South St. Louis County News

St. Louis Call Newspapers

South St. Louis County News

St. Louis Call Newspapers

South St. Louis County News

St. Louis Call Newspapers

Reader raises questions about new Common Core State Standards

To the editor:

I read the recent article by Staff Reporter Gloria Lloyd stating that educators were “surprised” about the objections to the new Common Core State Standards.

She proceeded to report a diatribe of “changes,” mostly different ages at which materials will be taught to children. I will not argue with Ms. Lloyd about these so called “standards,” except to say that teaching children something at an earlier age is not necessarily an improvement in standards.

Children develop physically and mentally at different ages. Some children will grasp information and assimilate it at a later age, but nevertheless become competent in that area of knowledge.

The questions I have are related to the 400 data points of information that will be collected on each child in the Common Core program. I will name just a few and refer to the Common Core Standards Initiative Data Mining put out by the federal Office of Education Technology, 2012, Pages 9 to 91, about tracking students from kindergarten to age 20. There is information related to extensive data mining procedures including “galvanic skin response,” blood pressure and pulse to evaluate students’ frustration levels.

This section refers to “wearable sensors and MRI imaging” — Page 32 in Promoting Grit and Tenacity. I think most parents would prefer to promote their own children’s’ grit and tenacity. This information will be collected by bracelets worn by our children, TV monitors in the classroom and, ultimately, MRI technology.

Really? What will be done with this type of data?

The National Center for Science in Education will be needing to link this data by exchanging information across agencies. I refer to the Quality Campaign Linking Data across Agencies, Page 3.

Since Department of Education head Arnie Duncan removed seven points from the Family Education Right to Privacy Act or FERPA, that allowed parents to consent for release of their child’s information, who exactly is going to see our children’s information?

Many children have psychological and emotional problems at a young age and go on to become highly intelligent and productive human beings. Albert Einstein never spoke a word until he was 4 years old. Is the government really going to predict which children will be successful and in what areas they will succeed?

Here is my last question: Why would government agencies and the Department of Education need to know about health care history, religious affiliation, nicknames, family voting status, gestational age of students at birth, race, fingerprints, DNA sequence, facial characteristics and handwriting, etc.? I refer to FERPA, Page 4.

Please explain exactly how this information will be used? Do you really think that anyone can accurately predict human behavior and human capabilities?

Do you really think the federal government and the Department of Education are reliable stewards of our children’s private information? Do you trust them to make predictions about the future abilities of our children? I say no; they are not and they cannot. And furthermore, I would like to see extensive private information about the people collecting information and making predictions about our children.

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