How The Federal Government Cleverly Played A Role In Drafting The Common Core Standards

Oh, the federal government claims they had nothing to do with writing the Standards.  They just paid for them.

But what if one of the lead writers for, say, the ELA Standards also sat on the NAEP (National Assessment of Educational Progress) Governing Board whose members are appointed by the Secretary of Education?

And what if the Governing Board members were deemed to be "federal employees?"

We have discussed Susan Pimentel before.  She was one of the lead ELA Standards writers and a member of the Standards "Work Group."  She was also re-appointed to the NAEP governing board by Arne Duncan in September 2011.

We stated in a previous entry that Susan Pimentel was the Director or Standards Works and Achieve, Inc.

In 1999 she authored the book, "Raising the Standard:  A Eight-Step Guide For Schools And Communities."  In the book she writes about laying the groundwork for lasting school reform because genuine, long-lasting reform grows from the grass-roots.  She lists organizations that can help "guide" the standards such as Achieve and the American Federation of Teachers (AFL-CIO).  

She said, "Ours is a society that thrives on change...Reform is hard work."

Pimentel donated over $22,000 to Democrats in 2012 (mostly to Obama's campaign).  Significantly more than the $4000 donations she made in 2008.

Sneaky.

New York School Principal Promotes Test Prep Company

The Center Moriches High School Principal and President of the Suffolk County Principal Association, Edward Casswell, has been caught promoting a testing company, Method Test Prep, using a school computer in his PUBLIC high school office.

One might wonder what kind of incentive Mr. Casswell or the school received for his glowing, "scripted" endorsement.

The President of Method Test Prep, Tom Ehlers, claims that the school is paid for each student who takes the course.

For the children.....

Enroll America

Obama's only work experience prior to becoming President is that of a community organizer trained in the philosophies of Saul Alinsky.

Once a community organizer...always a community organizer.

And if all Obama knows is community organizing, what would he do if he wanted to facilitate his trademark legislation Obamacare?

You would organize groups in the community like churches, unions or Acorn-style organizations to go out and enroll people.

Like this one:  

Enroll America

Board members include members from Families USA, Teva Pharmaceuticals, Catholic Health Association, National Association of Community Health Centers, Kaiser Permanente, Maryland Citizens Health Initiative, and the American Hospital Association.

Let's look a little closer at a few of these organizations.

Families USA

Board members include L. Toni Lewis from SEIU, Ali Noorani from the National Immigration Forum who is the Godfather of the Utah Compact and has ties to supporting amnesty candidates in Arizona, and Sister Simone Campbell from a group called NETWORK.  Sister Campbell spent the summer of 2012 campaigning for Obama and was even invited to be a guest speaker at the 2012 DNC convention.

Catholic Health Association

The President of the CHA is Sister Carol Keehan.  Sister Keehan was a supporter of Obamacare and even participated in "negotiations" between the White House and the Conference of Catholic Bishops regarding birth control. 

You can read how much Sister Keehan's commitment to Obamacare is worth.

George Soros is known to have funded Catholic groups who will push his global agenda including population control.  


National Association of Community Health Centers

The NACHC Community HealthCorps Navigators

The NACHC donated $7000 to Harry Reid's Searchlight Leadership Fund in 2012.  The group also donated to Sherrod Brown (D-OH), Ben Cardin (D-MD), Bill Keating (D-MA), AmericPac (who donated $10,000 to Ann Kirkpatrick's campaign), The Democratic Party of Montana and the Democrat Congressional Campaign Committee.

Maryland Citizen's Health Initiative

Maryland Citizen's Health Initiative pushed for Obamacare with their slogan "Healthcare for All!" campaign.  Fellow partners included the SEIU, Moveon, Planned Parenthood, UFCW, etc.

Community Organizing.  

It's the New American way.

Could This Be The Common Core Out For Districts?

The National School Board Association who represents over 14,500 districts in the country, sent a letter to Arne Duncan in May 2011 to address their concerns over proposed changes to the Family Education Rights and Privacy (FERPA) law.

By December 2011, the Department of Education and Arne Duncan made the changes.

States were required to sign a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) by mid-2010 and agree to four reforms before they could receive any money from the Race to the Top grant.  One of these reforms included establishing a longitudinal data base.  It was probably assumed that student data would be secure and protected by FERPA.

The DOE then did a bait-and-switch by modifying the FERPA laws to give the government the ability to access and use our children's Personally Identifiable Information (PII) without parental consent and share or sell it to other "authorized representatives" for "educational purposes."

This sounds like a breach of contract and the perfect "out" for local Districts or States.

Some Districts have already started the ball rolling....

The school boards of Rye Neck, Pleasantville, Pelham and Pocantico Hills voted this week to drop out of New York’s participation in the Race to the Top program, hoping they will be able to withhold at least some data from the state. Districts considering doing the same include Dobbs Ferry, Hastings-on-Hudson and South Orangetown.

Bold Alton New Hampshire School Board Votes to Reject Common Core

http://whatiscommoncore.wordpress.com/2013/09/17/bold-alton-new-hampshire-school-board-votes-to-reject-common-core/

**UPDATED**  Another NY district has pulled out.
Spackenkill School District

Arizona Obamacare Navigator Grant Recipients

Feels a lot like Acorn.

Arizona Navigator Grant Recipients include:

1.  Arizona Association of Community Health Centers whose free clinics include:

         Adelante Healthcare  (CEO is on the board of the Greater Phoenix Chamber of Commerce)

         John C Lincoln Healthcare (Greater Phoenix Chamber of Commerce member)

         Tidwell Family Care Center (AKA Clinica Adelante), a migrant health center serving all "residents" of Maricopa County.

The Greater Phoenix Chamber supported Brewer's Medicaid Expansion.  Payback?

Just a reminder of other campaign donations made by the Chamber's Greater Leadership Fund to those who helped ram through the Medicaid expansion.

John McComish

Jeff Dial

Bob Worsley (who enjoyed many donations from healthcare PACs for his campaign)

Steve Yarborough

Republican Victory Fund (Review the Victory Fund/House Victory fraud here)

Republican House Victory

Heather Carter

2.  Arizona Board of Regents (Client of Chuck Coughlin)

3.  Greater Phoenix Urban League

4.  Campesinas Sin Fronteras is associated with AmeriCorp.  What was that Obama said about AmeriCorp?

Then again, Planned Parenthood in NH received $145k as well.

Planned Parenthood of Northern New England 

Anticipated grant amount: $145,161 

Planned Parenthood of Northern New England (PPNNE) is a nonprofit health care provider. 

PPNNE will assist patients and other consumers with understanding new programs, taking 

advantage of consumer protections, and navigating the health insurance system to find the 

most affordable coverage that meets their needs. The organization will primarily serve 

individuals in the following counties: Hillsborough, Rockingham, Grafton, Cheshire, and 

Sullivan in New Hampshire

Sample Common Core PARCC Test Questions

Since Arizona is in the same testing consortia, PARCC, as Louisiana, we thought you might enjoy the following sample questions for English III students produced by the Louisiana Department of Education.

Remember, it's just a set of "standards."

The items that follow are based on an excerpt from the book In Defense of Women, which is located at the end of this set of questions. 

1. What are two central ideas presented in the excerpt? 
A. Men have prevented women from succeeding, but with new-found economic security, women will have the upper hand in the workplace. 
B. Women have more economic freedom, which means they will have more choices, especially when it comes to marriage. 
C. Women have a little more freedom, but the progress has been slow and the gains very small. 
D. Most women prefer to work than to marry, and as a result, family life is diminishing. 

Correct Answer: B

2. What is the purpose of mentioning “grandmothers” and “woman of a century ago”? 
A. To show that women of all generations prefer marriage to working 
B. To illustrate how little progress women have made through the years 
C. To emphasize the change in what women can expect in their lives 
D. To acknowledge the efforts of the first women activists  

 Correct Answer: C

3. In paragraph 3, the author refers to certain “propagandists” of the women’s movement. Based on the author’s description, his attitude toward them is best described as 
A. amused. 
B. fearful. 
C. confused. 
D. scornful. 

Correct Answer: D

4. Which words or phrases from paragraph 3 provide the best clues to how the author feels about the “propagandists”? 
A. “averse to marriage” 
B. “man-eating suffragettes” 
C. “preachers” and “prophetess” 
D. “wake the world with no such noisy eloquence” 

Correct Answer: B

Henry Louis Mencken (1880–1956) was an American journalist, essayist, and magazine editor. Mencken is regarded as one of the most influential American writers and prose stylists of the first 
half of the twentieth century. His book In Defense of Women was published in 1918 during the height of the suffragist movement, whose supporters sought to give women the right to vote. 

from In Defense of Women 

by H.L. Mencken 

1 The gradual emancipation of women that has been going on for the last century has still a long way to proceed before they are wholly delivered from their traditional burdens and so stand clear of the oppressions of men. But already, it must be plain, they have made enormous progress—perhaps more than they made in the ten thousand years preceding. The rise of the industrial system, which has borne so harshly upon the race in general, has brought them certain unmistakable benefits. Their economic dependence, though still sufficient to make marriage highly attractive to them, is nevertheless so far broken down that large classes of women are now almost free agents, and quite independent of the favor of men. Most of these women, responding to ideas that are still powerful, are yet intrigued, of course, by marriage, and prefer it to the autonomy that 
is coming in, but the fact remains that they now have a free choice in the matter, and that dire necessity no longer controls them. After all, they needn’t marry if they don’t want to; it is possible to get their bread by their own labor in the workshops of the world. Their grandmothers were in a far more difficult position. Failing marriage, they not only suffered a cruel ignominy,[1] but in many cases faced the menace of actual starvation. There was simply no respectable place in the economy of those times for the free woman. She either had to enter a nunnery or accept a disdainful patronage[2] that was as galling[3] as charity. 

2 Nothing could be plainer than the effect that the increasing economic security of women is having upon their whole habit of life and mind. The diminishing marriage rate and the even more 
rapidly diminishing birth rates show which way the wind is blowing. It is common for male statisticians, with characteristic imbecility,[4] to ascribe the fall in the marriage rate to a growing disinclination on the male side. This growing disinclination is actually on the female side. Even though no considerable body of women has yet reached the definite doctrine that marriage is less desirable than freedom, it must be plain that large numbers of them now approach the business 
with far greater fastidiousness[5] than their grandmothers or even their mothers exhibited. They are harder to please, and hence pleased less often. The woman of a century ago could imagine nothing 
more favorable to her than marriage; even marriage with a fifth-rate man was better than no marriage at all. This notion is gradually feeling the opposition of a contrary notion. Women in general may still prefer marriage to work, but there is an increasing minority which begins to realize that work may offer the greater contentment. 

3 There already appears in the world, indeed, a class of women, who, while still not genuinely averse to marriage, are yet free from any theory that it is necessary, or even invariably desirable. Among these women are a good many somewhat vociferous[6] propagandists, almost male in their violent earnestness; they range from the man-eating suffragettes to such preachers of free motherhood as Ellen Key[7] and such professional shockers of the bourgeoisie[8] as the American prophetess of birth-control, Margaret Sanger. But among them are many more who wake the world with no such noisy eloquence, but content themselves with carrying out their ideas in a quiet and respectable manner. The number of such women is much larger than is generally imagined, and that number tends to increase steadily. They are women who, with their economic independence 
assured, either by inheritance or by their own efforts, chiefly in the arts and professions, do exactly as they please, and make no pother[9] about it. Naturally enough, their superiority to convention 
and the common frenzy makes them extremely attractive to the better sort of men, and so it is not uncommon for one of them to find herself voluntarily sought in marriage, without any preliminary scheming by herself—surely an experience that very few ordinary women ever enjoy, save perhaps in dreams or delirium. The old order changeth and giveth place to the new. 


[1] humiliation 
[2] financial support controlled by a person or organization 
[3] irritating 
[4] silliness, absurdity, or stupidity 
[5] excessive care or delicacy 
[6] outspoken 
[7] Swedish feminist writer 
[8] middle class 
[9] fuss, disturbance

Arizona Healthcare Website Is STILL Down

When clicking on the link for the Arizona Marketplace, you will get this:

Four days after Obamacare went online.

UPDATE:

We did check the prices in other states and here are the "UN" affordable rates we found for a family of five...

California:

Massachusetts:

Update 10/8/13

So close...