Who is the extremist here?

News flash to the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC)...no one likes common core.  The "advocacy group" recently released a report criticizing conservative opposition to common core curriculum standards.  SPLC's Maureen Costello stated in an Education Week article that "'you see attacks on the common core first to eventually destroy public education...'"  The article went on to say that the SPLC says "'players in conservative media and policy...are determined to undermine the standards in over-the-top attacks so that the U.S. Department of Education (DOE) can be dismantled, public schools are starved of revenue through the growth of vouchers and tax-credit scholarships, and teacher tenure is ended.'"

 

This position completely ignores the fact that conservatives are just one of the many voices expressing concern about common core state standards.  As a matter of fact, here in Marylandunions and lawmakers are working together to slow down common core.  These are hardly "right-wing" institutions, or even moderate in a state like Maryland.  Nobody likes common core because no one knows how it's supposed to be implemented.  It's just another bureaucratic idea that sounded like a good idea at the time, with no real plan to make it work on the ground.  Kids suffer while the adults figure it out.

 

SPLC's argument that critics of common core are aiming to dismantle public education and the DOE is a ridiculous fallacy and extremist in its own right.  Keep up the pressure folks!  We are winning this debate!