REPEAL THE CORE CURRICULUM

STANDARDS FOR OKLAHOMA

SUPPORT HB1714
 What are Core Curriculum
Standards or CCS?
National academic standards for English/language arts and math

Adopted by Oklahoma State Board of Education in June of 2010

To be integrated by Oklahoma teachers in their curriculum over

the next 4 years.

The Priority Academic Student Skills, or PASS, fully

implemented in Oklahoma in 2003 will become obsolete.
 Misconceptions about CCS

Misconception #1. National standards and tests will make US

students more competitive with their global counterparts.

While the countries that outperform the US on international

tests have national standards, so do most of those countries that
score lower than the US.

http://www.heritage.org/Research/Reports/2010/05/Why-National-Standards-Won-t-
Fix-American-Education-Misalignment-of-Power-and-Incentives#_ftnref20
 Misconceptions about CCS

Misconception #2. National standards are necessary so that

parents can understand how their children’s academic
achievement compares to that of other students across the
country.

The meaningful information that parents and other taxpayers

need is already available. If access to the information is
inadequate, that does not justify a national standards and testing
regime.
http://www.heritage.org/Research/Reports/2010/05/Why-National-Standards-Won-t-
Fix-American-Education-Misalignment-of-Power-and-Incentives#_ftnref20
 Misconceptions about CCS
Misconception #3. National standards are necessary because
state standards vary in quality.

Teachers union pressure, pervasive political correctness, and

pedagogical and content disputes hamper the quality of state
standards and could equally plague national standards as well.

Centralized standards and testing would eliminate the possibility

of competitive pressure for increasing standards of excellence. Is
uniformity or excellence more important in the national
standards movement?
http://www.heritage.org/Research/Reports/2010/05/Why-National-Standards-Won-t-
Fix-American-Education-Misalignment-of-Power-and-Incentives#_ftnref20
 Can national standards and
testing systems make a
considerable difference?

Yes! They empower the federal government.

http://www.heritage.org/Research/Reports/2010/05/Why-National-Standards-Won-t-
Fix-American-Education-Misalignment-of-Power-and-Incentives#_ftnref20
Will CCS Empower Parents &
Other Taxpayers?
No. Centralized standard-setting would force parents and other
taxpayers to relinquish one of their most powerful tools for
school improvement: control of the academic content, standards,
and testing through their state and local policymakers.

It is unclear that national standards would establish a target of

excellence rather than standardization, a uniform tendency
toward mediocrity and information that is more useful to
bureaucrats who distribute funding than it is to parents who are
seeking to direct their children’s education.
http://www.heritage.org/Research/Reports/2010/05/Why-National-Standards-Won-t-
Fix-American-Education-Misalignment-of-Power-and-Incentives#_ftnref20
 “Federal School Support”
means . . .

Centralized allocation of resources -or- “spread the wealth” goes

to school.

The kind of comparable data that a national test would supply

would help to provide equalization of resources among schools.
Equal spending has not resulted in raising student achievement.

http://www.heritage.org/Research/Reports/2010/05/Why-National-Standards-Won-t-
Fix-American-Education-Misalignment-of-Power-and-Incentives#_ftnref20
 Don’t we need to take
advantage of Federal money?
At face value, this appears to be a push for higher standards. In reality, some states have dumbed
down their definition of proficiency on state tests in the interest of receiving federal funds. Federal
funding is an incentive that can trump interest in actual progress on student outcomes. http://
www.heritage.org/Research/Reports/2010/05/Why-National-Standards-Won-t-Fix-American-Education-
Misalignment-of-Power-and-Incentives#_ftnref20

No Child Left Behind led to the dumbing down of many state standards and very little improvement
in student outcomes. http://boston.com/community/blogs/rock_the_schoolhouse/2010/11/

Oklahoma should not give up its authority over education in exchange for temporary federal money,
especially when we have lost the Race To the Top Grant and will get no Federal money for the
adoption of CCS. Implementation of CCS has been estimated in the millions of dollars for some
states. Where will Oklahoma find this funding? http://www.dailynews.com/ipinions/ci_17168645
How will CCS Affect Teachers?

The national assessments that arise from the CCS will drive what
teachers teach on a daily basis. Many schools now tie individual
student scores directly to teachers’ contracts/pay/rehiring. To
survive, teachers will be forced to “teach to the test”.

Why is teaching to the test such a bad idea? Its not, if you prefer
for Washington to control what teachers teach and what children
learn rather than local officials and parents.
 Can’t we just make our own
changes to the CCS?
Not really. As passed and enrolled, SB2033 stipulates that the
CCS cannot be modified more than 15% of the total curriculum.
If the CCS are decided to be not as rigorous as first thought and
are modified beyond that 15%, there could be a very real
possibility of our State Department of Education being in
violation of their own school law.

Did you realize that we have yet to see the CCS? How can we be
sure we wouldn’t want to change more than 15% if we have never
seen the curriculum?
 What Can We Do Now?

We need to repeal the CCS before we have

spent the money to implement them and
before it will cost the state to repeal them!
Support HB1714 - Repeal the Core
Curriculum Standards for Oklahoma