able to secure the backing of 48 governors,
from red and blue states alike.”
Now that the program has
been implemented in 45 states,
however, it has drawn critics of all stripes. Some say the
new standards are too rigorous, others say they’re not rig-
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