Conform
By Glenn Beck, Kevin Balfe , and
Kyle Olson
Date
Review Posted: May 15, 2014
Author: Glenn Beck, Kevin Balfe, and Kyle
Olson
Release
Date: 2014
CCCCC (A
case could be made that I would only review the best of the best because if
while reading a book it does not hold my interest, I would not finish it and
therefore would not review it.)
DISCLAIMER:
This review was NOT written
by me, it was written by Kathleen Jasper,
a former Assistant Principle in the Florida school system and that is what
makes her review extra special. When I read her review I felt I could not
do my review the justice that she gave the book especially since it was written
by someone who you would have to consider on the other side of where most
people would put Glenn Beck. Please
review Ms. Jasper's web site at www.ConversationsED.com;
it is a wonderful sight with great content.
If you want to see the online interview between Glenn Beck and Kathleen
Jasper, go to: http://tinyurl.com/lf9ruuu,
it is an outstanding interview! Ms.
Jasper's review is reprinted with her permission and appears exactly as she
posted it on www.ConversationsED.com.
Ms.
Jasper's review:
In Glenn Beck’s new book, Conform, I realize the one thing
that would unite a liberal like me and a conservative like him is the fact that
we both believe to conform to what a system deems appropriate, proficient, or
standard is detrimental to creativity, autonomy and most important, independent
thinking.
The fight against standardization, high-stakes testing, big data and
shady education policy is not exclusive to any party or ideology. After reading Conform, I realized Glenn Beck
and I agree on many things. Here are just a few:
Common Core is not the answer.
In Conform, Mr. Beck meticulously
outlines Common Core and reveals that this new government initiative is about
money and control. Those who are the major players in the Common Core push are
those who stand to profit either politically or financially off of our
students.
I was pleasantly surprised that Mr. Beck goes after the right people in
his critique of the Common Core: Former Florida governor Jeb Bush, The Gates
Foundation, Achieve Inc., President Obama and US Secretary of Education, Arne
Dunken – a hodgepodge of democrats and republicans pushing our students into,
what I call, the machine.
The idea that a standard curriculum like the Common Core would solve
problems like high mobility rates and achievement gaps is simplifying the multifaceted
and complicated problems in our current system – problems exacerbated by No
Child Left Behind (NCLB) and Race to the Top (RTTT).
The push towards College
and Career Ready limits
our students to a grim future.
According to Mr. Beck, Common Core is designed to create workers not
thinkers, and I agree. I use the word drones when referring to ideal students
under standardization.
Drones are what I saw when I visited a first grade classroom in a Florida
public school recently. All the students were sitting in front of computers. I
asked the teacher, “And what are they doing?” thinking they must be on the
Internet creating something or looking up information. She told me, “They are
getting ready for FCAT (the current standardized test for Florida students). We
are teaching them how to take online tests.” It was something out of a Brave
New World or 1984 and literally sent chills
down my spine.
The underlying premise and discussion regarding the Common Core is,
“students must be college and/or career ready.” So basically the Common Core is
running on only
two choices, which are grim at best. The first grade class I visited
was a prime example of that preparation.
I argue, and so does Mr. Beck, students should be given freedom in how
their future unfolds. Students should be able to choose whether they want a
traditional education or whether they want to pursue a tech school, trade
school, online school, internship, apprenticeship and more.
There are an infinite amount of possibilities for students. Why are the
Common Core crusaders only pushing 2: College and Career? We should be
preparing them to make choices not preparing them for a life designed by a
testing company.
Standardization and high-stakes testing is about
MONEY.
There is money to be made in books, curriculum and tests. And when they
are all aligned, a word used often in
education, they are easy to package and sell to districts and states.
Private companies can then control our students while they give kickbacks
to Common Core crusaders on Capital Hill. In Conform, Mr. Beck exposes the
tangled web of interconnection among the Gates Foundation, testing companies,
and data collection/storage services.
High-Stakes testing, like those left over from NCLB and those being
administered for Common Core and RTTT, bring in big profits. Companies like
Pearson print the books, build the curriculum, make and score the tests, and
store the data. Testing companies lobby hard so high-stakes tests are the only
measure we use to assess our students and hold teachers accountable.
And here’s the shocker, the same people who are pushing Common Core,
accountability, and standardization, all have their hands in the companies
tasked with providing the services needed for test construction, test
administration, and data collection, storage and analysis.
We don’t need any more data.
Mr. Beck and I are in complete agreement that currently districts,
schools, teachers, administrators, students, and parents are required to bow
down to the almighty data. Every decision has to be data driven. We collect it,
store it, use it, and worse, waste it. In classrooms all over the country there
are data walls, data folders, data software, data chats, data groups, data,
data, data. We are over saturated with data and it has become impossible to use
it effectively.
This push towards collecting, storing, using, distributing and analyzing
the infinite amount of data we accumulate in schools and beyond is big money
for those who stand to gain. In fact, Mr. Beck explains $787 billion dollars
were spent in stimulus money to build systems capable of tracking and storing
longitudinal data of student progress. Eventually we will be tracking people
from conception until death.
The Common Core is State Led? Really?
The audacity of the federal government to say this is state led is
preposterous. Many state governors were asked to adopt the Common Core before
the standards were even written. And as states stand up and say, “No, we are
not going to proceed with the Common Core,” the federal government is threatening them with heavy
fines and loss of school
funding. How does this type of intimidation and fear tactics occur if this
initiative is state led?
Solutions
Glenn Beck has a valid point when he says, “Americans may not be able to
go from the glut of standardized testing we have now to nothing – but maybe
there is some middle ground.”
I believe there is middle ground to explore. Here are just a few
suggestions.
1.
Scale back high-stakes
testing. We do not need the amount of tests we currently have in circulation.
Under the Race to the Top Grant, districts have been forced to implement content
area tests separate from those already in place. Students are testing 1/3 of
the school year. Media centers, computer labs and other resources have been
stolen by testing companies.
2.
Create a global
perspective on school design. For example maybe take a few notes from Finland.
Yes their demographics are different but if that’s the only reason we are
refusing to explore the tactics Finland uses to be as successful as they are,
we are missing the mark. A few things to take from Finland right off the bat: they
don’t standardize, they revere teachers, and they allow students to make
choices in their learning.
3.
Allow districts and
communities to develop curriculum in tandem with parents, students, teachers
and administrators. Relinquish some control and have faith in people to decide
their own destiny. Educators are smart; give them back their autonomy.
4.
Eradicate isolation in
education. We isolate students based on test scores, abilities, poverty levels,
and exceptionalities. Stop categorizing unique students into finite
classifications. When we do this, we determine their future before they have a
chance to know who they are.
5.
Use your voice. Stand up
and stop conforming. Talk to teachers in your area; talk to parents. Students
can learn the laws and their loopholes and refuse standardized tests.
Mr. Beck and I both agree this country was built on the backs of men and
women who stood up, said no and refused to get into the machine. Every
evolution and revolution in this country has occurred because people refused to
allow the machine to determine their existence and the existence of their
children.
And in the words of my conservative friend Mr. Glenn Beck, “We have the
right solutions and the will to implement them. We are ready. Are you?”
Number
Of Times I Have Read This Book: Only once.
Will I read it again? Absolutely!
Who
Should Read the Book? Everyone
interested in the future of America.
Education IS the future of America and it is currently on the wrong
track with more money being spent on education than in any other country in the
world with results that fall far behind other countries. If you are happy with this result, don't read
the book. If you are unhappy, read the
book. Give the book to teachers you
know. The book is so important and there
are so many people who that when they hear the name Glenn Beck are turned off
and therefore will not read the book and that will definitely not only be their
loss, it will be the country's loss as well.
This is a very important book.
