Ramesh Ponnuru‘s latest contribution to the print edition of National Review offers a much-needed, level-headed analysis of various perspectives on Common Core public school standards. Six paragraphs into the piece, Ponnuru offers an apt assessment of the current debate, one which Terry Stoops is likely to endorse:
The argument over Common Core is quickly becoming one of those heated debates in which both sides mostly talk past each other, motives are subject to attack, and little attention gets paid to a basic question: Can it work? Can we help students learn more by getting the states to agree to a uniform set of high standards?
After focusing attention on those critical questions, Ponnuru offers a synopsis of Common Core’s history, offering plenty of reasons for some conservatives to have endorsed the idea and for others to question it. Without invoking conspiracy theories or blasting Common Core as the latest experiment in secret socialism, Ponnuru nonetheless points out a key concern about the project.
Michael McShane, who studies education policy at the American Enterprise Institute (where I am a visiting fellow), is not a foe of Common Core — but he too raises some doubts about its likelihood of success. It is not clear, for example, that anything close to adequate steps are being taken to make sure that teachers will be prepared for the new standards. Teacher-preparation programs generally emphasize “the development of a worldview” rather than the acquisition of specific skills and knowledge; they may not be a good fit for the new standards. Professional-development programs will have to equip existing teachers for the standards, but there is not much evidence that these programs are effective.
He points out, as well, that any textbook or other instructional material can be labeled “Common Core-aligned” by the company selling it. Schools might think they are implementing the Common Core when they aren’t; and they could then misinterpret test results, for example blaming poor scores on teachers instead of the choice of textbooks.
McShane wonders, finally, if the original vision behind Common Core will prove politically sustainable. What happens when the test scores dip as a result of new, higher standards? Will parents and teachers quietly resolve to do better, and will voters push legislators for new reforms that raise scores? Or will school systems and states just lower their cut scores and say they’re meeting the new standards?
The only way to truly ensure uniformity of standards — uniformity in practice, that is, not just on paper — is to have a central organization in charge of enforcing it, McShane notes that centralization will be needed for other purposes too, such as updating the standards over time. So either the fears of loss of state autonomy that the critics keep warning about will have to be realized, or the benefits that supporters seek won’t be. Either way, the idea behind Common Core, of state-led uniformity, will disintegrate.
Common Core is not a conspiracy. That doesn’t mean it’s a good idea. It could well end up wasting the time and energy of education reformers for a decade without doing much for students. And it may be that the reformers should face a truth that both No Child Left Behind and Common Core tried to deny: that there just is not much that can be done at the national level to improve primary education.
