A revealing CCSSO letter, leaked to the public, reveals Common Core investors’ collective panic about Ian Reid’s new film, Building the Machine.
Missouri Education Watchdog and Breitbart News reported that CCSSO deputy executive director Carissa Miller’s letter shows top Common Core moneymaking / grant-receiving businesses are combining to discredit the Common Core documentary. Many businesses need Common Core’s claims to be believed, or they lose this gold rush. So they’re trying to stop it, understandably.
And if the documentary is seen despite their efforts to discredit it, the groups have laid a plan to smother the truth with smooth “positive” talking points and with a soon-to-be-released documentary of their own.
If you watch the film, you’ll know why they’re panicking. Truth is truth.
The documentary solidly wipes out the “higher standards” claims of Common Core’s creators, using filmed speeches by Common Core’s creators and funders, and using interviews with top Stanford professors, Common Core validation committee members and respected members of think tanks, both for and against Common Core. Importantly, it shows that the real issue of education reform is not even about academics, ultimately; it’s about power.
The CCSSO doesn’t want people to know this power struggle exists. But it does exist. In fact, who ends up holding decision-making power is the main conflict inside ed reform, despite all the pleasant words about education standards.
As the backers of the new documentary succinctly put it:
“…This issue is far more than what standards public schools should use. It is about who will decide how and what our children are taught.” -William Estrada, in Breitbart interview.
You can read the leaked letter here. You can watch the movie here.
I want to point out this part of the panic-letter:
“The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and Fordham [Institute] have put together the attached two documents that can be used to clarify the vast amount of misinformation that will be circulated as a result of the movie. Please note – these are EMBARGOED until Monday, March 31st…. The U.S. Chamber is in the final stages of producing their own Common Core mini-documentary… Below we’ve include some tips for messaging and responding to the critical questions this film may generate in your state. We will send out the Chamber video when it is released.
Regards,
Carissa
————————–
Why do they just include “tips for messaging and responding” rather than including documentation, facts, links to contracts and legally valid, scientifically valid evidence? Evidence is not wanted. Only marketing, “messaging.”
FYI: Carissa is Carissa Miller, CCSSO deputy executive director.
For newcomers: The CCSSO is a nontransparent group that co-created the Common Core and then partnered with the federal Department of Education to collect data on a national level. It’s the same group that openly admits it has a “commitment to disaggregation of student data.”
I call the CCSSO a “superintendents’ club”. It does not include all state superintendents nor is it an elected body. The CCSSO seems want the public to believe –as does its twin sister, the NGA– that it has voter-designated authority to boss states around. It does not. Neither has authority and neither represents voters like our Congress does. Repeat: CCSSO and NGA have no elected authority. Do not be decieved by their pomp. They are just private groups that combined to create and copyright Common Core, heavily influenced/ funded by philanthopist-turned-takeover-king Bill Gates.
If you care about the traditional American voice of the local voter setting policy, rather than having closed-door private cliques that partner with the feds setting local policy, please oppose these goals of the CCSSO. Make your voice heard. Let your State Superintendent know you want him/her to bow out of membership in this club to focus energy on local control of education.
–While you’re at it, send your superintendent a link to the movie.
I hope every American watches it.
COMMON CORE 
Excellent movie.
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Oh I LOVE this part of the letter “It seems that the US Chamber of Commerce has decided they have to do something more than provide the same old weak talking points that mean nothing to parents whose children have suddenly been diagnosed with learning disorders (formerly known as normal developmental progress), laziness or undue influence of angry white suburban moms. “
That’s not part of the letter. It’s part of Missouri Education Watchdog’s commentary on the letter.
Would love to send a link to the documentary to our APPOINTED (not elected) education commissioner here in KY. Unfortunately he is currently the president of the CCSSO and wouldn’t give it the time of day. It’s unbelievable the silence here in KY. I’m guessing it has a lot to do with Dr. Holiday’s position with the CCSSO.
Silence is their only defense. That and the scripted sales-pitches and tag lines that are getting so very old…
This is wonderful; thank you for posting it!
After watching and reading COUNTLESS hours worth of information on Common Core, this documentary is, in my opinion, BY FAR the best, most concise, easy to follow and understand summation on the Common Core I’ve come across. Fantastic! See it and SHARE IT! Here in Montana the public is just waking up to the truth about Common Core. It can’t happen fast enough though, especially for any parent like myself who has school-age children. We ALL must be courageous and bold in defending our rights as parents and American tax payers against this insidious wave of the worst dumb-down to hit education in decades (or possibly ever). Our children, ALL our children deserve better and it’s up to us to keep raising awareness. Remember, even the biggest wild fire can starts with one tiny flame.
You’d have to be a complete idiot to interpret that letter as “panicked.”
Ladies, you rock. Thank you for all you do for us…… Please don’t stop……
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The Feds are not complicit since there are no actual Feds involved. The DOE ,like so much of the rest of what was once our government has been 5th columned. 4th,3rd, and 2nd columned as well. What we have here is a case of those cliques you mentioned negotiating with themselves. It’s the same as people thinking that DC regulates Wall St. when in fact it’s Wall St. That regulates DC. Get the money out of politics and destroy the revolving doors.
The key is ending compulsion. Repeal all truancy laws. Amend the First Amendment with two words, thus, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of education or religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;”. Would to God our schools were as free and successful as our churches.
where is the letter? i don’t see it here.
Many well-meaning people still think Common Core can somehow be useful. That it can be implemented without the misuse/overuse of standardized testing. This view is naive. Common Core is a marketing platform designed to tap into a guaranteed income stream – public tax revenue. The products are the purpose and the students become revenue sources. The claim that “achievement” can be defined by bubble-test scores is such a dangerous and often repeated lie. Students in rich private schools get much much more. They get authentic, well-rounded curriculum. They get discovery, critical thinking, and an environment that values self-sufficiency, ethics, social intelligence, and collaboration. Don’t all students deserve that?