Open Letter to the Texas State Board of Education and Texas Legislature 02.24.16
It is with profound sadness, frustration and concern for what is next that I write to you, following the viewing of the hearing by the Commission on Next Generation Assessments and Accountability that was held in Austin yesterday.
I am appalled by Governor Greg Abbott’s choice of appointment of Texas Education Commissioner, Mike Morath. While we witnessed a despicable display of arrogance by the Commissioner, I was grateful to finally hear him take ownership of the Common Core and national alignment in our state standards. Not only did he grace us with his humor and his wit as it pertains to being dismissive of our State laws, but he took a gleeful sort of pride in his ownership of this behemoth.
We learned from the Governor’s Commissioner and some of his supporters that our children are a profit and loss tick for the end game of Education Reform. We learned that he fully intends to comply with Federal mandates and “what the Federal government expects.” We now understand that he fully intends to monitor our children from cradle to grave for the purposes of “workforce development.” These measures are not just of academic performance, but actual physical responses to circumstances in the classroom. I was taken aback by the number of times “real time” was referred to and the number of metrics that will be supplied by this real time data initiative.
This Commission and any of our elected bodies that do not stand against are working toward pitting the people of this State against the government.
This is a pivotal point for education in our State because the powers that be are no longer hiding their intentions. Monitoring of our children at a Federal level, while denigrating the quality of their education is reminiscent of Communist models that the world has experienced in the past.
Social engineering, diminishing reading, writing and arithmetic in exchange for teaching values, attitudes and beliefs, tracking the moment by moment performance and emotion of school children, dictating the outcomes of their adult lives through the use of data, nanny state government in education… these things are the antithesis of Liberty. Remember Liberty? Remember the Republic? Remember individual sovereignty? Remember the enumerated powers?
This is a historical movement that will have your names on it. Which side of the equation will you be on? We know what to expect of the Beltran’s in this shift, but several of you identify yourselves to your constituents as Conservatives. Conservatives are liberty minded and understand the rights of the individual. Are you going to sign off on this knowing that it violates every premise that this country was founded upon? Will you let that rest on your shoulders? Will you be able to sleep at night knowing that you didn’t at least attempt to stand up for our kids, our state and our nation?
We will soon see because the time to stop it is now, before it fully makes its way into the classroom. You are either with the children or you are not. Make your position known today.
