Today’s Sheila Resseger commentary in the Providence Journal
is a call to arms for parents, educators, and all who care where we’re going regarding Common Core and the PAARC.

It’s not the first time former teacher Resseger’s weighed in, but her war cry’s gaining traction: Teachers’ union NEARI has determined to inform parents that they may, in fact, opt their kids out of these questionable tests, with no adverse consequences.
Yep…They’re all tired. And sick of what they see as flagrant violation of what we should all be about in the education of our youth.
“The problem,” the way they see it? Business and industry running the show, folks who know little about how students learn but who know a whole lot about how to make a profit. And profit they’re making, as stock watchers readily admit: Pearson (the group who determined Common Core standards and now who design the PAARC test) is zinging off the charts, as a company, as seen in the stock’s growth per this graph representation.

Here’s more, too, on how Pearson got their influential command of US education.

In a Nero-fiddling-while-Rome-burns scenario (OK, metaphor could be better,) schools and teachers quake as they see little ones hunched over tests, trying desperately to answer questions that are muddied and incomprehensible.

Parents and all those in the educational need to end this madness and return our schools to what they should be about–educating our youth.

Not providing the next best return on a Stock Market investment.

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A tangential problem however:  What to do with the kids who’ve opted out of the significant amount of time ear-marked for the test situation? Do they stare blindly into space or should they be allowed to pursue other activities, quietly? No simple answers here.