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Your Voice Deserves to Be Heard And Respected.
Ever since 2009, when Idaho first joined the Common Core State Standards Initiative, Idaho parents have been requesting an open discussion with the State Board of Education regarding the state’s choice to adopt this initiative through administrative rules. After the administrative rules expired this past summer, numerous concerned parents signed petitions to request public hearings to be held in their counties to address new rules. To their excitement, the State Board of Education held 4 hearings -- one in Nampa, Twin Falls, Coeur d’Alene, and Idaho Falls. Moms and Dads from across the state came out to express their concerns for the future of their children’s education.
But what came from it?
In the end, many of these parents' valid concerns were ignored. Those that spoke out against the standards were labeled as chronically unhappy, content standards hating, tin-foil-hat-wearing, conspiracy-theory extremists.
Even worse, their concerns for the future of our education system were labeled as unimportant or invalid.
As a parent, grandparent, future parent, or citizen in Idaho, your valid concerns deserve to be heard and respected by the State Board of Education.
If these parents' concerns were truly invalid, then why are test scores decreasing or remaining stagnant? Shouldn’t we have education standards that help our children excel? These valid points alone are enough for anyone to recognize that changes need to be made to our system.
We have found that Common Core standards are not benefitting our state because….
- They have not produced better education results, instead, they have stayed stagnant or fallen significantly.
- They devalue the input of individual teachers in their work with individual students.
- They are an attempt to centralize education, allowing the federal government to intervene in our state’s education programs.
- They are copyrighted, and Idaho can’t adapt. This requires our state to adopt the standard word for word with the ability to add just 15%.
Idaho, we can do better than this for our children.
We recognize that our teachers need a standard, however, Common Core isn’t it. Over the next few days, you will have another chance to make an impact on the course of Idaho’s public schools for our children’s future. Public hearings will be held at the Idaho State Capitol with the House Education Committee in room EW41. If you are able, we highly encourage you to attend one of these hearings. The details for the three scheduled hearings are as follows:
- English Language Arts Standards: Wednesday 9:00 - 11:00 AM
- Math Standards: Thursday 9:00 - 11:00 AM
- Science Standards: Monday 9:00 - 11:00 AM
Unfortunately, remote testimonies are not scheduled to be allowed. However, if you are not able to attend in person but would like to still leave a comment, you can email them to the committee secretary at [email protected]. If you would like to watch the hearings online, they will be available to watch live here.
We sincerely hope you will take a stand and use your voice to ensure these standards get the review they deserve. Idaho’s children are depending on us to provide the best because they deserve the best.
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