Tech Thursday: Recapping Higher Ed CTE/CCSS

For today’s “Tech Thursday” article, I’ll be recapping some of my past anti CCSS/Career Tech Ed (CTE)/CCR (College Career Readiness) articles. Why? New followers who don’t have much information about Adult CCSS have been requesting help. Helping new warriors? I’m on it!

A Beginning:

Not long before we were saddled with Common Core Standards (I leave the ‘States’ out from time to time when writing. The States had nothing to do with CCS), a plan hatched by the PCAST team (President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology). The plan? Creating more science and tech jobs. The means? Common Core Standards. The report was released so close to the rollout, language in the document stated carrying out the jobs agenda via the CCS. The date? 2010 The title of the report? The official title of the report is “Report to the President, Prepare & Inspire K-12 Education in STEM for America’s Future” The original article has the pdf for you to download, a bullet point list of all kinds of educational overhaul you’ll want to refer to. See: https://www.commoncorediva.com/2014/09/02/from-the-files-pcast-stem-and-common-core/

If you’d like an example of STEM woven into a state’s Workforce Training (ie CTE, CCR), check out my article about the STEM edcation waivers (thanks to Race to the Top). https://www.commoncorediva.com/2014/12/02/wybi-wednesday-rttt-stem-ed-waivers-and-more/

A Pause:

Wait a minute above it says K-12? I thought this was about College/Career Readiness, etc. If you new to the fight against CCSS, you’ll be glad to know that CCSS not only was the vehicle of choice for STEM, but it’s being used as the vehicle for CCR Standards, too. And to think, CCSS is a brain child of P3s, not educators. CCSS is in complete violation of the 10th Amendment to the U.S. Constiutution AND 3 federal education laws! (my very first post has the education laws and how CCSS violates them. See: https://www.commoncorediva.com/2014/08/30/welcome-introduction/ )

Adult CC Standards:

Post Secondary Common Core was always a part of big idea in aligning American education. To assume it ends at 12th grade is a mistake. Back in 2013, the U.S. Dept of Vocational Education published a report. The gist was because there hadn’t been cohesive Adult Standards before then, aligning them was a good thing. What’s of interest is some of the very same CCS writers were on board for writing the Adult version! Meaning anyone from community college to a 4 year higher learning institution would be in the sights of more alignment via CCS. You’ll really want to see how much better these aligned standards are than the previous ones. See: https://www.commoncorediva.com/2014/09/04/common-core-after-high-school-reality-check/

An example of how Adult Common Core can impact your state’s post secondary education? NC’s is a great one! See: https://www.commoncorediva.com/2015/01/20/ftf-tuesday-career-readiness-and-data/

HR5’s Claim on Post Secondary CCS and Your Students:

Because post secondary education has students of all ages and all educational backgrounds, it is a fallacy to assume that coming from somewhere CCS wasn’t taught into a CCSS aligned school, your students won’t be impacted. They absolutely will! It is happening on a daily basis as we speak. So, the ‘acclaimed’ HR5 (Student Success Act) made sure (buried in the bill, of course) that CTE (Career Tech Ed) would be embedded. If you’ve not read the text of the bill (it’s a doozy, over 600 pages). You’ll want to see pages 113 and 280. You’ll also want to see each reference to the Perkins Funding and/or IDEA funding. See my article from earlier this year will all the information and links related to this impending nail in education’s coffin.

Related information: Since we have all kinds of educational choices in America, have you ever wondered HOW those students outside a more traditional approach are defined? Yes, the U.S. Dept. of Education has even defined what ‘alternative’ education means. However, with the snares and mandates of HR5, how would your non traditional students fare? See: https://www.commoncorediva.com/2014/12/03/tech-thursday-career-techcommon-core-and-alternative-education/

To see the over 200 businesses and organizations wanting to see HR5 succeed, visit: http://opportunitynation.org/latest-news/dear-congress-a-letter-from-200-businesses-and-organizations1/

Lastly:

I have been asked by Women on the Wall to speak twice on a national phone in conference call about Common Core in post secondary education. I’ve provided both links for you here so you can access not only the information I shared, but the information from other experts as well. The first interview was in late 2014. The most recent one was a few weeks ago.
2014’s: https://soundcloud.com/alice-linahan/woman-on-the-wall-conference-call-with-lynne-taylor-and-mary-bowen

2015’s: https://soundcloud.com/alice-linahan/wow-conference-call-with-common-core-diva-lynne-taylor-on-workforce-development