Rubio Faces Scrutiny for Donors' Common Core Ties

PHOTO CREDIT - 2016 THE PULSE
As Senator Marco Rubio moves up in the polls after three strong debate performances, his own record, as well as the financial connections of the major donors for his campaign are starting to undergo significant review. For those that care deeply about downsizing the federal role in education, that means examining monetary ties to Common Core, testing and data mining.Rubio has done very well in his speeches, the one debate where he or anyone was able to talk about Common Core and votes related to Common Core and the overreach of the federal government via the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) currently known as No Child Left Behind (NCLB). He is to be thanked for voting against the final ECAA/No Child Left Behind rewrite and for Senator Cruz's amendment on state sovereignty in testing in that mammoth federal bill. He received a solid C, but not higher, on the Pulse 2016 Common Core report card because of his "Know Before You Go Act" which will require a boatload of student data mining, but has room for improvement.Unfortunately, the bloom may be coming off his anti-Common Core rose due to significant donations from two of the largest funders of Common Core in the nation and the world. The first are two donations totaling $3000 from Microsoft billionaire Bill Gates. Gates recently said in an Atlantic interview that " representative democracy is a problem" in regard to climate change. Rubio is the only one of the seventeen Republican candidates that received any political contributions from Gates in the period covered in this chart. PHOTO CREDIT - RAMIN TALIE/GETTY IMAGES
The other major donor and perhaps more influential for Rubio, is Wall Street billionaire Paul E. Singer. The following excerpts from an excellent Breitbart article by Dr. Susan Berry explain Singer's foundation: Singer "founded the Paul E. Singer Foundation, whose work thus far has 'focused on supporting research and scholars in the areas Read more

Tagged as , Bobby Jindal, Carly Fiorina, Common Core, Foundation for Excellence in Education, Jeb Bush, Manhattan Institute, Marco Rubio, Paul Singer, Paul Singer Foundation, Rand Paul, Rick Santorun, Ted Cruz.

Bush & Kasich Fail While Cruz & Paul Shine in APIA Review with FSCCC Analysis

Republican Senators Ted Cruz (TX) and Rand Paul (KY) earned the best grades of A- while not surprisingly, former Governor Jeb Bush and current Ohio Governor John Kasich received failing grades for their positions and actions on Common Core. The graded review of 16 Republican candidates was done by the American Principles in Action group. The full report card is available HERE.The report was based on how well candidates by their statements and actions have answered three questions: 1.) Have they spoken out and acted against Common Core?Statements opposing Common Core must acknowledge that the standards are of low-quality, fail to meet the expectations of high-performing countries, and contain language that controls the curriculum and instructional methods used in the classroom. Recognition of these deficiencies is central in determining whether a candidate's actions have been a sincere effort to replace the Common Core with high standards or to simply rebrand it under another name.2.) Do they understand and have they made a specific commitment to protect state and local control of education from further federal intrusion?In particular, we are looking for candidates who understand how the federal government intrudes onto state decision-making and who advocate for structural changes to prevent such intrusions. Moreover, the candidate must understand that the intended division of power between the federal government and the state is meant to ensure that people can shape state and local policies. He must understand how the breakdown of that division destroyed the safeguards that could have, and likely would have, prevented Common Core.3.) What efforts has the candidate made to protect student and family privacy interests against the rising demands of industry and central planners for more personal student data?Such interests include the right of parents to control what type of information is collected (e.g., social and emotional information, behavioral history, Read more

Posted in Political Aspects of Common Core. Tagged as 2016, Ben Carson, Bobby Jindal, Carly Fiorina, Chris Christie, Donald Trump, early childhood education, federal interference, Jeb Bush, John Kasich, Lindsey Graham, Marco Rubio, Mike Huckabee, Psychological Profiling, Rand Paul, Rick Perry, Rick Santorum, Scott Walker, standards, student data privacy, Ted Cruz.

Chris Christie Now Has "Grave Concerns" About Common Core

Apparently seeing his poll numbers tank in what is probably a significant part due to his support of Common Core, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie has changed his position on the standards. Here is a set of his contrasting statements on Common Core courtesy of the New Jersey Star Ledger: Here is what he said in 2013 at a charter school
"We are doing Common Core in New Jersey and we're going to continue. And this is one of those areas where I have agreed more with the President than not. And with Secretary Duncan. I think part of the Republican opposition you see in some corners in Congress is a reaction, that knee-jerk reaction that is happening in Washington right now, that if the president likes something the Republicans in Congress don't. If the Republicans in Congress like something, the president doesn't."
And here's what he said Tuesday in Iowa:
"I have grave concerns about the way this has been done, especially the way the Obama administration has tried to implement it through tying federal funding to these things. And that changes the entire nature of it, from what was initially supposed to be voluntary type system and states could decide on their own to now having federal money tied to it in ways that really, really give me grave concerns. So we're in the midst of re-examination of it in New Jersey. I appointed a commission a few months ago to look at it in in light of these new developments from the Obama administration and they're going to come back to me with a report in the next, I think, six or eight weeks, then we're going to take some action. It is something I'm very concerned about, because in the end education needs to be a local issue."
Governors Bobby Jindal and Mike Huckabee have also changed their positions. Star-Ledger columnist Tom Moran calls this position change a "flip-flop. Regardless, this now leaves Jeb Bush as the only major potential Republican 2016 presidential candidate who is openly supporting Common Read more

Posted in Political Aspects of Common Core. Tagged as 2016, Bobby Jindal, Chris Christie, Jeb Bush.

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