Common Core State Standards Initiative - Case Study Example

Common core standard of education is a danger to children Introduction The Common Core State Standards (CCSS) was introduced as a measure to ensure that all students in the United States would receive the same experience in mathematics and English, so that the high school graduates can have a standardized level of knowledge that would enable them secure basic employment opportunities (Rycik, 2014). Nevertheless, while this goal is noble and laudable, the major problem arising from this initiative is the conflict it creates between the expectations and the reality of its implementation. To start with, the parents and the students are upset and concerned about the numerous tests that the students have to take under this initiative. On the other hand, the Common core standard initiative conflicts the teachers instructional training that the teachers received during their teaching preparation training. This makes it difficult for the teachers to adjust to the new instructional requirement under the Common core standard (Sewall, 2014). Thus, this discussion seeks to assess the dangers that the Common core standard of education presents to children. The issue was selected because it is a nationwide concern for all educational stakeholders; parents, teachers, students and the employers have issues related to the overall impact of the introduction of the Common core standard on the high school graduate abilities and skills to cope with the requirements of the outside world (Exstrom & Thatcher, 2014). The discussion will first define the Common core standard problem, and then venture into the analysis of the available literature and studies that have explored the need, justification, benefits and dangers posed by the educational initiative to the students. Finally, the discussion will conclude with giving the suggestion for improvement. However, it can easily be concluded that the Common core standard poses some educational danger to school children. Discussion Statement of the Problem The need to adapt to the global working environment cannot be ignored at this time and age where globalization has made it essential for employment preparation and training to be shaped such that it does not only suit the local environment, but also the global working environment (Rycik, 2014). Thus, the establishment of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) was a necessary move towards aligning the elementary and the high school education in the United States to match with the college education and the work expectations of the top performing countries globally (Boslaugh, 2014). Thus, the students were required to undergo the learning and practicing of rigorous content laced with high-order skills, so that students can graduate with clear and understandable skills that are commensurate with the global society requirements. Thus, the Common Core State Standards is an education initiative that was introduced into the American education system based on the success in other countries, but was never scrutinized and given public inquest to understand the likely benefits and the dangers that this form of education standard posed to the American educational system (Sewall, 2014). More profoundly, the states had only two months during a summer holiday to assess the introduction of the Common Core State Standards and then recommend for its implementation, thus limiting the public and other educational stakeholders’ engagement in the process (Exstrom & Thatcher, 2014). The consequence has now come in the form of the numerous challenges and misinterpretations that the new initiative has received from the different education stakeholders, most especially the parents and the conservative educationists, who are of the opinion that classical education imparted unlimited knowledge, skills and values of human art, language, music, history and logic to students (Murphy, 2014). On the contrary, the Common Core State Standards based education is being interpreted as a move by the political elite to control the education sector, owing to the fact that colleges are being required to align their intakes with the Common Core State Standards model of testing. This, according to those opposed to the Common Core State Standards education system, is an initiative that seeks to control and shape the minds and souls of the students in a certain dimension, since once the political regime is able to control the educational curriculum, then; it is able to control the lives of the future generations (Wallender2014). Thus, the conservative educationists are of the view that the down fall of America does not start with a lowly-informed voter, but rather with a no-critical-knowledge student (Rycik, 2014). Thus, owing to the fact that the Common Core State Standards seeks to standardize the nature of skills and knowledge that students can receive, it is apparent that critical thinking and diverse knowledge gaining has been restricted for the American school children, which spells a disaster for the future of the nation. In this respect, the Common Core State Standards is a relevant subject for analysis, owing to the present and future implications it holds on the state of the nation. Literature Review The core of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) education initiative is to establish social justice, which is built on the pillars of fairness and diversity, owing to the fact that grouping students on the basis of their academic ability is bad for their self-esteem (Murphy, 2014). Therefore, the establishment of a system that does not divide students along this line is healthy for the educational system. However, the implementation of the “college-ready” students, who are also “career ready”, based on untested educational theories has become disruptive to the traditional classic educational system (Sewall, 2014). According to (Wallender, 2014), the major justification for the establishment of the Common Core State Standards is to standardize the quality of education throughout the United States, such that the students leaving high school are trained and prepared in a similar manner to join colleges p.8. However, this position has been sharply criticized by the opponents of the Common Core State Standards, who do not dispute the need for the preparation of all students for college based on the same platform, but on the mode of implementation of the objective. The major weakness identifiable in Common Core State Standards is that it is build on the premise of restricting students from learning classic fictional literature, and instead requiring the adoption of more non-fictional texts in the school curriculum (Rycik, 2014). This has been seen as method of eroding the eroding the essence of classic literature in schools, which is to create the love for reading, through the presentation of a diverse nature of storytelling that interests students and motivate them to read. Therefore, the outcome of this restriction is that the students produced through the Common Core State Standards curriculum will be academic-oriented students with no creative thinking skills, which are developed through the student’s mind interaction with diverse fictional literature (Exstrom & Thatcher, 2014). Thus, the overall consequence of the Common Core State Standards is that it aims at training students for future static jobs, without instilling a sense of creativity in the students, which would advance the future course of the student’s life, even amidst employment challenges (Sewall, 2014). The other benefit that has been peddled as the basis of the introduction of the Common Core State Standards is the benefit of introducing quality education to all students, while enhancing education rigorousness for all students (Wallender, 2014). There is no doubt that with standardized system of education where the students are not based on their capabilities but rather on a standard format of ensuring that all of the students are equal, education rigorousness will be increased. However, it is the benefit of increased rigorousness in education that delivers low critical and logic skills to the students that remains doubtful (Sewall, 2014). The Common Core State Standards has changed the education curriculum such that students will be required to forfeit running certain basic mathematical skills such as computation, algebra, geometry and calculus until later in the final grades of their education (Rycik, 2014). This will simply mean that such students will not have been acquainted with the basics of mathematical knowledge from their early educational lives, which will in turn mean giving such children more difficulties in their future education at college degree and postgraduate levels. Such students will be prompted to leave their education at lower levels, since they cannot cope with the knowledge and skills requirements of higher level educational, rendering the whole educational system a counter-productive social development system. Thus, the claim that Common Core State Standards will deliver high quality education to students is entirely faulty and untrue, since it is simply based on untested and questionable philosophies (Exstrom & Thatcher, 2014). The major aim of the Common Core State Standards, as opposed to the claim that it will produce high quality education for students, is to prepare the students for the admission into non-selective community colleges that demands no technical knowledge for students. The Common Core State Standards students are not prepared for practical-based technical universities that teach subjects like chemistry, physics, mathematics, medicine and finance, which will demand technical knowledge on mathematical principles and creativity that will have been eroded by this education initiative (Rycik, 2014). The teaching efficiency is yet another aspect that has been adversely affected by the introduction of the Common Core State Standards. This is because, under the current and also the previous teachers training instructional programs, teachers were not prepared to offer educational instructions that are based on the new Common Core test-based education standards (Boslaugh, 2014). Therefore, there is a high likelihood that teachers will not be able to deliver the educational instructions effectively, which then means that students will be left at a cross-road. The students will be left not knowing what they are supposed to know under the new curriculum initiative. At the same time, they will have lost on the substantial knowledge they would have benefited from, if the teachers instructed them under the traditional system of education (Sewall, 2014). Thus, the Common Core State Standards initiative will simply disadvantage the students from the efficiency of educational instructions they would have received from their teachers. The breach of autonomy of education is yet another problem that arises from the implementation of the Common Core State Standards, since the states and parents have lost their voice in shaping the educational needs of their children (Murphy, 2014). The Common Core State Standards seeks to standardize the educational system throughout the United States, such that all the states will adapt a similar curriculum that erodes the traditional diversity of education in the USA, which has always incubated and bred creativity and innovation amongst the students, due to exposure to different forms of education knowledge and skills (Wallender, 2014). In this respect, it would never matter where the students seek to advance their knowledge and skills in education, since all states would be offering the same content starting from the elementary through to the college education. Thus, the capacity to diversify the educational knowledge has been killed with the introduction of the new educational initiative, while the states’ autonomy for education has also been violated (Sewall, 2014). The overall effect is the development of a future generation that cannot diversify ideas in creating solutions to local problems. The breach of privacy of students is yet another major problem associated with the Common Core State Standards initiative (Exstrom & Thatcher, 2014). This is because; the new educational initiative requires students’ data to be kept and submitted to the federal educational department for the different races in schools, including the personal data such as age, disciplinary history, health-care data among other fundamental requirements (Wallender, 2014). The effect of such data collection by the educational department is to create a database that will be applied to discriminate the students in employment or other social benefits, based on their past educational histories such as the disciplinary history (Sewall, 2014). Thus, while the new educational initiative is targeting to benefit all the students equally in matters of college admission and career preparation, it will in the end result in discriminatory consequences in the future for the same students it sought to benefit. Conclusion The Common Core State Standards is an educational initiative that was introduced to offer all the students in the United States similar English and mathematics experience, so that they would be equally prepared for college admission and consequent careers. Despite the noble intentions that this educational initiative had, its implementation theory has resulted in situations where the state authorities, parents and students are aggrieved, since they have lost their educational autonomy to the federal educational department, which is controlling the nationwide education through the standardized curriculum. Loss of privacy for students, disorientation of the teachers’ instructional efficiency, low quality education and lack of student creativity are just some of the dangers that the Common Core State Standards poses for the American educational system. Thus, if the noble intentions of creating equality, fairness and social justice through education are to be created, the implementation of the Common Core State Standards should not be on the basis of abolishing fictional classic literature or basic mathematical principles from being taught in schools. References Boslaugh, S.E. (2014). Common Core State Standards Initiative. Salem Press Encyclopedia. Exstrom, M. & Thatcher, D. (2014). Common Core: Put to the Test. State Legislatures 40(8), 22. Murphy, T. (2014). Tragedy of the Common Core. Mother Jones, 39(5), 36-68. Rycik, J. A. (2014). Support Continues to Erode for Common Core Standards and Assessments. American Secondary Education, 42(3), 52-54. Sewall, A. M. (2014). Common Core State Standards: Impact on Higher Education and Libraries. Journal Of Library Administration, 54(4), 337-346. Wallender, J. (2014). The Common Core State Standards in American Public Education: Historical Underpinnings and Justifications. Delta Kappa Gamma Bulletin, 80(4), 7-11. Read More