Anti Fed Ed Warriors, for years AND in spite of whatever political party is in charge, we’ve gotten pretty much NOWHERE near ending the grasp of those educratic, sold out leaders to the CCSS Machine in relation to our citizens.
What we HAVE gotten in exchange is a bunch of U.S. Constitution dishonoring laws, policies, and farces.
Amendment 13 was written to end slavery, yet, as the Progressive/Technocratic modern education reform has been playing out, more and more students, teachers, and education leaders of all ages are being enslaved to mind numbing workforce training!
Amendment 14 was written to throw out any Congress member or other federal leader for insurrection against the Constitution.
The entire education reform IS an insurrection against America!
Let’s not forget that what happens at the Federal level makes it way down to the State level as long as the States ignore the 10th Amendment!!
A Fighting Back Tool:
Warriors, if you already listened to the FPE Media “Alternative Education in the Crosshairs” Segment 1’s discussion of the lies being spun about the shift in education FROM academics TO workforce training, then you’ll know I cited HR5587 and S3271.
These pieces of legislation were expressly FOR increasing the amount of workforce based/competency geared education for ALL educational choices.
Today, I’m tackling two of them in an update.
Trickery, Process, or, Both?
As per the legislative process, at the end of each Congressional session, no pending business is left on the table. So, when the new Congress convened in January 2017, it was a fresh start. That BOTH Chambers rebrand older versions of bills or update them, is nothing new.
What has Congress done to HR5587 and S3271? It is important to note that their newer versions weren’t released until AFTER our Series was published.
The Bills:
HR5587 (Strengthening Career and Technical Education for the 21st Century) and its ‘sister’ S3271 (Workforce Advance Act).
In 2016 I laid each of these (and a few more) out for your information bank of anti Fed Ed Warrior ‘weapons’.
So, what changes/updates have HR5587 and S3271 seen?
Check out this excerpt from the ACTE’s “CTE Policy Watch” in the screen shot below in regards to HR5587.
Wow, 5587’s name remained!
Only the bill number (and a few other small changes) will be revised. So, what are those ‘small’ changes? I’d like to point out the yet-to-numbered version is 97 pages long.
The first change I saw was a word play game. (a very worn out CCSS Machine tactic)
For example, on Page 4, “by striking ‘‘academic and career and technical skills’’ and inserting ‘‘academic knowledge and technical and employability skills’’; B) by inserting ‘‘and programs of study’’ after ‘‘technical education programs’’; (2) in paragraph (3), by striking “including tech prep education’’; and (3) in paragraph (4), by inserting ‘‘and programs of study’’ after ‘‘technical education programs’’.
By removing ‘including’, education’s shift to that of a worker skilled based one is undeniable.
How so? The only amount of academics remaining will directly be related to your career tracked CTE courses.
Other noticeable changes to HR5587:
A shift from 5 occupational tracks to 3 tracks
That aligned ‘challenging academic state standards’ must be present at the post-secondary level of education in your State
‘In demand industry skills’ will be given top priority in education
Crenditialing will replace Associate degrees and other such certificates in some instances
The increasingly popular education ‘fix all tool’: pay for success formulas for States.
The rest of HR5587 remains (for example: the early college programs; dual enrollment; middle school career explorations, etc.) Most especially: CTE Concentrators and Participants (meaning teachers, students, schools, and partnerships between education and business).
The Senate HELP Committee 5/3/17 introduced S1004 “Perkins Fund for Equity and Excellence”. From all appearances, S1004 replaced S3271. According to Congress.gov’s website, S3271 is still in the HELP’s possession..dormant. Does that mean the content of S3271 went away, too? Not in a ‘New York minute’.
You’ll still find the CCSS Machine’s rhetoric concerning the value of competency based education. You’ll still spot the ‘need’ to ‘redesign high schools’ as well as ‘support CTE innovation’ without a need to remediate students.
How?! “equitable access to rigorous, engaging, and relevant real world education through partnerships with business and industry and higher education that prepare students to graduate from high school and enroll into postsecondary education… with the ability to use knowledge to solve complex problems, think critically, communicate effectively, collaborate with others, and develop academic mindsets.”
S1004 will also encompass those outside the public, traditional classrooms.
In the screen shot below, note the highlighted sentences and phrases. ESSA (Every Student Succeeds Act) embedded ‘region specific education’. WIOA (Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act) contains the STANDARDS (as cited in ESSA) by which States are to align all learning/teaching. Lastly, let’s remember that one of the CCSS’s rebrands for nationally aligned Standards was/is “College/Career Readiness”!!
Warriors, as was pointed out in our Series, these federal laws and bills are written to link each other like gears and cogs. This is fitting considering the CCSS Machine is grinding our nation down.
Other S1004 important notes:
Skill based assessments will not go away
Funding for States will be up for increase/decrease depending on the conformity level of participation by each State
Workforce Development Boards at the State level will continue to increase
Increased presence of corporate America in the classrooms and resources (for all age groups/education ‘choices’)
Wrap-around services, including SEL (social emotional learning)
The Secretary of Education (DeVos) will get an increase in power as well
Power Is A Dangerous Thing:
Finding yet another piece of proposed legislation giving the U.S. Secretary of Education (regardless who that person is)more power is proof our Congress has no clue, or doesn’t care, that NO federal intrustion into education should be happening!! It definitely feels like a trick.
So, here’s what I found on DeVos and CTE.
1) U.S. News and World Reports’ Opinion page stated (Dec. 2016) that DeVos should have CTE high on her priority list. The author even titled the piece ‘A New Race to the Top’. (a side note here: I wonder if the author realized the U.S. Dept. of Labor already has this in place for CTE via the WQDI (Workforce Quality Data Initiative). In the article, P-Tech (already in place in NY) is mentioned, as is the Western MI Avation Academy.
2) Advance CTE’s website includes Western MI Avation Academy AND DeVos’s testimony before the Senate HELP Committee here.
In her HELP testimony she stated students SHOULD have CTE. Her exact words: “students really need to have a full menu of options,” including “technical schools, community colleges [and] apprenticeships.” (by the way, this fits with her ‘school choice’ belief)
3) DeVos is also pushing STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) as part of the way America can have more connections to CTE. This makes sense when you factor in how much STEM is embedded in WIOA, ESSA, HEA, and the STEM Act.
4) DeVos was joined by a Trump family member pushing STEM back in March 2017.
More Tricks:
Warriors, my good friend Deb Gerry Herbage writes a blog named “Exposed!”. She recently had a post where you’ll find out other tricks and lies we’ve been sold/told by the CCSS Machine member group, AIR, Inc. You’ll see how she found the States involvement in these lies, too. I urge you to read it.
You’ll also want to consider this screen shot from an AIR, Inc. 2015 publication. Then apply this evidence to the updates in both HR5587’s update and S1004:
Closing:
Warriors, have no fear! Regardless of the countless tricks the CCSS Machine dishes out, I am confident we will be swift in exposing the word games, number changes, and anything else coming down the pike. I will keep digging to see what other changes Congress isn’t openly sharing.
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