Betrayed by the Governor of Texas

Betrayed! 

JoAnn FlemingBy JoAnn Fleming, Executive Director, Grassroots America – We the People PAC; and for identification purposes – Chair, TX Legislature’s TEA Party Caucus Advisory Committee
Today, Governor Rick Perry made a sharp left turn. According to sources inside the GOP Caucus meeting, Perry has decided to abandon his own promises to the people of Texas. One year ago – on Tax Day 2012, no less – Gov. Perry unveiled a “State Budget Compact” and promised us he would champion and push for these five principles:
1. Practice Truth in Budgeting
2. Support a Constitutional limit of spending to the growth of population & inflation
3. Oppose any new taxes or tax increases; make the small business tax exemption
   permanent
4. Preserve a strong Rainy Day Fund
5. Cut unnecessary and duplicative government programs and agencies
One year later, due to a lack of leadership, these promises won’t likely survive the legislative session. Once again, we get a lot of talk, but little real action. Today, Perry signaled to Texas House Republicans that these promises really no longer matter.
If that’s not bad enough, Gov. Perry is asking House Republicans to walk the plank for him in support of busting the spending capputting Texas further into debt, and raiding the Rainy Day Fund. In exchange, Perry promised to campaign for those legislators who would follow him in this reckless quest to betray the conservative base and to violate foundational conservative principles.
Our answer? Anyone thinking about following this unprincipled approach should remember the “Cruz Missile” that blew up all conventional political wisdom last year and sent an earthquake through the middle of Austin.
The conservative grassroots of Texas that united to send Ted Cruz to the United States Senate is more committed than ever to protect this state from the establishment ruling class in both parties. We will consider any votes to bust the spending limit, to drive Texas further into debt, and to drain the Rainy Day Fund to be a declaration of war on our children and grandchildren. Texas is NOT Washington, DC, and we don’t take kindly to betrayal.

Women On the Wall  takes on the issues that matter. Sharing information and updates on our weekly radio show on Monday mornings at 10 am CST. You will not want to miss this show. We take on the issues that are effecting the safety and security of our children and grandchildren.

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Alice Linahan

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Voices Empower has partnered the Freedom Trailer Teams to Educate, Inspire and Motivate.

Women On The Wall.org

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  Please attribute to Alice Linahan  with Voices Empower

 

“Show Us The Money ~ TEA and ESC”

By Janice VanCleave TxCSCOPEReview.com 

I need a hero to stop CSCOPE in Texas

I need a hero to stop CSCOPE in Texas

TEA (Texas Education Agency) and the ESC (Education Service Centers) spent $31,900,000 from a grant to develop a training program for educators and administrators. The objective being that Texas teachers would be given specifics about the TEKS.

Teachers attending the sessions would leave with a scope of the TEKS (descriptions of the TEKS for the grades and subjects they teach).

With information about the TEKS and their school calendar, teachers would have all the tools they need to develop a sequence (yearly schedule) for each subject.

CSCOPE Senate HearingDuring the senate ed committee meeting, the superintendents didn’t say a thing about this material. In fact they gave testimony that without CSCOPE they have no specifics about the TEKS.

The ESCs had to have spent much time developing TEKS training material for K-12 in all subjects.

What is the difference in the CSCOPE scopes and sequences and the TEKS Profession Development Initiatives scopes and sequences? 

Every Texan needs to know just how their tax money is being spent. Every Texan needs to know that those in charge of the ESCs are not being governed and are free to spend our tax money as they see fit.

Every Texan needs to contact their ESC and ask for original copies of the TEKS Professional Development Initiatives paid for by a $32 million grant–their tax money provides this.

Rider42 Texas Professional Development Research Study

 

 

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Join the Movement to Stop CSCOPE

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Women On the Wall  takes on the issues that matter. Sharing information and updates on our weekly radio show on Monday mornings at 10 am CST. You will not want to miss this show. We will have up to date information on CSCOPE  and guests who are the experts on education and other issues that are effecting our children and grandchildren.

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Alice Linahan

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CAIR WORKING HARD TO KILL TEXAS ALAC BILL

At the Capital in Austin on Jan. 31st the photo below was taken. It was Texas Muslim Day. Of the 12 sponsoring groups 8 have direct ties to the Muslim Brotherhood.

Texas Muslim Day at the Capital CAIR

So it is not surprising to find out…..

When it comes to Senator John Carona’s legislation, SB1639, Texas’ American Laws for American Courts legislation, our opponents become more vocal as we get closer to victory.And we are VERY close to victory in Texas.

One such opponent is the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR), an unindicted conspirator in the Texas Holy Land Foundation terror finance trial and a Muslim Brotherhood front group operating right here in the U.S.

Just the other day, CAIR put out a “Texas Action Alert” asking legislators to “put a stop to anti-Muslim legislation in the Senate.” Specifically, CAIR tells its members that “if 11 Senators vote to block the measure, it can be stopped….” And they ask them to “call your Texas Senator today and ask that they block SB1639 from reaching the floor.

Pro-ALAC patriots: We need the voices of Texas to tell the ALL State Senators what the bill REALLY does…and what it does NOT do. We need your voice today.

As a reminder, SB1639 is merely common-sense proposal protects Texans’ individual constitutional rights from foreign laws or legal doctrines in cases related to marriage, divorce, or parent-child relationships, where the application of those laws/doctrines would violate those constitutional rights. No particular foreign law is singled out. The legislation applies to them all.

SB 1639 was recently passed out of the Texas Senate Business & Commerce Committee by a vote of 5 to 4. The next step is for the Rules Committee to send the legislation to the Senate floor for a final vote.

At this time, we need all of our Texas members to relay their strong support for SB 1639 to their individual state Senator. By continuing to work together, we can see American Laws for American Courts legislation passed in Texas this session!

In order to see ALAC passed into law in Texas, can we count on you to perform the following easy action today?

** IMPORTANT ACTION ITEM **

We need your help TODAY in contacting YOUR STATE SENATOR to relay your strong support for SB 1639 and your desire to see the bill reach the Senate floor as soon as possible for a vote.

(Click HERE to locate your state Senator and his/her contact information.)

Please respectfully relay the sentiments below, either via phone call

or e-mail:Senator,

I urge you to support SB 1639, introduced by Senator John Carona, in order to protect the constitutional rights of Texans from the incursion of foreign laws and foreign legal doctrines.

Further, I ask that you do all you can to see this important bill brought before the full Senate so it can receive the vote it deserves.

To-date, four other states have passed legislation like SB 1639. Texas needs to be next, as we must maintain the authority of the Texas and U.S. Constitutions.

As a Texas voter, this bill is of the utmost importance to me!

Thank you for your leadership on this vital matter.

Sincerely,

(Your name and city)

Again, many thanks for all of your efforts, Texas. You ARE making a difference!

 

 

 

Just Breaking: Power of the People!! Republican Win Against Common Core

The National Republican Party passed a resolution against Common Core in their platform. Yeah!

Common Core

Photo Courtesy of Left, right unite against Common Core

Hat Tip to Dawn Wildman – San Diego Tea Party organizer Southern California Tax Revolt Coalition Inc. www.socaltaxrevoltcoalition.org California Co-Coordinator Tea Party Groups www.Californiateapartygroups.org Guest Host of City on a Hill radio show http://www.blogtalkradio.com/cityonahill

and to Truth in American Education 

Here is the original draft:

RESOLUTION CONCERNING COMMON CORE EDUCATION STANDARDS

WHEREAS, the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) are a set of academic standards, promoted and supported by two private membership organizations, the National Governor’s Association (NGA) and the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) as a method for conforming American students to uniform (“one size fits all”) achievement goals to make them more competitive in a global marketplace, (1.) and

WHEREAS, the NGA and the CCSSO, received tens of millions of dollars from private third parties to advocate for and develop the CCSS strategy, subsequently created the CCSS through a process that was not subject to any freedom of information acts or other sunshine laws, and never piloted the CCSS, and

WHEREAS, even though Federal Law prohibits the federalizing of curriculum (2.), the Obama Administration accepted the CCSS plan and used 2009 Stimulus Bill money to reward the states that were most committed to the president’s CCSS agenda; but, they failed to give states, their legislatures and their citizens time to evaluate the CCSS before having to commit to them, and

WHEREAS, the NGA and CCSSO in concert with the same corporations developing the CCSS ‘assessments’ have created new textbooks, digital media and other teaching materials aligned to the standards which must be purchased and adopted by local school districts in order that students may effectively compete on CCSS ‘assessments’, and

WHEREAS, the CCSS program includes federally funded testing and the collection and sharing of massive amounts of personal student and teacher data, and

WHEREAS, the CCSS effectively removes educational choice and competition since all schools and all districts must use Common Core ‘assessments’ based on the Common Core standards to allow all students to advance in the school system and to advance to higher education pursuits; therefore be it

RESOLVED, the Republican National Committee, as stated in the 2012 Republican Party Platform, “do not believe in a one size fits all approach to education and support providing broad education choices to parents and children at the State and local level,” (p35)(3.), which is best based on a free market approach to education for students to achieve individual excellence; and, be it further

RESOLVED, the Republican National Committee recognizes the CCSS for what it is– an inappropriate overreach to standardize and control the education of our children so they will conform to a preconceived “normal,” and, be it further

RESOLVED, That the Republican National Committee rejects the collection of personal student data for any non-educational purpose without the prior written consent of an adult student or a child student’s parent and that it rejects the sharing of such personal data, without the prior written consent of an adult student or a child student’s parent, with any person or entity other than schools or education agencies within the state, and be it finally

RESOLVED, the 2012 Republican Party Platform specifically states the need to repeal the numerous federal regulations which interfere with State and local control of public schools, (p36) (3.); and therefore, the Republican National Committee rejects this CCSS plan which creates and fits the country with a nationwide straitjacket on academic freedom and achievement.

References:

1. www.corestandards.org

2.  Federal Law 20 USC 1232a-Sec. 1232a. and The Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) Pub.L. 89-10, 79 Stat. 27, 20 US.C. ch. 70.

http://us-code.vlex.com/vid/prohibition-against-federal-control-19195093

3.  http://www.gop.com/rnc_counsel/

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Join the Movement to Stop CSCOPE

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Women On the Wall  takes on the issues that matter. Sharing information and updates on our weekly radio show on Monday mornings at 10 am CST. You will not want to miss this show. We will have up to date information on CSCOPE  and guests who are the experts on education and other issues that are effecting our children and grandchildren.

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Alice Linahan

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“Education Is Serious Business: Green, Yellow, and Red People”

By Donna Garner 

GREEN, YELLOW, AND RED PEOPLE:  CATEGORIES IN EDUCATION

Generally, I believe there are two different types of philosophies of education; and nearly all educators, curriculum, vendors, organizations, and advocacy groups fall into one of these two categories.  (3.3.13 — “Traditional vs Progressive— Two Completely Different Philosophies of Education”

Green Yellow and Red CSCOPE People

Green Yellow and Red CSCOPE People

Next, there are also three different types of individuals involved; and we can see this all across America.

The “green” people are those who go-along to get-along; they go with the status quo and are content to follow whatever teaching fad is in vogue at the present time. These people are not bad people but are easily deceived by those who have ulterior motives (e.g., drive-by media, national educator organizations, left-leaning politicians, CSCOPE, Common Core Standards).

 

The “yellow” people are those who are driven by greed, money, power, and fame. Many of these people are vendors, lobbyists, or school employees who look past the egregious content of their products so long as they themselves are benefitting.  Into this group fall some CSCOPE/TESCCC/ESC employees, Thomas Ratliff, Mike Moses, Pat Jacoby, TASA, TASB, etc.

 

The “red” people know exactly what they are doing. They have long-term goals to change America, and they realize that the best way to do this is to indoctrinate this and succeeding generations of school children in their classrooms.  Into this group fall such people as Obama, Arne Duncan, Linda Darling-Hammond, Bill Ayers, the National Education Organization, and many other left-leaners.

Politicians can come in all different colors – green, yellow, and red. Those who blindly follow are green. Those who seek fame, fortune, and/or control for themselves are yellow. Those whose aim is to change America from a capitalist, free-market Republic into a Socialist, Communist, Marxist country are red.

I do not believe that very many of our Texas Legislators fall into the “red” category, but I do believe many of them do fall into the “green” or “yellow” categories.

 TEXAS’ NEW TYPE #1 CURRICULUM STANDARDS (TEKS)

Here are the links to the TEKS as posted on the official Texas Education Agency website for the four core courses adopted by the SBOE starting in May 2008 through May 2012:

ELAR TEKS –http://ritter.tea.state.tx.us/rules/tac/chapter110/index.html

SCIENCE TEKS –http://ritter.tea.state.tx.us/rules/tac/chapter112/index.html

SOCIAL STUDIES  TEKS –http://ritter.tea.state.tx.us/rules/tac/chapter113/index.html

MATH TEKS –http://ritter.tea.state.tx.us/rules/tac/chapter111/index.html

The TEKS (curriculum standards – not curriculum) tell school districts/educators WHAT to teach. It is left up to the local teachers to decide HOW to teach them.

As you look over the TEKS, you will find that most of them are knowledge-based, academic, grade-level-specific for each grade level or each course; and the standards (i.e., elements) are largely measurable. Those were the parameters set by the elected SBOE back in 2005-2006 before they started adopting the new set of TEKS. These specific parameters were set so that the writing teams would be forced into Type #1.

As you scan through the various subjects and grade levels in the new TEKS, please notice the verbs used at the beginning of the standards. The verbs have deliberately been chosen to bring measurability to the standards such as identify, create, interpret, locate, examine, describe, explain, compare, summarize, master, demonstrate, follow, communicate, incorporate, use, apply, evaluate, organize, etc.

This is the Type #1 philosophy of education – no subjectivity, feelings, opinions, etc. The new Type #1 TEKS emphasize academic knowledge – the right answer – instead of the “process.”  This is why school districts that have become totally fixated on constructivist, project-based learning (e.g., CSCOPE districts) are not in alignment with the Type #1 TEKS because the constructivist/project-based  activities glorify the process rather than the right answer.

Can you find any of the new TEKS that say discover, give your opinion, what do you think, etc.?  These are Type #2 verbiage.

(One of our SBOE members made it a habit each time he visited a school district and viewed a technology demonstration or a science experiment of some kind to go up to a student afterwards and ask him to verbally explain what he just proved. The SBOE member said he hardly ever found a student who could actually explain the concepts underlying the demonstration/experiment.)

Measuring StickBecause of the parameters set by the SBOE for the new TEKS before the writing teams even met, the new Type #1 TEKS elements can be measured on the STAAR/End-of-Course tests largely through objective questions and answers.  Because of these parameters, the constructivist, project-based philosophy of education as seen in CSCOPE does not align well with these new TEKS and explains why the CSCOPE schools did worse on their STAAR/EOC’s than did the non-CSCOPE schools. This also should help us to understand why we must not lose the “measuring stick”  – the STAAR/EOC’s.

If the truth were known, I imagine Pearson really enjoyed producing and then setting up the “answer keys” for the STAAR/EOC tests for Texas because our standards are clear, precise, and measurable.  Producing a test for a “road map” (Type #1) is much easier than producing a test for a “wish list” (Type #2).

RESULTS OF TYPE #1

If we want our public school children to learn to read well, we must have Type #1.

If we want them to be able to speak and write English well, then we must have Type #1.

If we want them to be patriotic citizens who revere the Founding Fathers and know and honor the Constitution, then we must have Type #1.

If we want our graduates to be knowledgeable voters who know history and can analyze current events based upon the past and the present, then we must have Type #1.

If we want our public school children to recognize that they and the whole world were created by a Higher Being, then we must have Type #1.

If we want our public school children to know their math facts to automaticity, then we must have Type #1.

If we want our public school children to be able to do well in foreign languages, then we must have Type #1 that teaches the phonetic sound system and grammar/usage in English so that they can apply that to their foreign language learning.

If we want our public school children to read the great pieces of literature that have connected our country to past generations, then we must have Type #1.

If we want our public school children to have the skills and knowledge they need for college and/or the workplace, then we must have Type #1.

If we want to turn out scientists who are well read, logical, analytical, and who can write down their scientific conclusions, then we must have Type #1.

If we want our graduates to be able to write compositions built upon facts and persuasive techniques, then we must have Type #1.

If we want our high-school students to know how to research a topic and then put that information into well-written text, we must have Type #1.

If we want legislators who are well read and who have a deep understanding of world history/American history/U. S. legal system and how those apply to current events, then we must have Type #1.

________________________________________________

Join the Movement to Stop CSCOPE

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Women On the Wall  takes on the issues that matter. Sharing information and updates on our weekly radio show on Monday mornings at 10 am CST. You will not want to miss this show. We will have up to date information on CSCOPE  and guests who are the experts on education and other issues that are effecting our children and grandchildren.

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The SBOE (State Board of Education) CSCOPE Review Process needs YOU!

I need a hero to stop CSCOPE!!

This is a call for Texas Citizens who care about what our children are learning- be on the CSCOPE review teams across Texas.

Interested citizens may submit a nomination form through April 29.  The CSCOPE Ad Hoc Committee expects to make committee assignments in May. The review panels would then work June 3-16 to review the material.

Click here to see the CSCOPE review timeline.

State Board of Education – CSCOPE

The State Board of Education has launched its review of CSCOPE, a curriculum which has been a lightning rod for controversy for content that is alleged to erode fundamental American values, devalue Christianity and favor Islam. The State Board of Education will be seeking public participation in the review process, beginning with review team member nominations which open this week.

“We are committed to a vigorous, thorough, transparent and fair review process,” says District 10 SBOE Member Tom Maynard (R-Florence) who is a member of the ad hoc committee appointed by SBOE chair Barbara Cargill to coordinate the CSCOPE review process. Maynard also chairs the board’s Committee on Instruction.

The board will use the same criteria to evaluate CSCOPE content as it does traditional textbooks.

CSCOPE is an online program that assists districts in aligning curriculum with state standards. In question are the more than 1,600 model lesson plans called “exemplar lessons” and the accompanying tests.

The review process will begin with social studies.

“We anticipate the appointment of 14 review teams to tackle the 431 social studies lessons and assessments, which range from kindergarten to 12th grade government,” Maynard says.

“We want a broad cross-section of parents, teachers, content experts and other stakeholders involved in the process, which will begin in early June and finish in late July,” he says.

The Texas Education Agency will open the nomination system for reviewers on Tuesday, April 9. Interested parties can access the nomination form from the State Board of Education page of the Texas Education Agency website. The application deadline is April 29.

 

Steps in the Nomination and Review Process 

 

Step 1:  The public will be notified about the nomination process.  Nominees must fill out an application document and submit a current resume.  The administrator sends the nominees’ applications and resumes to the SBOE member that represents their district.

 

Step 2:  SBOE members may submit nominations for the review panels to include parents, classroom teachers, curriculum specialists, school administrators, and other stakeholders in Texas education.  SBOE members should ensure that nominations represent at least 4 different grade levels.  SBOE members should list nominations in priority order.  The Ad Hoc committee will make every effort to see that there is fair representation for all board members who submit nominations.

 

Step 3:  The Ad Hoc committee reviews the applications and recommends to the SBOE Chair nominees to each review panel. Each review panel will have 3-9 members based upon the recommendations of the Ad Hoc committee.

 

Step 4:  From each Panel, one Facilitator is selected by the Chair of the Ad Hoc committee. This person serves as the coordinator of the meetings of that particular panel, reports to the Committee as needed and facilitates the report coming from that panel.

 

Step 5:  The Ad Hoc committee charges the review panels to review the instructional content in CSCOPE in accordance with the guidelines set by the SBOE Chair with input from the Ad Hoc committee.

 

Step 6:  Individual reviews, once they are complete, will be sent to the review panel facilitator by a date determined by the Ad Hoc committee.  The facilitators will compile a review panel report and send the review panel documents to the administrator.

 

Step 7:  The Ad Hoc committee will receive the reports from the administrator; the reports will also be sent to the SBOE and the CSCOPE governing body.  The review panel reports will be posted on line for the public.

 

Step 8:  The CSCOPE governing body will consider the feedback of the review panel members and determine how to use those comments to improve the lesson content offered by CSCOPE.

 

Step 9:  The CSCOPE governing body will report back to the Ad Hoc committee

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There are two different types of philosophies of education; and nearly all educators, curriculum, vendors, organizations, and advocacy groups fall into one of these two categories.  (3.3.13 — “Type #1 and Type #2 — Two Completely Different Philosophies of Education” by Donna Garner

CSCOPE, Dan Patrick, Women On The Wall and the 2nd Amendment.Protect Type 1 Traditional Education in Texas! Get involved.  

  • If we want our public school children to learn to read well, we must have Type #1.

 

  • If we want them to be able to speak and write English well, then we must have Type #1.

 

  • If we want them to be patriotic citizens who revere the Founding Fathers and know and honor the Constitution, then we must have Type #1.

 

  • If we want our graduates to be knowledgeable voters who know history and can analyze current events based upon the past and the present, then we must have Type #1.

 

  • If we want our public school children to recognize that they and the whole world were created by a Higher Being, then we must have Type #1.

 

  • If we want our public school children to know their math facts to automaticity, then we must have Type #1.

 

  • If we want our public school children to be able to do well in foreign languages, then we must have Type #1 that teaches the phonetic sound system and grammar/usage in English so that they can apply that to their foreign language learning.

 

  • If we want our public school children to read the great pieces of literature that have connected our country to past generations, then we must have Type #1.

 

  • If we want our public school children to have the skills and knowledge they need for college and/or the workplace, then we must have Type #1.

 

  • If we want to turn out scientists who are well read, logical, analytical, and who can write down their scientific conclusions, then we must have Type #1.

 

  • If we want our graduates to be able to write compositions built upon facts and persuasive techniques, then we must have Type #1.

 

  • If we want our high-school students to know how to research a topic and then put that information into well-written text, we must have Type #1.If we want legislators who are well read and who have a deep understanding of world history/American history/U. S. legal system and how those apply to current events, then we must have Type #1.

===================================

Join the Movement to Stop CSCOPE

Click the photo to sign the Petition and Join the movement to#StopCSCOPE 

Women On the Wall  takes on the issues that matter. Sharing information and updates on our weekly radio show on Monday mornings at 10 am CST. You will not want to miss this show. We will have up to date information on CSCOPE  and guests who are the experts on education and other issues that are effecting our children and grandchildren.

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“Hogwash Alert to National Review Online”

[4.4.13 – I have never read a more thorough and well-documented discrediting of Common Core Standards than what Christel has presented below.  This article is a keeper because she has undoubtedly spent hours gathering and inputting the links to her sources so that all who read this article can verify its accuracy.  Our sincere thanks goes out to Christel for providing this elucidating rebuttal to the National Review’s “hogwash.”  – Donna Garner]

 

“Hogwash Alert to National Review Online”

By Christel Swasey

I’m calling for a hogwash alert on today’s National Review article about Common Core.

The ironically titled The Truth About Common Core article cannot be taken seriously. It’s written without any links or references for its Common Core-promoting claims, and it’s written by two authors whose employers are largely funded by the main funder of all things Common Core.

Can anyone take seriously those who praise Common Core while being paid to do so?

The article makes “truth” claims that include the notion that Common Core is “more rigorous,” (where’s the proof?) and that the standards allow policymaking to happen locally. How can that be? The standards are written behind closed doors in D.C. The standards are copyrighted and are unamendable by locals. There is a 15% cap on adding to them, written into the ESEA Flexibility Waiver Request. And there is no amendment process; thus, no local control.

For anyone who has been living under an education reform rock, know this: Gates is the single biggest promoter and funder of Common Core, bar none.) So, Fordham’s and Manhattan Institute’s writers should not be expected to be objective about Common Core.

If it seems like practically everyone supports Common Core, Gates’ money is why. Bill Gates has said he’s spent $5 BILLION pushing (his version of) education reform. He’s bribed the national PTA to advocate for Common Core to parents; he’s paid the CCSSO to develop Common Core; and he owns opinion maker Education Weekmagazine. There’s a near-endless list of Gates’ attempts (very successful, I might add) to foist his vision of education without voter input.

The National Review writes that it is a “right-of-center” organization, as if that claim is a “trust-me” pass. This is meaningless in Common Core land because, as Emmett McGroarty of the American Principles Project, has said, “Opposition to Common Core cuts across the left-right spectrum. It gets back to who should control our children’s education — people in Indiana or people in Washington?”

But we should clarify that oodles of Democrats and Republicans sell or benefit from Common Core implementation. That is the top reason for the gold rush anxiety to promote the national standards. A secondary reason is lemminghood (misplaced and unproven trust).

Republican Jeb Bush is behind the Foundation for Excellence in Education, a nongovernmental group which pushes Common Core and is, of course, funded by Gates. Republican Rupert Murdoch owns not only Fox News, but also the common core implementation company Wireless Generation that’s creating common core testing technology. Republican Senator Todd Huston of Indiana got his largestcampaign donation from David Coleman, common core ELA architect; then, after Huston was elected to the Indiana Senate and placed on its education committee, Coleman hired Huston to be on the College Board. They are profiting from the alignment of the SAT to Common Core. And of course, Huston is on Jeb Bush’s Foundation for Excellence in Education, too. Even my own Republican Governor Herbert of Utah serves on the elite executive committee of NGA, the Common Core founding group. He doesn’t make money this way, but he does make lots of corporations happy.

I could go on and on about the Common Core gold-and-glory rush. I haven’t even touched on all the Democrats who promote Common Core for gain. But I don’t want to be up all night.

So, on to the liberals and/or not-right wing radicals who oppose Common Core:

California Democrat/author Rosa Koire and respected educator like Diane Ravitchoppose Common Core as an untested academic and political experiment that increases the high-stakes of standardized testing. They see that Common Core is promoting unrepresentative formations of public-private-partnerships, and promotes teacher-micromanagement. Chicago history teacher Paul Horton says Common Core turns teacher-artisans into teacher-widgets; he also sees it as a Pearson anti-trust issue. Teacher Kris Nielsen has written “Children of the Core” and teacher Paul Bogush calls teaching Common Core sleeping with the enemy. Math teacher Stephanie Sawyer predicts that with Common Core, there will be an increase in remedial math instruction and an increase in the clientele of tutoring centers. Writing teacher Laura Gibbs calls the writing standards an inspid brew of gobbledygook. Anonymously, many teachers have published other concerns in a survey produced by Utahns Against Common Core.

Still, political funders of the standards and corporations selling its implementation try to get away with marginalizing the opposition. But it can’t be done honestly. Because it’s not a fight between left and right.

This battle is between the collusion of corporate greed and political muscle versus the individual voter.

It’s a battle between the individual student, teacher, or parent– versus hugepublic/private partnerships. That’s the David and Goliath here.

The Common Core movement is not about what’s best for children. It’s about greed and political control. A simple test: if Common Core was about helping students achieve legitimate classical education, wouldn’t the Common Core experiment have been based on empirical study and solid educator backing?

Did the authors of the Hogwash article really not know that Common Core wasn’t based on anything like empirical data but simply fluffed up on empty promises and rhetoric, from the beginning.

Where’s the basis for what proponents call “rigorous,” “internationally competitive,” and “research-based?” Why won’t the proponents point to proof of “increased rigor” the way the opponents point to proof of increased dumbing down? We know they are fibbing because we know there is no empirical evidence for imposing this experiment on students in America. The emperor of Common Core is wearing no clothes.

Many educators are crying out –even testifying to legislatures— that Common Core is an academic disaster. I’m thinking of Professors Christopher TienkenSandra StotskyThomas NewkirkZe’ev WurmanJames Milgram, William Mathis, Susan Ohanian, Charlotte Iserbyt, Alan Manning, and others.

The National Review authors insist that Common Core is not a stealth “leftist indoctrination” plot by the Obama administration. But that’s what it looks like when you study the reformers and what they create.

First, let’s look at the Common Core textbooks. Virtually every textbook company in America is aligning now with Common Core. (So even the states who rejected Common Core, and even private schools and home schools are in trouble; how will they find new textbooks that reflect Massachusetts-high standards?)

Pearson’s latest textbooks show extreme environmentalism and a global citizen creating agenda that marginalizes national constitutions and individual rights in favor of global collectivism. The biggest education sales company of all the Common Core textbook and technology sales monsters on the planet is Pearson, which is led by mad “Deliverology” globalist Sir Michael Barber. Watch his speeches.

He doesn’t just lead Pearson, the company that is so huge it’s becoming an anti-trust issue. Sir Michael Barber also speaks glowingly of public private partnerships, of political “revolution,” “global citizenship” and a need for having global datacollection and one set of educational standards for the entire planet. He’s a political machine. Under his global common core, diversity, freedom and local control of education need not apply.

Along with some of the gold-rushing colluders chasing Common Core-alignment product sales, there are political individuals calling educational shots, and these are without exception on the far, far left. And of these, the National Review is correct in saying that their goal to nationalize U.S. education has been happening since long before Obama came to power.

But they are wrong in saying that Common Core isn’t a road map to indoctrinating students into far left philosophy. Power players like Linda Darling-Hammond and Congressman Chaka Fattah ram socialism and redistribution down America’s throat in education policy, while Pearson pushes it in the curriculum.

It’s safe to say that Linda Darling-Hammond has as much say as anyone in this country when it comes to education policy. She focuses on “equity” and “social justice” –that is, redistribution of wealth using schools. Reread that last sentence.

Darling-Hammond has worked for CCSSO (Common Core developer) since long before the standards were even written. She served on the standards validation committee. She now works for SBAC (the Common Core test writer); she also consults with AIR (Utah’s Common Core test producer) and advises Obama’s administration; she promotes the secretive CSCOPE curriculum and more.

Study her further here to learn the groups she works for, what’s in the books she writes, how many times she quoted herself in her report for the U.S. equity commission, and what she said in last summer’s speech to UNESCO about the need to take swimming pools away from students.

So yes, there is an undeniable socialism push in Common Core textbooks and in the Department of Education.

Next.

The National Review’s authors claim Common Core won’t “eliminate American children’s core knowledge base in English, language arts and history.” By cutting classic literature by 70% for high school seniors, they are absolutely doing exactly that. The article says that Common Core doesn’t mandate the slashing of literature. Maybe not. But the tests sure will.

What teacher, constricted by the knowledge that her job is on the line, will risk lowering the high stakes student scores by teaching beyond what is recommended in the model curriculum of the national test writers?

And that’s the tragic part for me as an English teacher.

Classic literature is sacred. Its removal from American schools is an affront to our humanity.

Common Core doesn’t mandate which books to cut; the National Review is correct on that point; but it does pressure English teachers to cut out large selections of great literature, somewhere. And not just a little bit. Tons.

Informational text belongs in other classes, not in English. To read boring, non-literary articles even if they are not all required to be Executive Orders, insulation manuals, or environmental studies (as the major portion of the English language curriculum) is to kill the love of reading.

What will the slashing do to the students’ appreciation for the beauty of the language, to the acquisition of rich vocabulary, to the appreciation for the battle between good and evil?

We become compassionate humans by receiving and passing on classic stories. Souls are enlarged by exposure to the characters, the imagery, the rich vocabulary, the poetic language and the endless forms of the battle between good and evil, that live in classic literature.

Classic stories create a love for books that cannot be acquired in any other way. Dickens, Shakespeare, Hugo, Orwell, Dostoevsky, Rand, Marquez, Cisneros, Faulkner, Fitzgerald– where would we be without the gifts of these great writers and their writings? Which ones will English teachers cut away first to make room for informational text?

The sly and subtle change will have the same effect on our children as if Common Core had mandated the destruction of a certain percentage of all classic literature.

How does it differ from book burning in its ultimate effects?

Cutting out basic math skills, such as being able to convert fractions to decimals, is criminal. Proponents call this learning “fewer but deeper” concepts. I call it a sin. Common Core also delays the age at which students should be able to work with certain algorithms, putting students years behind our mathematical competitors in Asia.

For specific curricular reviews of Common Core standards, read Dr. Sandra Stotsky’s and Dr. Ze’ev Wurman’s math and literature reviews in the appendix of the white paper by Pioneer Institute. (See exhibit A and exhibit B, page 24.)

Next.

The National Review claims that the standards “simply delineate what children should know at each grade level and describe the skills that they must acquire to stay on course toward college or career readiness” and claim they are not a ceiling but a floor. This is a lie. The standards are bound by a 15% rule; there’s no adding to them beyond 15%. That’s not a ceiling?

The article claims that “college and career readiness” doesn’t necessarily mean Common Core. Well, it does, actually. The phrase has been defined on the ed. gov website as meaning sameness of standards to a significant number of states. I would give you a link but this week, so oddly, the Department of Education has removed most of its previous pages. You can see it reposted here:

The article insists that Common Core is not a curriculum; it’s up to school districts to choose curricula that comply with the standards. Sure. But as previously noted: 1) all the big textbook companies have aligned to Common Core. Where are the options? 2) Common core tests and the new accountability measures put on teachers who will lose their jobs if students don’t score well on Common Core tests will ensure that teachers will only teach Common Core standards. 3) Test writers are making model curriculum and it’s going to be for sale, for sure.

The article falsely claims that “curriculum experts began to devise” the standards. Not so: the architect of Common Core ELA standards (and current College Board president) is not, nor ever has been, an educator. In fact, that architect made the list of Top Ten Scariest People in Education Reform. A top curriculum professor has pointed out that the developers of Common Core never consulted with top curricular universities at all.

The article claims that states who have adopted Common Core could opt out, “and they shouldn’t lose a dime if they do” –but Title I monies have been threatened, and the No Child Left Behind waiver is temporary on conditions of following Common Core, and for those states who did get Race to the Top money (not my state, thank goodness) the money would have to be returned. Additionally, every state got ARRA stimulus money to build a federally interoperable State Longitudinal Database System. Do we want to give back millions and millions to ensure that we aren’t part of the de facto national database of children’s longitudinal school-collected, personally identifiable information?

The article states that the goal is to have children read challenging texts that will build their vocabulary and background knowledge. So then why not read more –not less– actual literature?

The article also leaves out any analysis of the illegality of Common Core. The arrangement appears to be illegal. Under the Constitution and under the General Educational Provisions Act (GEPA) the federal government is restricted from even supervising education.

GEPA states: “No provision of any applicable program shall be construed to authorize any department, agency, officer, or employee of the United States to exercise any direction, supervision, or control over the curriculum, program of instruction, administration, or personnel of any educational institution, school, or school system, or over the selection of library resources, textbooks, or other printed or published instructional materials by any educational institution or school system…”

And for those still believing the federal government isn’t “exercising direction, supervision or control” of the school system, look at two things.

1. The federal technical review of tests being mandated by the Department of Education.

2. The federal mandate that testing consoria must synchronize “across consortia,” that status updates and phone conferences must be made available to the Dept. of Education regularly, and that data collected must be shared with the federal government “on an ongoing basis”

3. The recent federal alteration of privacy laws that have taken away parental consent over student data collection.

Finally: the “most annoying manipulation tactic” award for the National Review Article is a tie between the last two sentences of the National Review article, which, combined, say, “Conservatives used to be in favor of holding students to high standards… aren’t they still?” Please.

Let’s rephrase it:

Americans used to be in favor of legitimate, nonexperimental standards for children that were unattached to corporate greed and that were constitutionally legal… Aren’t we still?

 

“Texans Must Be Patient: Help Is on the Way”

By Donna Garner 4.3.13

I listened to the Senate Education Committee’s public hearing on various bills yesterday morning.  One of the first people to testify was Texas Commissioner of Education Michael Williams, and various responses between him and Sen. Dan Patrick occurred as they discussed the present high-school graduation requirements vs. Sen. Patrick’s SB 3 and SB 1724.

 HB 5, SB 3, SB 1724 – DUMBING DOWN BILLS

Sen. Patrick tried to justify SB 3 by saying it increases academic requirements.  However, Tex. Ed. Comm. Michael Williams explained that presently only 20% of our high-school students elect to go into the least rigorous Minimum graduation plan because the default plan (the norm) is the more rigorous Recommended 4 x 4 plan (4 years each of English, Math, Science, and Social Studies). 

Under Sen. Patrick’s SB 3, the Foundation plan would become the default plan (the norm).  This would undoubtedly result in a much larger percentage of students choosing to take only the Foundation courses instead of taking the more rigorous Recommended or Advanced (i.e., Distinguished) courses.  

Sen. Patrick’s Foundation plan is only slightly more rigorous than the present Minimum plan. By allowing a large swath of our Texas high-school students to graduate under the Foundation plan rather than the more rigorous plans, we can expect the largest percentage of graduates under SB 3 to walk across the stage at graduation having a lower level of foundational knowledge and skills.

WHY WE MUST NOT LET OUR STANDARDS DOWN NOW

Right now, 80% of Texas students are in the Recommended degree plan; none have walked across the stage yet because they are presently high-school sophomores and freshmen. 

Out of those students who have graduated under the “old” plan, only 48% have gone on to higher education in Texas.  Sadly, 30% of those have required college remediation.  

It is for this reason that the SBOE working with the Texas Education Agency decided to implement the 15 STAAR/End-of-Course tests in English/Math/Science/Social Studies – to measure, show, and push toward better teaching and learning in these courses.

Like it or not, the fact is that high-stakes STAAR/End-of-Course tests motivate both teachers and students to strive for a higher standard.

If the legislature decides to gut these EOC’s in the four core courses (Grades 9 – 11), then how can we possibly believe that the educational level of students graduating from our Texas high schools will improve over what is occurring right now?  Presently less than half of our high school graduates go on to college (48%), and 30% of those require remediation before they can even get started receiving college credit.

THE WRONG DEBATE

A debate over Algebra II occurred at the hearing.  Sen. Patrick said he had heard that colleges/universities no longer consider Algebra II to be an indicator of college readiness. Comm. Williams said he had heard that rumor but had not seen anything definitive. Sen. Patrick asked Comm. Williams to gather data on this issue.

What the public and legislators need to understand is that the reason colleges/universities may have lost confidence in the Algebra II course is that the “old” dumbed-down TEKS (curriculum standards) have been in our schools since 1997.  The majority of students graduating under those standards (today’s juniors and seniors) most likely do not have the college-ready skills that they need. 

The requirement for students to take Algebra II is not the problem; the problem is that the rigor in math all the way through school under the old Math TEKS (passed in 1997) simply has not been there. 

TOO SOON TO BACK OFF

The new more rigorous TEKS (adopted starting in May 2008) and the more rigorous STAAR/EOC’s have not even produced any high-school graduates yet.  Only sophomores on down have been exposed to the more rigorous TEKS and STAAR/EOC’s. 

If the legislature will just take their hands off the present New Plan (15 EOC’s, 4 x 4 course requirements) and allow it to go forward, the graduates who emerge from this year’s sophomores will prove that taking Algebra II, the other 4 x 4 courses, and the15 End-of-Course tests have indeed elevated their college-ready/workforce status.

SAYING THE OBVIOUS

At yesterday morning’s Senate hearing, another discussion ensued over Pearson(the largest publishing company in the world and the producer of the STAAR/EOC’s). Sen. Patrick asked Comm. Williams to produce data to show how many tests each year Pearson scores nationally and how much time each evaluator spends on each subjectively scored question.   

Exactly!  That is why Type #1 TEKS are so important and why we fought to get Type #1 TEKS adopted by the Texas State Board of Education (SBOE) starting in May 2008.  The old Type #2 TEKS and TAKS tests were very subjective, and that is why teachers had to teach their students “to play the TAKS game” in order to help them pass those subjectively graded TAKS tests.

The Type #1 STAAR/EOC tests are a “different animal.”   These new tests contain a majority of objectively scored questions with right-or-wrong answers.  Subjectivity is a bad thing on high-stakes tests given at the state (or national) level because the value system of whoever evaluates the questions is an all-important and subjective factor.

On the new Type #1 ELAR-STAAR/EOC alone there are some 40 right-or-wrong grammar/usage objectively scored questions. This was not the case on the old TAKS tests in which much more subjectivity was the norm. The new, fact-based, academic, Type #1 TEKS have made it much easier for Pearson to create right-or-wrong, objectively scored questions; and this has cut down on the subjectivity in grading the STAAR/EOC’s.   

PATIENCE NEEDED

Comm. Williams explained that the STAAR/EOC’s have only been given for one year (School Year 2011-12) and that over time, the teachers will adjust by increasing their own content knowledge so that they are able to raise the level of instruction in their classrooms. 

The key word here is “patience.”

Parents need to be patient while the New Plan begins to take hold in their children’s classrooms.

Students need to be patient while they move steadily into learning more content knowledge at each grade level.  This in turn will eventually raise their academic levels so that the STAAR/EOC’s will not frighten them anymore.

Administrators need to be patient also.  After this year’s juniors have taken the TAKS tests, high schools will not have to worry about giving both the TAKS and the STAAR/EOC’s. By this time next year when this year’s sophomores and freshmen pass to the next grade levels, the New Plan will largely be in place except for the seniors IF only the legislature will back away from gutting what we who care about children and their future have worked ten years to accomplish – authentic education reform in Texas.

Legislators need to be patient and give the New Plan time to work. At this point only the high school sophomores on down have experienced the rigor and depth of instruction in the new Type #1 TEKS.

It would be a terrible shame for this group of Texas Legislators to go down in history as the ones who prevented Texas from leading the country in education reform.

Even worse yet, it would be a blot on these legislators’ heads if the colleges, universities, and the workforce in years to come were able to lay the blame for the downfall of the Texas economy on the 83rd Legislative Session.  

P. S.  In listening to the Senate Education Committee public hearing yesterday morning, I heard Sen. Dan Patrick say that Sen. Van de Putte is going to come forth with an amendment to SB 3 that would make it a requirement for all high-schoolstudents to get an endorsement. Perhaps the legislators have begun to hear us on this one point…  (Please see “The Toxic Trio of Bad Bills: HB 5, SB 3, SB 1724” – 4.1.13 —  http://educationviews.org/the-toxic-trio-of-bad-bills/ )

 

*If CSCOPE had not slithered into our Texas public schools as an outgrowth of SB 6 (passed in the last legislative session), the education reform begun in Texas in May 2008 would have already elevated the academic achievement in our Texas classrooms.  However, because CSCOPE is Type #2, it has impeded the progress that was meant to be seen in our Texas classrooms by now.  According to the test results posted on the Texas Tribune website, CSCOPE schools did worse than non-CSCOPE schools on the STAAR/End-of-Course tests (2011-12 School Year)

“CSCOPE HEARING: Two Sides of the Coin”

by Donna Garner

4.2.13 *I took notes of this meeting as fast as I could, and I trust that the information presented is accurate.

Same story, second verse — Back on Jan. 31, 2013, the Texas Senate Education Committee held a public hearing on CSCOPE. Today, April 2, 2013, another public hearing on CSCOPE was held by the same Sen. Education Committee; but this time the hearing was tied to a piece of legislation — SB 1406.

SB 1406 seeks to give the elected members of the Texas State Board of Education (SBOE) oversight and direction over CSCOPE.

Photo by Scott Butner

TWO SIDES OF THE COIN

Basically two groups of people testified today.  One group was made up of the school administrators and school boards who think they cannot live without CSCOPE.  They claim CSCOPE is a much-needed management tool and that their districts cannot possibly afford the expense of writing their own curriculum. Hence, CSCOPE is the answer to all their problems!  Never mind that qualified teachers have always been able to write their own excellent lesson plans for eons.

The other group was made up of the parents and the citizens of Texas who are concerned with the many very troubling aspects of CSCOPE and who either want the Texas State Board of Education to be given oversight and direction over CSCOPE or else want to put CSCOPE completely out of business.

The first group seemed more concerned about CSCOPE giving them a system to micromanage classroom teachers while the latter group talked about their concerns over what their children and other Texas children are actually learning in the CSCOPE lessons.

In other words, the first group was concerned about control; while the latter group was focused on students’ learning and the damage done to children’s

vulnerable minds from being taught erroneous and sometimes biased CSCOPE lessons.

It is important to point out that all of the many school administrators who came to testify were getting paid for their mileage, meals, time away from school, and overnight accommodations.

The parents and the public who came to testify did so on their own dime. They took off work or else left their families to drive all the way down to Austin. If I were a Texas Senator, I would take much more seriously the concerns of those people with no vested interests.

The school administrators all talked from the same playbook (as usual). Most of them had been misinformed about the bill and thought it was a bill to take local control away from their districts.

As Senator Dan Patrick stated, “Wouldn’t it make you sleep better in the future if you knew that the SBOE had looked over the lesson plans so that you won’t have to worry about what’s in them?”

Senator Campbell explained to the school administrators that legislators appropriate dollars for education and are accountable constitutionally (1) to make sure those funds are spent efficiently and (2) to see that an adequate education is provided for Texas’ public school students.

The Senator said that since CSCOPE is flawed with errors and had been shrouded in secrecy that a light needed to be shined on it.  She emphasized that SB 1406 does not take away local control.  It makes sure that legislators are held accountable for the funds that are entrusted to them by the taxpayers.

 

SBOE CHAIR REVEALED CSCOPE EVALUATION PLANS FOR SOCIAL STUDIES

 Barbara Cargill, chair of the Texas State Board of Education (SBOE), described how she had been asked by Senator Patrick to appoint an ad-hoc committee. It met on Friday, March 29, in Dallas, Texas. The ad-hoc committee is made up of four SBOE members and three CSCOPE directors including the state TESCCC director.

Cargill explained that on April 22 – April 29, the public can start applying to be on the review panels.  May 13 is the hard deadline for SBOE members to submit their panel nominations. Three to nine people will be chosen for each panel based upon the number of CSCOPE lessons assigned to them.  Selected panel members will be notified by May 20, and passwords will be assigned. All of the reviews will be done virtually.

The end goal is to review all of the 400 lessons and tests in the Social Studies component of CSCOPE.  (The total of CSCOPE lessons in all four subject areas is close to 1,600).

The panels are to finish going through the first two six weeks of lessons between June 3 – 16.  If the panel members need to meet, they can go to their nearest Education Service Centers and participate through videoconferencing.  This will keep the costs down and will keep the panel members from having to travel and be gone from home.

The SBOE approved operating board rules in its January 2013 meeting; and taking the objectives for instructional materials approved by the Board, Cargill hopes to combine these to form an easy-to-use, objective checklist that the panels can utilize in their evaluations.

SB 1406 does not require TESCCC/CSCOPE to implement the recommendations of the review panels, but it is hoped that TESCCC/CSCOPE will choose to do so rather than experience the public’s animosity if the SBOE’s good faith gesture is ignored.  Cargill pointed out that the SBOE is doing this review without any cost to TESCCC/CSCOPE and that they should be glad to utilize the panels’ findings.

TROUBLESOME EXAMPLES PRESENTED FROM CSCOPE LESSONS

Barbara Cargill came prepared with a large packet made up of copies of CSCOPE lessons that contained factual errors, grammar/spelling mistakes, and questionably left-leaning examples from CSCOPE lessons.  These included such examples as:

  •  Readability problems with Grades 1 – 5 lessons written above grade level and Grades 6 – 12 written below grade level 
  • Many sentences with no periods, improper punctuation, incorrect usage such as “affects” instead of “effects”
  • Two diagrams (triangles) in an Algebra I lesson that math teachers say is an impossible problem to solve
  • A Grade 5 science unit on forces that contains incorrect examples of a hypothesis vs. observations
  • A diagram of a circuit without the wires being wrapped around the ends of the bulb
  • A lesson on law and motion using a hammer but pictured with an incorrect angle
  • A lesson using a spinner to graft the data of a student’s blood sugar level but that indicates incorrect medical information that could put a person’s life in danger
  • Incorrect medical information about running a fever or vomiting
  • A lesson which puts the U. S. under a questionable label that should say “free enterprise and capitalism”
  • A lesson with a very tiny picture of the U. S. Capitol under a label that could lead children to disrespect America
  • A derogatory term used to describe a family member
  • A deliberately prejudicial reference to the SBOE and its authority over instructional materials (i.e., textbooks)
  • A diagram of a man climbing a staircase that shows Communism as superior

Throughout the five-hour hearing on SB 1406, it did not seem to matter how many mistakes, flaws, misspellings, grammatical errors, factual errors, inappropriate, and biased statements were documented.  The school administrators sang CSCOPE’s praises as if they had not even heard any of the  negatives that were presented.  Hardly any of the administrators seemed bothered about CSCOPE’s secrecy, lack of transparency, the teacher “gag” order, and the highly unethical (or illegal) incorporation of TESCCC  operating as a shell company after using taxpayers’ dollars to create its product — all done without permission from the Texas Legislature.

Under questioning by the Senators, an ESC/TESCCC director indicated that a list of about 200 CSCOPE writers had been provided to the Senators and that some of these wrote entire lessons and some wrote only parts of lessons.  He also admitted that insufficient oversight and review of the CSCOPE lessons had occurred

Sen. Patrick asked one of the ESC directors to provide the Senators with a breakdown of how the $15 to $16 Million paid to CSCOPE last year was utilized (e.g., how much was paid to the writers, etc.)  The director stated that the people at the ESC’s who work on CSCOPE draw their salaries from the ESC’s and that their jobs are dependent upon CSCOPE’s success.

Since the Jan. 2013 public hearing, TESCCC has agreed to dissolve itself; but Sen. Patrick said that if CSCOPE continues to stay in the lesson plan business, it may be necessary to create a statute that will make sure no backtracking occurs.

TESTIMONY OF VARIOUS CSCOPE CRITICS

 Witness Colleen Vera presented documents she was finally able to get from TESCCC’s released board minutes that showed the directors had talked about selling CSCOPE to other states. She also found a statement from a 2011 meeting in which the directors were discussing whether CSCOPE’s primary goal should be just making money or serving the children of Texas.

 John Griffing provided testimony that proved that CSCOPE schools did worse than non-CSCOPE schools on the STAAR/End-of-Course tests (2011-12 School Year).  He stated, “CSCOPE does not work on STAAR/EOC.  Why remake the wheel?  Why not emulate the schools that are succeeding?  Why trust something that has shown us only failure?”

Testifier Peggy Venable who travels widely around the state of Texas said she has heard CSCOPE complaints everywhere she has gone.  She said she has yet to meet any citizens and/or parents who like CSCOPE.

Jeanine MacGregor presented the Senators with actual examples of CSCOPE lessons that have been plagiarized.  She also showed the Senators a slide (Slide #8) from a CSCOPE/TESCCC power point that vilified by name some of the people who had come to the Jan. 31, 2013 Senate Education Committee  hearing and had testified against CSCOPE.

Sen. Patrick was visibly upset that such a list had been circulated and said the Texas Attorney General would be notified so that he could track down who (ESC, TESCCC, local school district, individual) had initiated Slide #8.

Neal Fry offered a replacement bill for SB 1406 that would take care of the glaring double standard that exists in SB 6 regarding textbooks vs. online curriculum.

Deborah Parrish presented her concerns about the lack of phonics instruction in CSCOPE. She said that research from Johns Hopkins shows phonics is a major tool especially with low-income students. She stated that the 60% of Texas children who come from low-economic homes are the ones who are being hurt by CSCOPE the most because of the lack of phonics instruction.

FURTHER COMMENTS FROM SENATORS

Senator Campbell voiced her concern about the questionable CSCOPE lessons that have been removed by TESCCC once located but that have misinformed students for many years.

Sen. Patrick indicated his concern with the large number of curriculum standards that are found in the TEKS and wants the next legislative session to consider reducing the number of TEKS elements.

A number of people chose to register their positions rather than to testify, and the total number of people for and against SB 1406 appeared to be about equal.

============

Join the Movement to Stop CSCOPE

Click the photo to sign the Petition and Join the movement to#StopCSCOPE 

Women On the Wall  takes on the issues that matter. Sharing information and updates on our weekly radio show on Monday mornings at 10 am CST. You will not want to miss this show. We will have up to date information on CSCOPE  and guests who are the experts on education and other issues that are effecting our children and grandchildren.

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Knowledge is Power and together we can make the difference!!

Alice Linahan

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Statement from Attorney General Greg Abbott on CSCOPE

“The Attorney General’s Office has been working with Sen. Dan Patrick to scrutinize the CSCOPE program for several months.  We are deeply disturbed by the CSCOPE content and have significant legal concerns about the program’s operations.  Inexplicably, CSCOPE’s officials still have not taken any real steps to address the very concerns that have been raised thus far.  It is time for the veil of secrecy to be eliminated and we will continue working collaboratively with the Legislature until CSCOPE is held accountable for any potential improprieties.”

Are we Desensitizing our Daughters? More Texas High School Girls wearing Islamic Attire

While in Washington last week Women On The Wall asked the question…..

With the CSCOPE and Common Core Curriculum are we creating a National Security problem. Please take the time to listen to the answer and listen to Pamela Gellar’s solution.

Hint it is YOU-

CSCOPE ~ Are we Desensitizing our Daughters?Now today we have reports of  Texas Cscope School in Rockwall ISD has students adorn Hijabs in a High School Geography Class. From Ginger Russell More Texas Students in Islam Attire 

The students photographed themselves and posted the photos on the popular  social media site, Istagram.

Presently in the Islamic tourist region of the Maldives a young 15 year old girl is sentenced to flogging of a 100 whippings. Her crime was ruled “SEX OUTSIDE OF MARRIAGE” due to the fact that her step dad raped her continually over a period of years and murdered her ba

image_1364134192849396Rockwall girl 3

Let’s step back and look as what in fact is happening in other parts of the world where in the name of “Political Correctness” have allowed in Islamic Sharia law. From Pat

NewMediaJournal-Islamic extremists are stepping up the creation of “no-go” areas in European cities that are off-limits to non-Muslims.

Many of the “no-go” zones function as microstates governed by Islamic Sharia law. Host-country authorities effectively have lost control in these areas and in many instances are unable to provide even basic public aid such as police, fire fighting and ambulance services.

The “no-go” areas are the by-product of decades of multicultural policies that have encouraged Muslim immigrants to create parallel societies and remain segregated rather than become integrated into their European host nations.

Related update – France set to deport radical Imams from the country

 

Now I ask you again…..Are we desensitizing our Daughters and creating a National Security Threat.

Please keep in mind that because we are taking on the public schools parents are looking for other avenues to educate their children. Many who can’t afford private schools (even though private schools use CommonCore and CSCOPE) run to charter schools. Who by the way target the lower income hispanic and black community.

Just to be clear, I am not against all Charter Schools. Although I firmly believe we must have major safe guards in place to protect our citizens from organizations who seek access to our children to harm our nation. I also believe we should hold elected officials accountable for the legislation they put forward which may pose a National Security threat to our nation.

By promoting Charter School legislation some elected officials see a way to get votes and stay in their positions of power. Which gives them the opportunity to move to higher office. In addition it opens the door to raise huge campaign donations from charter school lobbies.  An example of such groups is the Cosmos Foundation/Harmony/Gulen Science Centers who have given free all expense paid trips to legislators in Texas and across the country and whose consultant was former executive director of the Republican Party and trusted advisor to President George W. Bush, Karen Hughes Hughes. 

If you are reading this an asking what are the Harmony Charter Schools? Below is a great video by Frank Gaffney founder of the (Center for Security Policy) as he works within his own community to stop the Gulen movment in Loudoun Virginia. Harmony is the name for the Gulen/Cosmos Foundation schools in Texas. In other states they go by different names. “

 

List of Gulen Charter Schools in the United States

 

An example of what results is Texas Senate Bill 2 currently working its way through the Texas Legislature.  Some of the heroes on exposing CSCOPE are now pushing a bill that completely opens the door for the Gulen Charter Schools to come into Texas in mass numbers.

Below is a breakdown of Senate Bill 2.

Senate bill 2 is a comprehensive overhaul of the laws that govern charter schools.  Changes are made on the authorizing, governing, and establishing of charter schools in Texas.

Looking at the bill, there were a lot of areas of concern, given the recent experience on CScope in Texas.

 

  • The current laws cap the number of charter schools in Texas at 215.  The cap is entirely removed.

 

  • A new governing board of 7 appointees will be the only oversight of these schools.  The State Board of Education will have no authority to grant or revoke charter school privileges in this state.  This puts us back in the position of non-elected officials in charge of the education.

 

  • If there are any vacant or underutilized facilities in a school district, the ISD “shall” lease that taxpayer funded facility to any approved charter school that wants it.  Note the word in the bill is shall (a mandate) rather than the word “may” (which is a choice).

 

  • First time charter schools will be granted a license to operate for a term of 5 years.  It will automatically renew at that point for 20 years.  Most of the Harmony/ Gulen charter schools (currently under question) will fall in the 20 year category.

 

  • The TEA will be required to post all vacant or underutilized facilities for all to see.  For organized charter efforts underway, it will be easy to snap up these facilities all over the state.

 

  • No new charter will have to pay rent or purchase the facility.  They pay $1.

 

  • The license of a charter school can be revoked by the newly formed commission only under the following circumstance:

a.  The school performs badly in 3 out of 5 years
b.  The school is not fiscally satisfactory on multiple reviews

 

Questions to ask…..

1. Why are non- elected officials being put in charge without public accountability?
2.  Why a 20 year renewal?
3.  Shouldn’t we worry about enormous expansion of schools of any type without input?
4.  What if the curriculum is found to be offensive?
5.  Why is our state funding for-profit enterprises?

The Education Committee on SB 2 (Senator Dan Patrick) concerning Charter Schools is considering what to do.  They must hear from you. ASAP The committee members are:

Chair: Sen. Dan Patrick   512) 463-0107
Vice Chair: Sen. Eddie Lucio, Jr.  (512) 463-0127
Members: Sen. Donna Campbell  512) 463-0125
Sen. Robert Duncan  (512) 463-0128
Sen. Kel Seliger  (512) 463-0131
Sen. Larry Taylor  (512) 463-0111
Sen. Leticia Van de Putte  (512) 463-0126
Sen. Royce West  (512) 463-0123

 

Below are charter school safeguards that have been proposed by various experts.

1. That a financial audit conducted under generally accepted accounting practices by an independent, reputable auditor be required – and publicly available – from any charter school operator applying for bond guarantees or other financial incentives;

2. That the name, address, and citizenship of all board members and key administrators applying for said guarantee(s) or other financial incentives issued by the state be recorded and made available to the public;

3. That the funds in the underlying bonds or other financial incentives to privately owned, publicly financed schools are to be used solely for schools within Texas;

4. Severe criminal penalties for fraudulent activities involving bond guarantees or other financial incentives issued by states – such as a Class 2 Felony for criminal or securities fraud violations.

===================

Below Safeguards proposed in the 82nd Legislative Session in Texas but that the Texas Legislature did not pass:

1.  Proof of U. S. citizenship for all charter school operator board members and top five highest-paid administrators. (Public ISD trustees must be U. S. citizens.)

2.  Names, titles, and biographies posted online for all charter operator board members and top five highest-paid administrators.

3.  Check registers posted online. (It is estimated that over 70 % of local ISD dollars are online.)

 

Why did these safeguards not pass? Because the elected officials were beholden to the lobby groups in Austin vs the people who elected them as their Representatives. 

Join the Movement to Stop CSCOPE

Click the photo to sign the Petition and Join the movement to#StopCSCOPE 

Women On the Wall  takes on the issues that matter. Sharing information and updates on our weekly radio show on Monday mornings at 10 am CST. You will not want to miss this show. We will have up to date information on CSCOPE  and guests who are the experts on education and other issues that are effecting our children and grandchildren.

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Knowledge is Power and together we can make the difference!!

Alice Linahan

Follow @AliceLinahan on twitter and Facebook 

Communist Goal #17 – Concerning U.S. Schools

Communist Goal #17.

Get control of the schools. Use them as transmission belts for Socialism and current Communist propaganda. Soften the curriculum. Get control of teachers associations. Put the party line in textbooks.

On Jan. 10, 1963, Congressman Albert S. Herlong Jr. of Florida read a list of 45 Communist goals into the Congressional Record. The list was derived from researcher Cleon Skousen’s book “The Naked Communist.” These principles are well worth revisiting today in order to gain insights into the thinking and strategies of much of our so-called liberal elite.

(Read it and weep for America!)

http://archive.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2003/5/8/133540.shtml

The Devil in the Details of Comprehensive Immigration Reform

February 27, 2013

Caution, Illegal Immigration

Odd that if you repeat something enough, people actually start believing it despite facts that prove the opposite is actually true.

Since the election of President Barrack Obama, Americans have witnessed this phenomenon on a grand scale.  Day after day, we’ve watched the main stream media join in lock step with the current administration to bring about the total transformation of our nation.

Most disturbing is the determination by some Republicans to grant amnesty, legal status and a pathway to citizenship to millions of uneducated and undereducated illegal aliens.  The end result of such action will turn our formerly exceptional nation into a North American version of neighboring Third World countries.

Hours after Romney’s defeat in 2012 the main stream media tossed out the poisonous bait to the GOP leadership and they swallowed it – hook, line and sinker.  The bait is the great lie that America is unable to secure its borders or enforce its long standing immigration laws so American citizens must shut their mouths and witness their nation’s “inevitable changing demographics.”  Inevitable?  Only if our government continues down the path it is on – allowing the unarmed invasion that has been going on now for several decades.

America possesses not only the right but also the knowledge and technology to stop this nonsense immediately IF only our elected officials have the backbone and desire to speak the truth and act accordingly.   Do they?

Many Republican party elites, party leaders (at all levels), and big business owners/donors jumped on the Democrat amnesty bandwagon to give 11, 20, or 30+ million illegal aliens residing in our country legal status and a pathway to citizenship.  The truth is that those numbers will be much greater when chain migration is factored in.

So who is leading this insane suicide mission the GOP has launched?  

At the front of the pack are corporations and “Big Business” — more specifically, Republicans who got their tail ends handed to them in 2007 when the grassroots successfully rose up and killed President Bush’s attempt to force “comprehensive immigration reform” upon rule-of-law American citizens.

Since that 2007 defeat the group has been working overtime to convince lesser informed party voters and GOP leaders (at all levels) that the party must abandon its traditional Republican rule-of-law stance on immigration in order to win the Hispanic/Latino vote and future elections.  Few seem to know that history does not support that line of thought.

U.S. census stats reveal that the majority of our illegal aliens come from countries south of our border.   While immigrants from other parts of the world tend to vote Democrat once granted American citizenship, a review of Hispanic/Latino voting patterns is vital in relation to predicted demographic shifts in America and upcoming election outcomes.

To those who have been following this debate and reviewing the facts about voting patterns of Hispanics/Latinos in America over the past 32 years it is hard to call the actions of the Republican leadership anything other than utterly stupid.

Since it seems many people in our nation appear to lack common sense when it comes to critical thinking, rule-of-law Americans across the nation should be asking the following two common sense questions as they consider and discuss this extremely serious issue:

First, if there was any remote possibility that the proposed amnestied 11 – 30+ million illegal aliens would vote for Republicans do you honestly think the Democrats would be working so hard to give them amnesty and eventually the right to vote?

Secondly, based on historical stats – why would any dedicated Republican Party leader support an action that ultimately would deliver millions of new Democrat voters for decades to come while perpetuating Republican defeats?

Obviously, the Democrats would not be working so hard to give legal status/path to citizenship/amnesty or anything else to 11 – 30+ million new people if they were in any way inclined to become Republican voters!  Hello Republicans – anyone home?

Stats indicate that America’s Hispanics/Latinos in general (and immigrant populations) vote DEMOCRAT – not Republican.

Statistics on voting patterns compiled by the Pew Hispanic Center, the Center for Immigration Studies and others have provided compelling data that must be considered.

The following excerpts from a November 8, 2012 Center for Immigration Studies article by Ronald W. Mortensen, entitled “Hispanics Were Democrats Long Before Illegal Immigration Became an Issue”  should give one reason to wonder who is doing the homework for the GOP on this issue:

“… pro-illegal-immigrant elements of the Republican Party fail to acknowledge that for at least the last nine elections, Hispanics have voted heavily in favor of Democratic presidential candidates over Republican candidates by an average of 64 percent to 31 percent, as shown by data compiled by the Pew Hispanic Center.”

Year Democrat Republican
1980/Reagan/Carter) 56% 35%
1984 (Reagan/Mondale) 61% 37%
1988 (Bush/Dukakis) 69% 30%
1992 (Bush/Clinton) 61% 25%
1996 (Dole/Clinton) 72% 21%
2000 (Bush/Gore) 62% 35%
2004 (Bush/Kerry) 58% 40%
2008 (Obama/McCain) 67% 31%
2012 (Obama/Romney) 71% 27%
Average 64% 31%

Article excerpts provide additional insight on several of the referenced elections in response to a Wall Street Journal article absurdly suggesting Romney lost the 2012 election because of his stance on illegal immigration:

 “The expulsion crowd at the Journal never acknowledges the fact that pro-amnesty, “comprehensive immigration reform” leader John McCain (R-Ariz.), was rejected by 67 percent of Hispanic voters, that 72 percent of Hispanics voted against Bob Dole, that 69 percent voted against the elder Bush and that 62 percent voted against the younger Bush. So, it could be argued that Romney’s “tough” illegal immigration stance cost him only 4 percentage points of the Hispanic vote as opposed to that of McCain and that he actually picked up 6 points over Dole and 2 points more than Bush senior did.

“The bottom line is that Hispanics are largely Democrats and they don’t swing their support to pro-illegal-immigration Republicans such as McCain and or even to Bush senior, who was vice president at the time of the 1986 amnesty”.

 “In fact, after the 1986 amnesty was signed by President Reagan, the Hispanic vote for the Democratic presidential candidate (Michael Dukakis) in the next election increased by 8 percent. After McCain attempted to push through another amnesty, Hispanic support for the Democratic candidate (Barrack Obama) in the next presidential election increased by 9 percent over that received by John Kerry in the previous presidential election.”

Still have doubts as to the likelihood of future massive declines in Republican Party victories should another amnesty pass?   If so I encourage you to read an article entitled,  “Immigration, Political Realignment, and the Demise of Republican Political Prospects” by James G. Gimpel.

It certainly appears that many “Big Business” Republicans and GOP leaders could care less about the America they leave to our children and grandchildren.  If they did, they would be leading the charge for America to choose the best and brightest immigrants for legal and orderly entry into our nation.  Instead, they are doing the exact opposite.

If you value the America you grew up in, do your homework and Seek the Truth on the issue of illegal immigration.   Then … Share the Truth with you friends, neighbors, elected officials, b­­­­­­­­­usiness owners and anyone else who will listen.  Last but not least … continue to Stand for Truth and pray God gives us the strength to prevail in the battle for America’s survival.

Connecting the Dots… Common Core Curriculum ~ CSCOPE and the Gulen/Charter Public Schools

Below is a series of short videos that will explain what the Common Core Curriculum is, who owns it and the threat it is to the United States. Notice Common Core is referenced in Michelle Malkin’s lastest  article which I highly recommend that you take the time to read. Rotten to the Core, Part III: Lessons from Texas and the Growing Grassroots Revolt

You have to also understand the connection between Common Core and the Texas CSCOPE online technology curriculum that is getting national attention. In the video linked above Jane Robins with the American Principles Project explains who Linda Darling Hammond is. 

One of the key influencers on the developers of Common Core is Linda Darling Hammond.

The developers of CSCOPE  reference Linda Darling Hammond as professional developer in their materials.

 Below will explain why the Common Core/CSCOPE opens the door for the Gulen Charter School and brings forward a major National Security Threat. 

Photo By New YorK Times Click Photo to linked article.

Because we are taking on the public schools parents are looking for other avenues to educate their children. Many who can’t afford private schools (even though private schools use CommonCore and CSCOPE) run to charter schools. Who by the way target the lower income hispanic and black community.

By promoting Charter School legislation some elected officials see a way to get votes and stay in their positions of power. Which gives them the opportunity to move to higher office. In addition it opens the door to raise huge campaign donations from charter school lobbies such as the Cosmos Foundation/Harmony/Gulen Science Centers who are giving free all expense paid trips to legislators in Texas and across the country and whose consultant was former executive director of the Republican Party and trusted advisor to President George W. Bush, Karen Hughes Hughes. 

 Just to be clear, I am not against all Charter Schools. I firmly believe we must put in safe guards first before passing comprehensive Charter School legislation and hold elected officials accountable for the legislation they put forward which may pose a true National Security threat to our nation.

If you are reading this and asking what are the Harmony Charter Schools? Below is a great video by Frank Gaffney founder of the (Center for Security Policy) as he works within his own community to stop the Gulen movment in Loudoun Virginia. Harmony is the name for the Gulen/Cosmos Foundation schools in Texas. In other states they go by different names. “

 

List of Gulen Charter Schools in the United States

An example of what results is Texas Senate Bill 2 currently working its way through the Texas Legislature.  Some of the heroes on exposing CSCOPE are now pushing a bill that completely opens the door for the Gulen Charter Schools to come into Texas in mass numbers.

Below is a breakdown of  Texas Senate Bill 2. 

 

Senate bill 2 is a comprehensive overhaul of the laws that govern charter schools.  Changes are made on the authorizing, governing, and establishing of charter schools in Texas.

Looking at the bill, there were a lot of areas of concern, given the recent experience with CScope in Texas.

  • The current laws cap the number of charter schools in Texas at 215.  The cap is entirely removed.
  • A new governing board of 7 appointees will be the only oversight of these schools.  The State Board of Education will have no authority to grant or revoke charter school privileges in this state.  This puts us back in the position of non-elected officials in charge of the education.
  • If there are any vacant or underutilized facilities in a school district, the ISD “shall” lease that taxpayer funded facility to any approved charter school that wants it.  Note the word in the bill is shall (a mandate) rather than the word “may” (which is a choice).
  • First time charter schools will be granted a license to operate for a term of 5 years.  It will automatically renew at that point for 20 years.  Most of the Harmony/ Gulen charter schools (currently under question) will fall in the 20 year category.
  • The TEA will be required to post all vacant or underutilized facilities for all to see.  For organized charter efforts underway, it will be easy to snap up these facilities all over the state.
  • No new charter will have to pay rent or purchase the facility.  They pay $1.
  • The license of a charter school can be revoked by the newly formed commission only under the following circumstance:

      a.  The school performs badly in 3 out of 5 years
b.  The school is not fiscally satisfactory on multiple reviews

 

Questions to ask…..

1. Why are non- elected officials being put in charge without public accountability?
2.  Why a 20 year renewal?
3.  Shouldn’t we worry about enormous expansion of schools of any type without input?
4.  What if the curriculum is found to be offensive?
5.  Why is our state funding for-profit enterprises?

Women On the Wall will be taking on this issue and sharing information and updates on our weekly radio show on Monday mornings at 10 am CST. You will not want to miss this show. We will have up to date information on CSCOPE  and guests who are the experts on education and other issues that are effecting our children and grandchildren.

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Knowledge is Power and together we can make the difference!!

TOM MAYNARD ADMITTED “SELLING” HIS VOTE TO RATLIFF — TEMPLE, TEXAS CSCOPE MEETING TONIGHT

Breaking News from the Temple, TX CSCOPE Meeting Monday February 25, 2013

XXXXX, thank you so much for the details about the Temple, Texas, CSCOPE meeting tonight. The fact that Tom Maynard, new member of the Texas State Board of Education, “sold” his vote to become the chair of the Committee on Instruction is a stunning admission.  In other words, rather than do the right thing and cast his vote for a conservative patriot such as Ken Mercer, Tom decided to “sell” his vote to Ratliff, thereby “anointing” Ratliff and his power play. This is so disgusting.  What a fool Maynard is to have allowed himself to be bought and paid for by Thomas Ratliff.  Maynard will regret that decision as he sees what an unethical person Ratliff really is.

 

For those who are unaware of who Thomas Ratliff is…..

Who is Thomas Ratliff?

Ratliff is the son of former moderate Lt. Governor Bill Ratliff and brother of Freshman House of Representative Bennett Ratliff who it just so happens was named by moderate Speaker of the House Joe Straus to the  2013 Public Education Committee.

Oh by the way….

Thomas Ratliff was ruled to be an illegal member of the SBOE  – registered lobbyist with conflict of interest

Ratliff is a registered lobbyist for Microsoft who sells to clients who do business with the Texas State Board of Education and with the Texas Education Agency, and was ruled by Attorney General Greg Abbott  to be  ineligible to serve on the SBOE.The AG went even further and stated that because Ratliff is ineligible even to be on the SBOE, then Ratliff’s argument in which he says he can recuse himself from certain votes involving his clients is actually mute and void because Ratliff should not be on the SBOE in the first place.

Teachers come firstSo now the question becomes…. is it about educating Texas children or is it about a ruling class of special interest groups who are making millions of dollars off of our Tax dollars and taking money that should be going to hire good teachers who actually know how to educate children with solid Type 1 education and who know how to write a scope and sequence instead of depending on an ineffective curriculum like CSCOPE.

Here is a little financial information you may be interested in.

“CSCOPE: How Much Have Taxpayers Paid?”

Statement from Tom Fabry:These two areas alone — $13 Million for CSCOPE and $30 Million for TASA/TASB — add up to more than $43 Million tax dollars – all going [each year] to unelected organizations outside the control of the SBOE. Many of these are the same Texas school districts that have filed a lawsuit to force the Texas Legislature to give them more of our tax dollars.

 

CSCOPE ~ Controversy in the Media ~ Critics include…..

I DEMAND MY NAME BE ADDED TO THIS LIST OF CRITICS OF CSCOPE

I join with Colleen Vera who commented on Ginger Russell’s post Cscope tries to Intimidate Private Citizens which links to a power point presentation to be given at the CSCOPE conference in San Antonio on Aug. 8th-9th.

Following is their power-point presentation for this upcoming Summer Cscope Conference. CSCOPE Intimidating Citizens?

Therefore I join Colleen Vera when she says……

I have a complaint against the person(s) responsible for this Power Point. My name was NOT listed as a critic of CSCOPE on slide #8. Also, no descriptions of criticisms are given. To be accurate, mine should read as follows:

“Colleen Vera – Retired Texas Teacher; critical of the fact that no one at CSCOPE, ESC 13, or TESCCC has yet to be charged with a crime for stealing property from the citizens of Texas by transferring ownership of CSCOPE to a private corporation under their own control, holding secret meetings against the Texas Open Meetings Act, and/or misuse of public funds by using public employees to staff a private corporation.”

Wade Labay promised the Texas Senate Education Committee that CSCOPE was now transparent. So people need the whole truth, not just what you want them to hear. Please have my name and the description of my criticism added to the presentation ASAP

[emailpetition id=”2″]

“Border Folly” – A National Security Threat

Lisa Benson on National Security and Illegal Immigration

Written by: Lisa E. BensonFebruary 18, 2013 

Phoenix, Arizona…

As I reported this past Saturday on KKNT 960 AM – Salem Communications – local ranchers are seeing an increase in illegal border crossings and not a decrease as stated by President Obama in last week’s State of the Union Address to the nation.

 

Specifically, a local rancher residing south of Sierra Vista, Arizona, claims that through local citizen surveillance, as well as via monitoring the broadcast frequencies of US Border Patrol agents, it is estimated that there are more than 1,000 illegal crossings a night.  The most obtrusive illegal crossings are happening west of Nogales, Arizona.

 

Moreover, there is a steady influx of Chinese crossing the border illegally. As recently as six nights ago, a group of Chinese were picked up, per the ranchers interception of border patrol communications. Without the interception, we would have never known.

 

With a 2,000 stretch of mutual border with Mexico, the ranchers assert that more than 75% of the border is porous — as evidenced in the picture above, unless a border agent is standing over every square mile of the mutual border, it is impossible to monitor solely with border agents.

 

Per Judicial Watch…

 

…U.S. Border Patrol estimates that three out of four illegal crossings EVADE apprehension.

 

Mr. President, We Demand A Secure Border:

 

As the hot potato issue of immigration reform heats up on Congress, we must

 

DEMAND CONGRESS DEFINE WHAT IS BORDER SECURITY

and tackle border security before comprehensive immigration reform

Difficult to ask when our elected officials want the votes of those they give amnesty to and that includes both political parties.

 

As I wrote in my newsletter, “Houston, We Have A Problem,” there is evidence that there is Iran influence in South America.  Specifically, there is a manned missile base inside of Venezuela.  Security analysts contend that Venezuela may use biological/chemical warheads before they have the full potential to use nuclear.  Hence, US cities are in the direct trajectory.

 

In addition…

As outlined in “A Line In the Sand: Confronting the Threat at the Southwest Border”

 

….and prepared by the Majority Staff of the House Committee on Homeland Security, Michael T. McCaul, Chairman,

 

“Venezuela is providing support — including identity documents — that could prove useful to radical Islamic groups.  The Venezuelan government has issued thousands of cedulas, the equivalent of Social Security cards, to people from places such as Cuba, Columbia, and Middle Eastern nations that host foreign terrorist organizations.  The U.S. officials believe that the Venezuelan government is issuing the documents to people who should not be getting them and that some of these cedulas could be subsequently used to obtain Venezuelan passports and even American visas, which could allow the holder to elude immigration checks and enter the United States.”

 

Further:

“Hugo Chavez, President of Venezuela, has been clearly talking to Iran about uranium,” said a senior administration official. Chavez has made several trips to Iran to foster his solidarity with Iran’s hard-line mullahs.

 

Taking this one step further:

In my radio interview linked below, I point out that Iran’s Asian strategy centers on China. Over the past decade, China’s tremendous economic growth (averaging 8% a year) has generated a voracious appetite for energy.  According to informed estimates, in the coming decade, China could surpass the United States as the world’s largest oil consumer.  Iran plays a key role in China’s energy fortunes; supplying 12% of China’s total imports.

 

Moving this right along…

 

Iranian and Chinese collaboration extends beyond energy resources.  China has long assisted Iran in the defense arena, serving as an early supplier to Iran’s nuclear program and more recently as a contributor to the regime’s military modernization efforts during the early 2000′s.  Between the cozy relationship Iran has with North Korea and China, nuclear proliferation is impossible to stop — certainly sanctions are too weak to cripple this aggressive axis of evil.

 

So, what does this have to do with South America and Chinese Crossing the Border

border train

Trains from Central America and Mexico en route to the U.S. border

 

Frankly, it is unclear who and why the Chinese are crossing into the U.S. illegally.  Maybe they are doing so because they can …or maybe…they cannot come legally because they are unable to obtain visas due to criminal activity and/or they are on a U.S. terrorist watch list.  It is obvious by the aerial photos of trains of illegals making their way to the US border that a few Islamists or Chinese would blend in with the overall population crossing illegally.

Please click on the link above to hear this week’s radio spot

Topic: America Needs To Demand A Closed Border

Before Comprehensive Immigration Reform

A Threat to National Security

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WBTM – Dallas –
Alice Linahan and Rebecca Forest/Hosts for Women on the Wall

Activist Moms Working to Protect America

 

Listen to my weekly radio spot on KKNT 960 AM

Saturday evenings

In the future, look for this on Sunday afternoon KKNT

 

Please watch for more information on the Chinese crossings.  I am going to be traveling to the border with a security detail — along with a journalist colleague and my video camera.  I will have more to report in the coming weeks. ….
I also ask that you please sign up to receive the action alerts from Secure America Now – SAN is central to the efforts to stop the confirmations of Chuck Hagel and John Brennan for CIA Chief.  They are the best resource for information you will need as you continue to call and/or write your Senators to BLOCK these nominations next week post Congress recess.

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www.secureamericanow.org

 

DISCLAIMER:

The information above, and opinions hereto, are that of Lisa Benson and not of any organization or entity.

 

 Lisa Benson2 Meet Lisa Benson… Lisa Benson is an engaging public speaker, activist, writer, fundraiser,and Mideast Policy Hawk analyst.   She gained her experience over a 25-year career in the Pro-Israel movement as a public relations, marketing and fundraising consultant to policy centers (both in Israel and the United States), universities, political candidates, national security organizations, and 9-11 Families.Days following the 9-11 terrorist attack, Lisa was contacted by the esteemed Steven Emerson, Founder of the Investigative Project, and asked to serve as a consultant on projects seeking private financial support for initiatives exposing terrorist cells in the United States. Following, Lisa has worked for many of the high-profile leaders in the national security field including, Steven Emerson, Brigitte Gabriel (ACT for America), Pamela Geller, Robert Spencer, Tom Trento (The United West), Sarah Stern (Endowment for Middle East Truth), Gerald Steinberg (The Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies at Bar-Ilan University).  She is currently consulting for Secure America Now, Lighthouse PAC and Women on the Wall while traveling the nation with national security organizations, as well as for her own lecture series.

 

Lisa is quick to say that she didn’t  seek out a career in national security; her journey in the Anti-Jihad movement was born out of necessity and a need for her expertise in the post 9-11 world.

 

She is a trained nonprofit development professional having served more than 200 organizations worldwide on more than three continents raising in excess of $350 million in her career.  Her experience in strategic planning, fundraising, marketing, communications, and public relations has served a myriad of humanitarian, scientific, higher-education and national security entities.

 

Lisa Benson’s education includes Masters of Public Administration coursework at the Rockefeller Graduate School of Public Policy, State University of New York and a Bachelor of Arts, Cum Laude, from the State University of New York at Albany.

 

The mother of two sons, Lisa is often referred to as a “rainmaker.”  Her clients credit her success to a winning combination of talent, tenacity and sense of humor!

 

To book Lisa for a speaking engagement

Call 602-790-6418 lbenson@lisabensonconsulting.com

 

Please watch for the new website, www.nationalsecurityspeaker.com which is coming soon.

Knowledge is Power and together we can make the difference!!

Alice Linahan

Follow @AliceLinahan on twitter and Facebook 

___________________________________________

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Message to the entire United States: The Grassroots is Powerful, We have Proof ~ CSCOPE

“Message to the entire United States: It was grassroots citizens in Texas who got involved and uncovered CSCOPE.  We can make a difference when we do our “homework” and then contact our elected officiaIMG_7114ls.  Our successful efforts in Texas to bring about change in CSCOPE can be replicated throughout this country to uncover the Common Core Standards which are the Obama administration’s takeover of the public schools right under the noses of the unsuspecting public” – Donna Garner

 

PRESS RELEASE – FROM TEX. SEN. DAN PATRICK, DISTRICT 7

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

February 8, 2013

 

SEN. PATRICK AND CSCOPE ANNOUNCE SWEEPING CHANGES

AUSTIN- Senator Dan Patrick, in coordination with the Texas Education Service Center Curriculum Collaborative (TESCCC), announces significant changes to the CSCOPE curriculum management system.

The TESCCC has worked with Senator Patrick, chairman of the Senate Education Committee, and the State Board of Education (SBOE), to address concerns raised at a recent committee hearing on the CSCOPE system.  The two parties have agreed to several immediate as well as forthcoming changes.

The changes that take effect immediately include:

· All future meetings of the TESCCC Governing Board, beginning with the February meeting, will be public with all the respective notice requirements being met.

· The TESCCC will begin a joint review process of all CSCOPE lessons with the SBOE beginning with Social Studies.

· Amendment of all Terms of Use Agreements, signed by both teachers and districts, removing civil or criminal penalties associated with the release of CSCOPE content.

· Clarifying that all teachers and districts may post any and all CSCOPE lessons that they deem necessary.

 

CSCOPE

Photo Courtesy of Times Record News

In addition to these immediate transparency and quality control changes, CSCOPE will also undergo structural, governance, and other changes, including:

· Ending the non-profit 501(c)3 arrangement that incorporates CSCOPE.

· Initiating the posting of CSCOPE lesson content to their public website.

· Creating a standing curriculum review panel, comprised of:  parents, teachers, school administrators, members of the SBOE, and TESCCC board members.

 

Finally, CSCOPE is notifying all participating school districts that lessons are not intended to be taught verbatim, and the Governing Board generally recommends that local districts utilize CSCOPE lessons solely as a resource.

 

Until CSCOPE lessons can be reviewed through a collaborative process with the SBOE and TESCCC, districts are strongly encouraged to review all lessons at the local level, to ensure that lessons are appropriate for their students.

 

State Board of Education chair Barbara Cargill is encouraged by the changes, saying, “I appreciate CSCOPE’s willingness to address concerns brought to light recently. The State Board of Education looks forward to working with them to resolve these issues, so CSCOPE can remain a useful tool for participating school districts.”

 

Anne Poplin, chair of the TESCCC Governing Board agreed, stating, “We have heard the concerns raised and are working hard to maintain the public’s trust in CSCOPE.  We appreciate Chair Cargill and Senator Patrick’s desire to assist us in ensuring that CSCOPE remains a valuable district resource in the future.”

Photo by Sandy Kelly

Photo by Sandy Kelly

Senator Dan Patrick agreed, “I’m glad the CSCOPE Board realizes that immediate and long term changes must be made to address the serious issues raised by our committee, parents, and teachers. Our committee will be monitoring the situation closely to ensure they follow through with their commitments. We will also be looking at legislation to ensure these changes cannot be reversed in the future and that the SBOE continues in their role of oversight of CSCOPE content. The future of the program will depend on CSCOPE keeping the commitments they have made and gaining the trust of the legislature, teachers, and parents.

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“Most Amazing Senate Ed. Hearing Ever — CSCOPE”

 

by Donna Garner

1.31.13

 

Texas Senate Hearing on CSCOPE with Sen. Dan Patrick

Today’s Texas Senate Education Committee hearing  on CSCOPE was amazing. I watched the proceedings online from 8:30 A. M. until it finished around 3:15 P. M., and I took notes as fast as I could type. These may not be word-for-word, but I trust that I have captured the essence of the hearing. 

 

Texas Senator Dan Patrick led the hearing, and these are the Senators who worked alongside him to question the witnesses:  Donna Campbell, Larry Taylor, Eddie Lucio, Robert Duncan, Ken Paxton, and Kel Seliger.  (As best I could tell from online viewing, Royce West and Leticia Van de Putte did not attend the hearing.) 

 

What thrilled me is that all of us private citizens who have dug out the truth about CSCOPE and who have been vilified for our efforts were vindicated today because the evidence presented proved we were right all along.

 

FACTS REVEALED IN TODAY’S HEARING

 

CSCOPE was originally produced in 2005-2006  by outside consultants, one of whom was Linda Darling-Hammond who is tied to Obama and the Common Core Standards which is a takeover of the public schools by the federal government.  

 

In 2009 CSCOPE was incorporated as a 501(3)(c) non-charitable organization under the TESCCC (Texas Education Service Center Curriculum Collaborative), and the 20 directors of the Education Service Centers (ESC’s) make up the board of directors of TESCCC.  To do this incorporation, no legal counsel was sought from the Texas Attorney General’s office nor from the Commissioner of Education/Texas Education Agency. 

 

Now 875 districts are using CSCOPE and pay for it with taxpayers’ dollars costing from $7 to $9 per student to “rent” CSCOPE each school year.  The monies collected by the ESC’s are passed along to TESCCC and then to their fiscal agent, ESC 13 in Austin.

COST OF CSCOPE AND ORGANIZATIONAL ISSUES

The Senators asked the ESC 13 witness how much school districts have paid for CSCOPE over the last several years, but that information did not seem to be readily available.  Sen. Campbell mentioned that Ector County ISD alone had spent $1.7 for CSCOPE just this school year. 

 

Questions were also raised about whether the ESC staffers who handle CSCOPE  full-time are paid by TESCCC/ESC 13 or by their own ESC’s and whether such an arrangement represents a type of double-dipping.

 

Sen. Campbell wanted to know who owns the proprietary property of CSCOPE if it was developed using public funds — “Do the people of Texas own it?”  She also questioned whether only parents should have access to CSCOPE since all Texas taxpayers paid for it. She said there are many good educators who are active and retired who have a commitment to helping children gain a good education and that everyone in the general public should have easy access to CSCOPE — in the same way that they do to copyrighted textbooks.  Sen. Campbell wanted to know where the checks and balances are to verify the content of CSCOPE.

 

Sen. Patrick told Wade Labay, Statewide Director of CSCOPE, that when a governmental body seeks to form a 501(3)(c), TESCCC should have sought legislative authority.  None was sought by TESCCC.

 

The Senators were very troubled by the fact that the Texas Attorney General’s office has said that the TESCCC is a governmental body yet it is using public funds to develop its product; uses public dollars to pay its ESC employees;  has no TESCCC business office; does not post its agenda; does not allow the public into its meetings; and will not allow public access to its minutes. 

 

“PLAYBOOK” RESPONSE FROM EDUCATION ESTABLISHMENT

Throughout the hearing, whenever members of the “education establishment” testified (e.g., school administrators, curriculum directors, representatives from Texas Association of School Board/Texas Association of School Administrators), it was as if they spoke from one “playbook” which had obviously been put together by ESC personnel. 

 

The common line used by the education establishment was, “Our district bought CSCOPE as a cost-saving curriculum management system to help our students to raise their academic achievement and to master the new STAAR/End-of-Course tests. Our teachers could not live without CSCOPE.” 

However, when hard data and research were sought by the Senators from the “ed establishment” to prove the effectiveness of CSCOPE, none could be produced — only their subjective opinions.  Almost all of the ed establishment witnesses mentioned their close-knit relationships with the ESC’s, and most said they had first heard about CSCOPE through the ESC’s.  Nearly all said their districts were constantly trained by ESC staff on CSCOPE.

 

CONCERNS OF THOSE CLOSEST TO THE CHILD

When classroom teachers, parents, or the general public testified — the ones closest to the classroom students — they told a completely different story.  One of the most poignant moments in the hearing occurred when a veteran Algebra teacher almost broke down in tears as he told of having to quit his teaching job recently because he was required to teach CSCOPE.  He said he could not look his students in the eyes, knowing that he was “aiding and abetting ignorance…and giving them an allusion of an education.” 

 

A well-credentialed education researcher, who works with many Texas school districts and who intensely dislikes CSCOPE, said she had had doors slammed in her face when she sought to uncover the ideology behind CSCOPE.  She said teachers are afraid to speak out about the content of the CSCOPE lessons and the links that students are directed to investigate.  Several of these links take students to sites where Wiccans are said to be similar to Christians and where Islam and Christianity are harmonized as being similar. 

 

A current classroom teacher of 30 years’ experience told about being offended with the lesson in which students were required to make a Communist/Socialist  flag.  She said her father had proudly fought in World War II to keep our nation free and that our students should be taught American exceptionalism.  She also said that CSCOPE content teaches none of the great novels and does not teach the young readers a systematic approach to reading using phonics.  She complained that CSCOPE instead teaches whole language and that there is no formal instruction of grammar, usage, and correct writing.

This experienced teacher gave the Senators a copy of the TESCCC/CSCOPE legal document passed out during a CSCOPE 2012 summer training session that states, “To support implementation of this detailed curriculum, districts must have processes and people in place to insure that there is sustained monitoring of the curriculum and that individual teachers do not have the option to disregard or replace assigned content.”  This teacher said that when parents put their children on the school bus to come to school, they are not sending them to school for a controlled and compulsory learning environment.  They want their children’s teachers to be able to be creative and to meet the individual needs of each child.  She said, “I want it recorded for the record that I have never voted for a conglomerate to take over the Texas school system, and parents have not either.”

 

Another witness said there was no need for CSCOPE because the curriculum standards (TEKS) are on the Texas Education Agency website along with many other excellent helps that teachers can use to prepare their students for the new STAAR/EOC tests.  Good teachers working together can create their own timelines and lesson plans.

 

One witness asked why the TESCCC was incorporated as a non-profit.  Was it to be able to hide the content of CSCOPE from the public?  Was it to keep their meetings, minutes, and agendas secret? 

 

TESCCC/CSCOPE PERSONNEL — OOPS!

 

When confronted with this evidence, the CSCOPE personnel at the hearing repeatedly admitted they had “Oops! Dropped the ball.”  As the meeting proceeded, it became clear that a pattern of cover-up by Wade Libya/TESCCC/CSCOPE has been taking place since the public “sleuths” started digging out the facts.  The website has been changed substantially since the Senate Education Committee public hearing was announced. Now Labay says teachers are not prohibited from allowing parents to see CSCOPE materials, but Sen. Patrick could never get a confirmed “yes” that parents could go right now and see fully their children’s CSCOPE materials 24/7.   

 

OBJECTIONABLE CSCOPE LESSONS

When the CSCOPE lesson referring to the Boston Tea Party patriots as “terrorists” was discussed (which had been in CSCOPE for seven years), Labay said it had been removed. 

 

When Labay was confronted with concerns over a lesson teaching the 5 Pillars of Islam, a lesson in which students role play a trek to Mecca, a lesson that teaches Allah is the same as Almighty God,  a lesson on Christopher Columbus that cherry-picks his diary to take out any of his references to his belief in God, and a lesson in which students create a Communist/Socialist flag, he gave a lame excuse about those lessons having been a part of the “old” lessons, having been left in CSCOPE at the request of teachers. 

 

One Senator said he found it perplexing that when these lessons were first revealed by the public “sleuths,” TESCCC accused these concerned citizens of circulating “fallacious claims.”  

 

Senators Taylor and Paxton were deeply troubled about the student project in which students were to design a Communist/Socialist flag.  They cautioned that teaching children to role play and sympathize with a particular cause is indoctrination of the mind, and they asked Labay to tell them who came up with that lesson plan?  Labay gave the lame excuse that there are over 1600 lessons and that ESC 12 CSCOPE staffers are the ones who are in charge of the content. 

 

One of the Senators responded, “Oh, you mean the same group that has the closed door board meetings…We have already talked about several egregious lessons today.  How many more are there that are buried up in the rest of the CSCOPE lessons that we have not located yet?”

NO OUTSIDE, INDEPENDENT REVIEW OF CSCOPE

The Senators kept hammering at the fact that 875 Texas school districts have been using CSCOPE for the last seven years; yet there has been no outside, independent review of CSCOPE to make sure that its lessons align with the SBOE-adopted curriculum standards (TEKS) upon which the new STAAR/End-of-Course tests are based. 

 

Sen. Patrick said he found it highly upsetting that it had taken the chair of the Texas State Board of Education six months to get a password to CSCOPE.  Former SBOE member Charlie Garza testified that he had asked TESCCC to have extra time to study the CSCOPE lessons, but his request was denied. 

 

It was also brought out that besides the per-student CSCOPE rental, TESCCC also makes money by charging publishers $100,000 per event to see the CSCOPE lessons so that textbooks can be produced that align with it.  Other vendors pay fees, and TESCCC also makes money from its yearly educators’ conference. 


Senator Patrick said that the public had brought most of the CSCOPE problems to their attention over the last six to eight months and that he was upset over the lack of transparency and the secrecy demonstrated by TESCCC/CSCOPE.  He said this is the reason we need transparency, open meetings, and posted meetings  — so that a governmental body cannot violate every entity of being a public entity.  “How many more mistakes are there? … What is behind the curtain? … You are in 875 school districts … This is a very serious matter.”

 

SBOE OVERSIGHT OF CSCOPE CURRICULUM CONTENT

One Senator said he was investigating the possibility of charging the elected members of the Texas State Board of Education with the task of verifying the content of CSCOPE to make sure it is aligned with the TEKS.  Barbara Cargill, the chair of the SBOE, said that the Board has a review process already in place that could be used for CSCOPE since it is being used in 70% to 80% of Texas school districts. 

 

Cargill also mentioned her concern that TESCCC in its incorporation papers states that if TESCCC is dissolved, CSCOPE goes to the federal government.  She mentioned that she is concerned CSCOPE is not aligned with publishers’ textbooks and that it is very confusing for students when they read a CSCOPE lesson (or CSCOPE test) that says one thing and a textbook that says another. 

 

Ms. Cargill complained that CSCOPE does not align itself with the new Science TEKS in which all sides of scientific theories (both strengths and weaknesses) are to be taught. Instead, the only links she could find in the CSCOPE lessons go to material that teaches evolution as fact.

 

Barbara Cargill was asked by one of the Senators whether SB 6 (passed in the 82nd Legislative Session) triggered the explosive growth of CSCOPE since school administrators can now purchase CSCOPE (i.e., instructional materials including software and hardware) with state dollars without those materials having passed through the rigorous SBOE adoption process.  She said that having “100 eyeballs” to evaluate the instructional materials at the SBOE level is far superior to having only a few CSCOPE employees do so.

 

Pat Hardy, also a member of the Texas State Board of Education, verified that CSCOPE is a curriculum [not a “curriculum mnagement system” as claimed by TESCCC/CSCOPE] and that it is the SBOE who adopts the curriculum standards — TEKS.

 

A parent whose children are in the public schools where CSCOPE is being utilized believes that the elected SBOE should have authority over CSCOPE.  However, she has a serious reservation because one of the present SBOE members is a registered lobbyist for Microsoft; and she wonders about the possible conflict of interest and corruption that could bias the SBOE/CSOPE alignment process.   

 

COMMON CORE STANDARDS INFILTRATING CSCOPE?

One retired science teacher said that at some point, Common Core Standards tried to purchase CSCOPE; and she is concerned because the Texas Association of School Administrators (TASA) is having a convention in California, using public dollars to pay for Texas school personnel to attend.  At this conference,  Common Core Standards and Linda Darling-Hammond will be featured.  Gov. Perry and both Texas Education Commissioners have said Texas will not participate in Common Core Standards.  Since CSCOPE is already in 70% to 80% of Texas’ school districts, the retired science teacher is afraid the CCS ideology could be permeating CSCOPE’s lessons right now.

 

CHILDREN BELONG TO PARENTS — NOT TO THE STATE

One of the last witnesses reminded everyone that children belong to their parents and not to the state; school children should be able to take their CSCOPE materials home each evening; and the public should have open access to see everything except the tests and answer keys. 

 

Texas Legislators ~ You have the power to make a difference to the Nation, Stop CSCOPE!

Photo Courtesy of Times Record News

 

Texas Legislators, just scan through this article; and you will see why Common Core Standards is interested in buying CSCOPE.  All that would then need to be done is to add links to CSCOPE (if they are not already there) that would take public school students throughout this country (including Texas) to the various pro-Muslim/Islamist entities listed in this article. This is just another reason why CSCOPE and all of its content must be open to the public to try to protect our children from indoctrination “at the click of a mouse.” – Donna Garner 

 

WND EXCLUSIVE

MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD GROUP TO ‘CONNECT ALL U.S. SCHOOLS’

Partners with State, Education departments on international initiative

Published: 1.23.13

by AARON KLEIN

 

JERUSALEM – A Muslim Brotherhood-linked organization has partnered with the U.S. Department of Education and the State Department to facilitate an online program aiming to connect all U.S. schools with classrooms abroad by 2016.

 

Vartan Gregorian, a board member of the organization, the Qatar Foundation International, was appointed in 2009 to President Obama’s White House Fellowships Commission.

 

WND previously exposed that Gregorian served as a point man in granting $49.2 million in startup capital to an education-reform project founded by former Weather Underground terrorist William Ayers and chaired by Obama.

Documentation shows Gregorian was central in Ayers’ recruitment of Obama to serve as the first chairman of the project, the Chicago Annenberg Challenge – a job in which Obama worked closely on a regular basis with Ayers.

Obama also later said his job at the project qualified him to run for public office, as WND previously reported.

Connecting schools to fulfill Obama pledge

The Qatar Foundation International, or QFI, in 2011 partnered with the Department of State and the U.S. Department of Education to facilitate matchmaking between classrooms in the U.S. and international schools through something called the “Connect All Schools” project.

QFI, funded by the Qatari government, explains on its website the initiative was founded in response to Obama’s call in his June 2009 speech to the Arab world in Cairo, Egypt, to “create a new online network, so a young person in Kansas can communicate instantly with a young person in Cairo.”

 

QFI relates how more than 100 U.S. schools and organizations have already connected on the interactive website.

The stated goal of the initiative is to “connect every school in the U.S. with the world by 2016.”

This is not the QFI’s first foray into the U.S. education system.

WND reported last May the Qatar-based foundation awarded “Curriculum Grants” to seven U.S. schools and language organizations to “develop comprehensive and innovative curricula and teaching materials to be used in any Arabic language classroom.”

QFI, based in Washington, D.C., is the U.S. branch of the Qatar Foundation, founded in 1995 by Qatar’s ruling emir, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani.

Thani is still the group’s vice-chairman, while one of his three wives, Sheikha Moza bint Nasser, chairs the organization’s board.

Thani also launched Al Jazeera in 1996 and served as the television network’s chairman.

The Qatar foundation is close to the Muslim Brotherhood.

In January 2012, it launched the Research Center for Islamic Legislation and Ethics under the guidance of Tariq Ramadan, who serves as the center’s director.

Ramadan is the grandson of the notorious founder of the Muslim Brotherhood,Hassan al Banna. Ramadan was banned from the U.S. until 2010 when the Obama administration issued him a visa to give a lecture at a New York school.

QFI, meanwhile, named several institutions after Yusuf al-Qaradawi, one of the top leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood. Many regard Qaradawi as the de facto spiritual leader of Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood.

The foundation instituted the Sheikh Yusuf Al Qaradawi Scholarships and in 2009 established a research center named the Qaradawi Center for Islamic Moderation and Renewal.

Qaradawi has personally attended scores of foundation events, including conferences at which he served as a keynote speaker.

Qaradawi achieved star status because of his regular sermons and interviews on Al Jazeera.

The Investigative Project on Terrorism documents Qardawi openly permitted the killing of American troops in Iraq and praised the “heroic deeds” of “Hamas, Jihad, Al-Aqsa Brigades and others.”

Obama, Ayers connection

Gregorian, president of Carnegie Corp. charitable foundation, was appointed by Obama in 2009 as a White House fellow. Born in Tabriz, Iran, Gregorian served for eight years as president of the New York Public Library and was also president of Brown University.

As Brown president, Gregorian served on the selection committee of the Annenberg Foundation, which funded Ayers’ Chicago Annenberg Challenge with a $49.2 million, 2-to-1 matching challenge grant over five years. Ayers was one of five founding members of the Annenberg Challenge who wrote to the Annenberg Foundation for the initial funding.

Steve Diamond, a political-science and law professor and a blogger who has posted on Obama, previously posted a letter from Nov. 18, 1994, in whichGregorian, serving as the point man on Annenberg’s selection committee, asked Ayers to “compose the governing board” of the Challenge’s collaborative project with “people who reflect the racial and ethnic diversity of Chicago.”

Ayers and other founding Challenge members then recruited Obama to serve as the project chairman.

WND was first to expose that Obama and Ayers used the project grant money to fund organizations run by radicals tied to Ayers, including Mike Klonsky, a former top communist activist who was a senior leader in the Students for a Democratic Society group, a major leftist student organization in the 1960s from which the Weathermen terror group later splintered.

National Review Online writer Stanley Kurtz examined the project archives housed at the Richard J. Daley Library at the University of Illinois at Chicago, finding Obama and Ayers worked closely at the project.

The documents obtained by Kurtz showed Ayers served as an ex-officio member of the board that Obama chaired through the project’s first year. Ayers also served on the board’s governance committee with Obama and worked with him to craft project bylaws, according to the documents.

Ayers made presentations to board meetings chaired by Obama. Ayers also spoke for the Chicago School Reform Collaborative before Obama’s board, while Obama periodically spoke for the board at meetings of the collaborative, the project documents reviewed by Kurtz show.

WND reported Obama and Ayers also served together on the board of the Woods Fund, a liberal Chicago nonprofit that granted money to far-left causes.

One of the groups funded by the Woods Fund was the Midwest Academy, an activist organization modeled after Marxist community organizer Saul Alinsky described as teaching tactics of direct action, confrontation and intimidation.

WND reported Jackie Kendall, executive director of the Midwest Academy, was on the team that developed and delivered the first Camp Obama training for volunteers aiding Obama’s campaign through the 2008 Iowa Caucuses.

Camp Obama was a two- to four-day intensive course run in conjunction with Obama’s campaign aimed at training volunteers to become activists to help Obama win the presidential election.

Obama scholar linked to ‘Ground Zero’ imam

 

Meanwhile, WND reported Gregorian is closely tied to the Muslim leaders behind the controversial Islamic cultural center to be built near the site of the Sept. 11 attacks.

Gregorian also serves on the board of the Sept. 11 Memorial and Museum. The museum is reportedly working with the American Society for Muslim Advancement, whose leaders are behind the mosque, to ensure the future museum will represent the voices of American Muslims.

“[The Sept. 11 museum will represent the] voices of American Muslims in particular, and it will honor members of other communities who came together in support and collaboration with the Muslim community on September 11 and its aftermath,” stated Daisy Khan, executive director of the society.

The Sept. 11 museum’s oral historian, Jenny Pachucki, is collaborating with the society to ensure the perspective of American Muslims is woven into the overall experience of the museum, according to the museum’s blog.

Khan’s husband, Feisal Abdul Rauf, is the founder of the society as well as chairman of Cordoba Initiative, which is behind the proposed mosque to be built about two blocks from the area referred to as Ground Zero.

With Gregorian at its helm, Carnegie Corp. is at the top of the list of society supporters on the Islamic group’s website.

Carnegie is also listed as a funder of both of the society’s partner organizations, Search for Common Ground and the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations. Gregorian was a participant in the U.N. body’s first forum, as was Rauf.

Rauf is vice chairman on the board of the Interfaith Center of New York, which honored Gregorian at an awards dinner in 2008.

World domination

Gregorian is the author of “Islam: A Mosaic, Not A Monolith.” According to a book review by the Middle East Forum, his book “establishes the Islamist goal of world domination.”

A chapter of the book, “Islamism: Liberation Politics,” quotes Ayatollah Khomeini: “Islam does not conquer. Islam wants all countries to become Muslim, of themselves.” Hassan al-Banna, founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, is quoted stating it “is the nature of Islam to dominate, not to be dominated, to impose its laws on all nations and to extend its power to the entire planet.”

Gregorian himself recommends for Muslims a system he calls “theo-democracy,” which he defines as “a divine democratic government” that, according to the book review, “would have a limited popular sovereignty under the suzerainty of Allah.”

With additional research by Danette Clark and Brenda J. Elliott
Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2013/01/muslim-brotherhood-group-to-connect-all-u-s-schools/#Xpq3Wlqe8zPMx775.99

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