Another bill to end the so-called “common core” educational standards has failed in the North Dakota House.
The bill would have prohibited North Dakota from keeping the Common Core standards – and adopting new standards that mirrored Common Core. It would also force the state to adopt Massachusetts standards from the early 2000s until the state could write its own. And the bill would also take away the power of the Superintendent of Public Instruction to approve the new standards.
Current DPI Superintendent Kirsten Baesler was criticized by the anti-Common Core people because she joined the Smarter Balanced Consortium -- which wrote the standardized tests students take. Those tests were based on Common Core standards.
But the bill’s opponents said the Department of Public Instruction has gathered teachers from across the state to write new standards – and those will be ready by April.
"There's been a lot of effort put in to making the new standards, and make them North Dakota standards," said the Chairman of the House Education Committee, Rep. Mark Owens (R-Grand Forks), whose committee unanimously recommended a "do-not-pass" on the bill. "Whether you think they look like Common Core standards or you don't, they're going to be North Dakota standards."
The measure was split into two parts, with a separate vote for each. Both parts failed – meaning the bill itself failed.