Category Archives: Public/Private Partnerships

Duncan Appointed Despite Controversial Past

CONCORD — Bill Duncan will take his seat on the state Board of Education, despite an aggressive lobbying campaign against his appointment by charter school advocates, home-schoolers, Common Core opponents and the state Republican Party.

The Executive Council on Thursday confirmed Duncan in a 3-2 vote along party lines, with Democratic councilors Chris Pappas of Manchester, (the deciding vote) Debora Pignatelli of Nashua, and Colin Van Ostern of Concord supporting Gov. Maggie Hassan’s nomination of the education activist and former Executive Council candidate.

Unlike Duncan who supports Common Core, his opponents are actually the true “champions” of the public schools because they are for getting the corporations and foundations OUT OF THEM.

He is only too willing to hand educational matters over, illegally, to the feds and their corporate partners.

By claiming support of Charter Schools, Duncan is seen as a hypocrite when he promotes “public” education. Charters are corporately run but still use taxpayer dollars, and are still subject to state and federal rules. At the same time he claims to be for “public” education, he is in fact, supporting Bill Gates, Pearson and other corporate foundations and NGOs that have tried to set the standards and methods for teaching, and are getting wealthy from the monopoly while illegally data mining our children.

Most constitutional scholars, and we agree, challenge the idea that state school board itself is even a legal body under the NH constitution.

Read more… Councilors say flood of calls preceded vote on new education board member

Wealthy Leftist Extremist is Hassan Appointee to School Board

A wealthy leftist activist with extreme views was just appointed to the state school board by Governor Margaret Hassan of NH.

Bill Duncan, a wealthy retiree with absolutely NO qualifications to serve on a state school board, supports Common Core, and in doing so, sanctions and supports (apparently) the pornography and political bias contained within its curriculum.

Duncan is also the plaintiff in a lawsuit against the state for allowing the business tax credit program that allows poor children choice in education.

Public education is being destroyed by the likes of Duncan and his followers… If NH does not oust her radical governor, nothing will change.

Girard at Large weighed in this morning just before the vote, and with Sid Glassner.

“He brings nothing to the table”. ~ Sid Glassner on Bill Duncan

NGA Chair Gov. Mary Fallin Target of Campaign to End Common Core

The National Governors Association is a NON governmental body that had a lot to do with crafting and promoting Common Core. This should have been illegal.

American Principles Project, Eagle Forum, Concerned Women for America, Home School Legal Defense Association and several other grassroots conservative groups launched a campaign urging the Chair of the National Governors Association, Governor Mary Fallin (R-OK), to end the Common Core State Standards Initiative. The NGA, along with the Council of Chief State School Officers, are co-owners of the copyright to the Common Core.

NGA Chair Gov. Mary Fallin Target of Campaign to End Common Core

Who Is the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation?

The Charles Stewart Mott Foundation is funding the NH After School organization.

Some philanthropic foundations as different as Soros’s leftist Open Society Institute and the conservative Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation support projects that represent the intentions of their donors. But too many foundations pursues goals contrary to any reasonable interpretation of their founders’ intent. Surely that is the case with the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation.

How has this foundation changed?

In 2010 thirty percent of Mott grants—149 grants totaling $27.8 million—went to its division called “Pathways out of Poverty.” The Mott annual report describes one of these “pathways” in ways Saul Alinsky would have approved. The goal: “To enhance the power and effectiveness of the community–organizing field in order to strengthen and sustain the involvement of low–income communities in shaping their futures.” The objective: “Strong and effective community–organizing networks at the national, regional and state levels that foster community engagement and positive change in poor communities.”

The foundation devotes much of its resources to advancing these Alinsky-inspired community organizing groups. Among its grantees are the Center for Community Change (a whopping $15,947,700 since 1999); National Council of La Raza ($5,081,000 since 1999); the ACORN-affiliated American Institute for Social Justice ($4,297,500 since 1999); the National Training and Information Center ($4,165,090 since 1999); Pacific Institute for Community Organization ($2,900,000 since 1999); the Gamaliel Foundation ($1,785,000 since 1999); Local Initiatives Support Corporation ($740,000 since 1999); the Alinsky-founded Industrial Areas Foundation ($600,000 since 2000); Midwest Academy ($505,500 since 2000); and Interfaith Worker Justice ($150,000 since 2007).

Perhaps these foundations should be more closely examined before people sign on to their programs.

Read more: Charles Stewart Mott Foundation: From Community Service to Community Organizing

Why Are NH Republicans Supporting Left Wing Foundations in Our Schools?

We have just learned that the Mayor of Franklin NH Ken Merrifield is now associated with NH After School – NHAN

“NHAN is a statewide collaboration, funded in part by the Mott Foundation, created to foster and encourage the development and sustainability of high quality afterschool programming.”

Now look at Chicago’s Acorn

“Finally, we wish to acknowledge Christine Doby of the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation for her vision and leadership in this effort. Cris Doby and the Mott Foundation’s unwavering commitment to community organizing and to asking prescient questions about the impact of community organizing made this research possible.”

ACORN never went away, they just changed a few names but continue to work towards political activism and Progressive “social justice” in public education.

IF you do more digging, you’ll see that Annenberg is also associated with the Nellie Mae foundation. They are already doing damage in many NH schools Why? Because they push practices that lower student achievement and focus on community organizing vs literacy and academic excellence. You can look at their own materials and again, note that they reference Saul Alinsky and the end of page one.

Core Beliefs of Annenberg:

As a mission-driven organization, the Partnership stands behind the following core beliefs:

1. Every student deserves to be held to high expectations.
2. High-quality teaching and learning is every student’s right, every day.
3. A collegiate education must be an accessible and attainable option for every student who has earned a high school diploma.
4. Schools must model civic responsibility, social justice, and multicultural understanding.

Civic responsibility = political activism NOT civic academic knowledge:
Great Schools Partnership

Annenberg in NH schools: New England Secondary School Consortium

What School “Transformation” Really Means

What School “Transformation” Really Means and Who is Helping it Along Without Knowing It

You’ve seen the video about how we must not think of our children as the property of their parents? If not go here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N3qtpdSQox0

You’ve seen them try to impose federal programs and fads in the public schools that have little to do with “standards” or academics and more to do with social engineering. OBE, IB, NCLB, and now Common Core…

You’ve seen them try to take control over your children at even younger and younger ages, duping many conservatives into the process who have no idea where these ideas or group are coming from.

Here is an elected official who is actually inviting far left community organizers into NH schools from the Annenberg Institute. Groups such as Annenberg are the ones causing all the problems in our schools; the dumbing down, and the political bias. Annenberg is where William Ayers and Keith Catone came from. And we have unwittingly allowed them access.

Don’t be fooled by the rhetoric about quality after school programs; the government just wants control of the kids 24/7.

Mayoral Summit for Afterschool and Expanded Learning
May 13, 2014
8:00 am – 1:00 pm
Grappone Center, Concord
Continental Breakfast & Lunch Provided
Ken Merrifield, Mayor of Franklin

Even teachers of after-school programs must meet government “dispositions” in order to hold a job:
NAA Core Competencies

This excellent article explains why all these things are being done…

Iserbyt was a senior policy advisor in the Office of Educational Research and Improvement (OERI), U.S. Department of Education, during the first Reagan Administration, where she had access to volumes of education documents. Subsequently, she published the Deliberate Dumbing Down of America and founded 3D Research Co, exposing the dangerous direction the American educational system has been heading.

Decades of battle and a sense that time is growing short have made her impatient with those who miss the forest for the trees. “Forget Communist Core,” she writes, referring to Common Core, a project to push national standards that are designed to produce a “workforce ready” population – “this is coming down the pike, which will include Communist Core, even if you think you have repealed it. This is the agenda to expand education into Limited Learning for Lifelong Labor.”

Iserbyt has just sent everyone on her list a copy of “A Vision for Public Education: Equity and Excellence,” prepared by the Georgia School Boards Association and published in 2010. She and the other education researchers behind the 8-disk DVD series Exposing the Global Road to Ruin Through Education see this “vision” as a fairly good example of what’s next in the pipeline, proffered at a point when citizens are weary of battle and feeling they have made their voices heard.

Beyond Common Core: transforming family-centered society to society-centered family

From Cradle to Grave, NH Wants Control of YOUR Children

All legislators [and of course the PUBLIC] are invited to a luncheon entitled “Children: the Bedrock of the Granite State,” sponsored by Spark NH, the Governor-appointed Early Childhood Advisory Council for the State of New Hampshire to be held on Wednesday, April 30th in Room 210-211 LOB during the noon lunch break.

The future prosperity of the Granite State depends on our ability to steward the next generation who will live, work and lead in our state. Come hear about the blueprint for state action, “The NH Comprehensive Strategic Plan for Early Childhood,” and what you as New Hampshire Leaders can do.

The presenters are Laura Milliken, Director of Spark NH, Tom Raffio, CEO of Northeast Delta Dental and Chair of the State Board of Education, Steve Rowe, President, NH Endowment for Health and Jackie Cowell, Executive Director of Early Learning NH.

Spark NH looks to be yet another quasi-governmental organization that seeks to place government over people, starting with your children.

The Strategic Plan

Bill Gates’ Crying in His Vault

Bill Gates is a sad clown today because his bizarre $100 million student data project has failed – InBloom, Inc Student Data Collection, to Shut Down!

Common Core-loving billionaire Bill Gates has suffered a stinging defeat in his ambitious quest to reform every cranny of the American K-12 public education system.

The nonprofit educational-software company InBloom Inc., which the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the Carnegie Corp. of New York financed to the tune of $100 million, announced on Monday that it will shut down permanently.

Read more… Bill Gates Crying In His Vault

Common Core tests full of corporate branding

Common Core is a bad idea. Republicans should remember that Jeb Bush, the guy the neocons are pushing as a “reasonable” candidate is a force behind the federalization of education standards. Something which couldn’t be less “conservative.” But it is corporatist. And those guys are the ones one needs to satisfy to become president of the United States right?

Read more…

Common Core Supporters Mount Slick Propaganda Campaign

We came across this website: TheCommonCore.com It is a pretty slick propaganda campaign backed by corporate interests who are promoting and funding Common Core, the attempt to nationalize education in the US.

Let us bust some of their “myth” busters…

1 – The Common Core State Standards are not a curriculum.

Nonsense. Any teacher today knows they will be tracked, traced, watched, spied on, written up and harassed and even fired if they don’t follow the exact methods and content prescribed by whatever new fad program is being implemented at the time. Common Core embraces all types of practices that are not only ineffective but detrimental to teaching. FACT: There is NO MORE ACADEMIC FREEDOM FOR TEACHERS TO TEACH HOW THEY THINK IS BEST.

2 – The Common Core State Standards were developed by a group of states that voluntarily elected to work together to raise the bar on what students should know and be able to do by subject.

More nonsense. The Common Core Standards are known to be inferior to what states like Indiana, Massachusetts and California had in place.

3 – Local school boards retain the same level of authority they had prior to the adoption of the Common Core State Standards.

Maybe. If this is true, why are they being pressured to support, and in most cases, do end up supporting Common Core despite the protestations of parents, teachers and taxpayers?

4 – The Common Core State Standards were developed by a thoughtful and transparent process led by the National Governors Association (NGA) and Council for Chief State School Officers (CCSSO).

Whopper! Most had no idea that NH started implementing these ‘standards’ in 2010. Transparency? Hardly. Besides, the NGA and the CCSSO are NOT EVEN GOVERNMENT ORGANIZATIONS BUT PRIVATE ORGANIZATIONS! What right did they have to create something that would be imposed on every school child in the country? Members of the Validation Committee had to sign “confidentiality agreements” and were unable to access notes, agendas, etc because they held private meetings.

5 – The Standards were informed by the best education practices in the country, the highest international standards, and evidence and expertise about educational outcomes.

Baloney. Most of the pedagogy is flawed in that it employs FAD LEARNING METHODOLOGIES and PRACTICES that have been failures since the early 1970s when first tried. There is NO data to suggest otherwise. (For example, the ‘flipped classroom’, ‘cooperative learning’, and ‘child-centered learning’.)

6 – International benchmarking played a significant role in developing the Standards

We don’t know why internationalism rears its ugly head here. We want to do what’s best for AMERICAN kids. Internationally benchmarked to what countries? We keep hearing this claim but no one has pointed to the top performing countries and their standards or have shown a side by side comparison with the Common Core Standards.

7 – No data collection is required as part of the Common Core State Standards initiative. In fact, it is illegal for the federal government to collect any student-identifiable data.

More nonsense. This data has been collected for years. Teachers have been asked to keep dossiers on students and in fact, dossiers have been kept on teachers who do not follow the ‘program’.

8 – The Common Core State Standards recognize that both content and skills are important.

Wrong. Like most globalist programs, CC believes that individuals skills should take a backseat to attitudes and values that would make students into globally acceptable workers for the coming world order. This is why you are seeing children tested and surveyed for their beliefs.

9 – The Common Core State Standards require an emphasis on literature, including Shakespeare as well as fiction specifically selected by each state and local school district.

This type of literature may or may not be included. It’s the use of unnecessarily prurient and inappropriate texts that is of concern, texts that often have little to do with the subject area. In fact some of the literature has parents up in arms because of the graphic sexual content.

10 – The Common Core State Standards do accommodate and prepare students for Algebra 1 in 8th grade, by including the prerequisites for this course in grades K-7.

If you push the standards down a grade level, this can happen. However we know that as they are written, students will be prepared for Algebra I by 9th grade. That’s about 2 years behind their high performing international peers.

11 – The Common Core State Standards drafting process relied on teachers and education experts from across the country.

The feedback may have been thrown in the trash according to one participant who was invited to review the draft standards. We also know that feedback from the only two content experts, Drs. Milgram and Stotsky, were NOT included in the final draft. That feedback would have elevated the CCSS to the level many parents want for their children.

12 – The Common Core State Standards drafting process relied on teachers and education experts from across the country.

See response to #11.

13 – The Common Core State Standards have made careful use of a large and growing body of evidence.

Interestingly, we never see any of this ‘evidence’.

14 – The Common Core State Standards are not a curriculum.

Standards and assessments drive the curriculum. In the case of the Common Core Math Standards, there is an emphasis on strategies and explaining your answer. This certainly drives pedagogy but unfortunately pedagogy that we know has been problematic to math education in this country in the past. In the case of English/Langugae Arts, there is a shift in focus away from classical literature in favor of informational texts.

Teaching multiple algorithms or strategies to young children adds confusion and will often times kill the love of learning math in a child. That is not a recipe for success but a set up for failure.