“Here I Stand, I Can Do No Other”

No, Warriors, I haven’t confused two historic figures. Yes, the picture you see is Joan of Arc. The title you read is a hat tip to Martin Luther as he nailed his 95 Points on that church door so long ago. If you have been following me long on my blog, or on social media, you know I have long identified with Joan’s fierceness. As far as Martin’s boldness? Yes, I’m about to go there.

A Certain Recent Release:

The President has recently released his 2018 Federal Budget Blueprint. It’s creating quite a buzz. You also know that in past federal budget releases, I’ve also gone over them.
In-depth and not unwilling to expose the alignment to the CCSS Machine.

The reality that the current President has promised to rid us of Common Core and yet padded the Administration with pro CCSS members, certainly has given us pause.

Trump’s promise for more jobs should also give us pause. Why? With the distinct presence of WIOA (Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act), ESSA (Every Student Succeeds), HEA (Higher Education Act); the federal money in place right NOW funneling through each of these; the CCSS Machine up to its neck in all 3, we need to be pointing to the same priorities:

a) Workforce based education IS here, playing out daily. It plays out not only through Common Core, but Career Tech Education, STEM, Next Gen, and so many other areas.
b) It’s playing out in employment centers, community colleges, our public-private partnerships, job development programs, and so many other places.
c) It comes in the form of SEL (social, emotional learning), CBE (competency based education), PBLs (project based learning), and constant over assessments for skills to meet some business’s idea of what a human should be able to do.

For the President to rid us of ‘Common Core’, he needs to be ready to rid us of ALL the connections. Think how many times we’ve heard and said, ‘follow the money’.

Since D.C. is a favored conduit of the CCSS Machine, we know a lot of evidence is waiting to be exposed. Federal budgets have lots of money…and lots of evidence we can trace.

Every day we hesitate, the more ingrained the CCSS Machine becomes in the new Administration. Warriors, we saw the CCSS Machine take up residence in D.C. during the previous Administration. The Machine is STILL there.

Warriors, do not simply look at the Blueprint’s ‘Dept. of Education’ budget items. Read the WHOLE thing.

I wish I could tell you that the CCSS presence has been eliminated with Mr. Trump’s Blueprint. It hasn’t.

Flummox Awaits Us:

(*Note: ‘flummox’ is an old word for being bewildered or perplexed.)

Flummox #1): So, in Trump’s Blueprint, did ‘Common Core’ get the axe? Not by name. There were some things involving CCSS, but not too many. Warriors, eliminating CCSS in one area (no matter how huge), means it survives elsewhere.

Flummox #2): Did the Dept. of Ed receive cuts? Yes, but are those cuts enough? That, my Warriors, remains to be seen.

Flummox #3): While the President’s Blueprint is not the entire Federal Budget,the word ‘blueprint’ suggests that what the President wants may be changed by Congress.

When will “We the People” get to see the entire 2018 federal budget? What other CCSS Machine ties will be revealed when We see it? Will We have time to influence Congress or will it be too late?

 A First Glance At The Blueprint:

Mr. Trump has identified (in the opening pages of the Blueprint) that the following federally funded activities/groups/services will be eliminated if his Budget requests are approved.

I’ve researched each of of these and have proven their CCSS ties. I’ve provided the previous published articles so you can go back and read just how deep those CCSS ties go. We’ll need to know which groups will be spinning the pro-CCSS rhetoric in the coming days.)

National Endowment of the Humanities  

National Endowment of the Arts 

PBS (proof) *Note: be sure to scroll down to see PBS’s embedding in ESSA.

Institute of Library and Museum Services *Note: there are at least 2 other related articles mentioned in this one. Find them here and here.
We should also note the question posed in the ‘Services’ article. If local areas cannot match federal funds, services like your libraries will close.

Woodrow Wilson International Center of Scholars (my article delved into the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Program. Both are under the same logo.) In the Blueprint, it is unclear how and if the International funding cut will impact the entire Woodrow Wilson organization.

21st Century Community Learning Centers *Note: of the many articles surrounding 21stCCLCs, this is probably the most relevant considering the Blueprint.

Be sure to see the other connections you’ll also see in the Blueprint. Also remember, Warriors, 21st CCLCs are codified in ESSA. Will Trump’s elimination of CCSS, repeal ESSA?!

Blueprint Agency Items “I Can Do No Other With”:

Martin Luther’s passion for truth and his boldness for making the evidence public drove him to state the declaration you see above. I like that boldness. While he found 95 pieces of evidence for action,  I’ve been able to identify 85 Concerns in the President’s Blueprint.  Here is the link to my special Guide detailing them.

To use the Guide, simply open the link. All red highlighted words will have several of my previously published articles which directly relate to each of the Agencies in the Blueprint.

Use the research to help you formulate your dissent to seeing MORE Common Core (and all its related entities) continued in the 2018 Budget!

Use any of the research to help you create a way to help remind the President of his campaign promise to rid us of Common Core. To rid us of the name only, solves nothing.

Lastly, share the Guide, as you see fit. Knowledge about the CCSS Machine is what keeps us powerful. We should be making as much of a protest about the Blueprint as we did about the new Secretary of Education’s confirmation.

No, we should be making MORE noise. We should demand a full repeal of any and all federal activity overreaching into education.

Warriors, it will take MORE than alerting the Oval Office with our priorities. We need to be ‘nailing these points to Congress’s doors. We need to be shouting these pieces of evidence boldly.

Warriors, we must do all of this. To do less, is something we should not permit. To take a ‘wait and see’ attitude could be dangerous to our fellow citizens.
Why? The federal budget impacts every age group, not a select few. With so much of the CCSS Machine still in our education, we must be a modern day Martin Luther of Joan of Arc.