Changes coming to Common Core

Good news for parents and teachers in public education. In the next 18 months you will see changes dealing with Common Core.
The Louisiana Legislature created and approved three different bills that changes how academic standards are selected in Louisiana. It does not altogether scrap Common Core.
Look for the new academic standards to be in place by the start of the 2016-2017 school year. Common Core will remain for another school year.
Rep. Brett Geymann, who first introduced a bill that did away from Common Core altogether, watched that bill get killed in the House side. He revamped the bill, which was approved by the House and Senate. It now awaits Gov. Bobby Jindal’s signature, which he is expected to sign.
Rep. Geymann was in Abbeville on Monday, visiting his friend, Rep. Bob Hensgens.
Geymann, a Republican, explained how parents and teachers now have a chance to see changes in how educational standards are reviewed. For the last year, he and other legislators, including, Hensgens, have been traveling around the state and having town hall meetings with parents and teachers. They heard the problems with Common Core from parents and teachers.
Geymann helped write House Bill 373, which changes the way the state reviews and updates the academic guidelines, including holding public hearings in all six of Louisiana’s congressional districts.
Over the next two years, a special panel from Louisiana will begin setting up its own educational standards, that may or may not be aligned with Common Core.
“They (special panel) will look at Common Core and work forward from there,” said Geymann. “We hope they will look at different things about Common Core. The curriculum. The math and the areas where there was a lot of controversy over. We hope they address those issues when they develop a new set of standards.”
When a new set of standards is created by the special panel, a new type of test will also be given. That could mean the end of PARC testing.
Once BESE adopts the standards, committees get to review the standards. They can like or dislike the new standards. If they dislike the new standards, it goes back to the panel.
The new governor even has the power to veto the new standards if he or she does not like them.
“They (BESE) is not going to want the Governor to veto its standards,” said Hensgens. “They are not going to want the legislature to vote against their new standards. That puts pressure on BESE. In the past, BESE had the final say. Now, because of these bills, we have oversight of the standards.”
“Our voices were not heard,” said Geymann. “We are forcing them to follow the law. They have to go through the public process so their voices can be heard.”
Creating new standards are expected to begin this fall.
“What has changed is that the public now has a key to be part of the process (of selecting new standards,” said Geymann. “If the public continues to be active and speak out, we are confident we will have a good set of standards, most importantly which are locally controlled.”
“That is all we wanted,” said Hensgens. “The big difference now is that when we find problems, (with the standards), we can change it.”