PHOENIX – There was an unfortunate victory for the Common Core cirriculum in Arizona. Senate Bill 1310 failed on March 5 by a vote of 12 for and 18 against. Arizona Governor Jan Brewer and Arizona Superintendent of Public Instruction John Hupenthal made an attempt at convincing Arizona citizens that Arizona controlled the standards by calling it Arizona College and Career Ready Standards.

S.B. 1310 would have prohibited the Arizona State Board of Education from implementing the Common Core Standards and require Arizona to withdraw from the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC). The bill would have prevented the Board of Education for implementing any standards that would effectively implement common core.

It would have require the Board of Education to adopt an existing college entry examination accepted by fifty-percent of the colleges in the country to measure the academic performance of students.

The common core standards have been under attack for some time. YouTube videos show common core proponents explaining that it is not important for students to get mathematical questions correct so long as they can “logically” explain their reasons for the incorrect answer. This seems to be a turn-around from the outcry a few years ago when it was discovered that United States students fared poorly against foreign students in math and science.

It was reported in November of last year that sixth-grade students of Milam Elementary School in Tupelo, Mississippi were told not to tell parents about one assignment. Digital Journal reported on an assignment to rewrite the Bill of Rights to the Constitution of the United States to make it compatible with the PATRIOT act.

According to the London Telegraph, fiction books are being replaced in the Bill and Melissa Gates foundation funded program in favor of non-fiction works such as Levels of Insulation by the US Environmental Protection Agency. According to this article:

Supporters of the directive argue that it will help pupils to develop the ability to write concisely and factually, which will be more useful in the workplace than a knowledge of Shakespeare.

Parents and grandparents locally have expressed concerns about the standards which are removing a requirement to learn cursive writing from the curriculum. This would make it difficult for students to read the original documents of the founding of the country such as the Constitution of the United State of America.

S.B. 1155, still in committee, will allow school districts and charter schools to opt out of the common core standards. S.B. 1095, also still in committee, would require the SBE to withdraw from PARCC and not implement common core standards. It would require the SBE to notify the speaker of the House and the president of the Senate before entering into any contracts with outside entities that develop multi-State academic standards.

In an 1816 letter to Joseph Cabell, Thomas Jefferson warned about the undue interference in local affairs by the national government.

No, my friend, the way to have good and safe government, is not to trust it all to one, but to divide it among the many, distributing to every one exactly the functions he is competent to. Let the national government be entrusted with the defence of the nation, and its foreign and federal relations; the State governments with the civil rights, laws, police, and administration of what concerns the State generally; the counties with the local concerns of the counties, and each ward direct the interests within itself.

In this letter he extended his opinion to the relationship between State and county government.

But if it is believed that these elementary schools will be better managed by the governor and council, the commissioners of the literary fund, or any other general authority of the government, than by the parents within each ward, it is a belief against all experience.

In 1800 he warned in a letter to Gideon Granger of Connecticut;

Our country is too large to have all its affairs directed by a single government. Public servants at such a distance, & from under the eye of their constituents, must, from the circumstance of distance, be unable to administer & overlook all the details necessary for the good government of the citizens, and the same circumstance, by rendering detection impossible to their constituents, will invite the public agents to corruption, plunder & waste.

Vladimir Lenin explained common core in 1917.

“Give us the child for 8 years and it will be a Bolshevik forever”

(Common Core mathematics explained)