Letter: Remove the shackles of Common Core
Re New Hampshire Board of Education Chairman Tom Raffio’s column, “Anti-Common Core legislation would be a big step backward” (Monitor Forum, Feb. 21): It’s important to understand that the board failed to consider better academic standards when adopting Common Core in 2010.
Raffio claims to support districts like Manchester and Alton, which are working to develop higher and better standards. So why didn’t the state board adopt these better standards for all New Hampshire students?
Raffio fails to mention that Common Core math standards cannot prepare students for science, technology, engineering and math programs because they do not include standards beyond Algebra 2 other than a handful of trigonometry concepts. To qualify for entrance into STEM programs students need pre-calculus and calculus. This is why elite schools, like Phillips Exeter where Gov. Maggie Hassan’s husband is headmaster, will not consider Common Core.
The old Massachusetts standards were among the best, as its students performed at the top of the country. So why didn’t New Hampshire consider these standards? Money. Federal money was offered to states that adopted Common Core.
Massachusetts also abandoned its standards for federal money, but it quickly noticed test scores were dropping. Massachusetts is now reconsidering its decision.
The New Hampshire board adopted Common Core over four weeks in the summer of 2010. The public wasn’t informed. No one testified at hearings. No comparison to better standards was made.
State legislators are working to terminate implementation of these mediocre, untested standards; eliminate a flawed assessment that even Nashua teachers and union leaders are opposing as inappropriate; and reject math standards that leave parents and children confused. New Hampshire has a real opportunity to offer students the best academic standards in the country, but first we must remove the shackles of Common Core.