Dive Brief:
- Even though South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley repealed the state's commitment to the Common Core State Standards beginning in the 2015-16 school year, some critics are saying the short timeline for creating new standards may mean not much will actually change.
- According to the new law, a to-be-announced panel of educators, parents, community, and business leaders must convene by January 2015 to review the old Common Core standards prior to creating their replacement.
- Any changes would have to be approved by both the state Board of Education and the independent Education Oversight Committee by August 2015, leaving only 7 months for new standards to be created and approved.
Dive Insight:
“If you’re going to wholesale write new standards, it takes a minimum of two years,” Melanie Barton, director of the Education Oversight Committee told the Associated Press. “I just don’t think in nine months you can totally rewrite two entire standards and do justice to the children of this state.”
This nine-month calculation is if the committee convenes earlier than the mandated January date. However, even if the committee began meeting today — which would be impossible because members have still not been selected — they will have just over a year to create new standards.
According to Sen. Brad Hutto (D-Orangeburg), the whole move to repeal the Common Core is just political spin. “The spin is that we did away with, abolished, Common Core. We didn’t do anything to it this year other than move up in time the cyclical review, probably to the detriment of the review,” Hutto said.
While many are already predicting the new standards will look very similar to the Common Core — a complaint that was seen in Indiana, where even less time was given for the creation of new standards — there are some definite changes that will happen. Last Monday, Gov. Haley signed the Back to Basics in Education Act, which mandates schools teach cursive and multiplication memorization, both of which are not found in the Common Core standards.
