The United States Common Core Standards Should Be Repealed

First of all, I would like to state that as in my first argument, the second round of this debate was for points and the third for rebuttals. Therefore, all refutes made by my opponent in the previous round are invalid, and seeing as he made no specific points I have nothing to refute. So technically, seeing as there are only points on the table on my side, and all of Con's rebuttals are invalid, I am currently winning this debate. However, I would like to give rebuttals for Cons exited to my points, because perhaps Con did not read my first argument, and it is only fair. 1) The standards are not causing the frustration, it is the curriculum. That is true, however, the standards are leading to this new curriculum, and even if it is the teachers fault, the only way to fix this is by training the teachers better. And in this day and age, we do not have enough money and resources to do this, so therefore it is improbable to keep these standards simply because without good teachers we cannot have better curriculum, and we should stick with what we know. Also, the CCS website is a completely biased source and points from there should not be valid in this debate. 2) It is actually easier to control what children are learning. It is supposed to be, but it is not. That was the original goal of these standards. However, they have FAILED! These teachers, who are unable to teach the new curriculum well, are giving the children false and confusing information by mistake, and on to of that, with the government in control of everything, states and school districts are unable to make their own choices about curriculum. Therefore, you do not get to chose what your child is learning, nor does the school district, or even the state, because the national government is now in charge of public schooling. So if your school was ahead, you will be pushed backwards! It is actually much harder to control. 3) Massachusetts test scores have improved. By .03%! (NYT) And even if they did, that is because schools are pressuring the children to memorize the information quickly, rather than fully comprehend and understand it. As the Los Angeles Times put it, "higher test scores does not mean higher knowledge." 4) Change the way it is taught, not what you're teaching. True, that would be the ideal solution, but as I mentioned earlier, we do not have the resources to do so, and to better educate the teachers! We cannot afford to, so we have 2 options. A. Keep this confusing curriculum and change nothing. B. Go back to the old, decent, UNDERSTANDABLE methods of teaching. 5) James Milark is not against Common Core. But Con merely stated part of the quote. The full quote also included the writer of the Common Core Standards calling them "a massive stress ball hanging over the school". Correct me if I'm wrong, but that comment sounds pretty negative to me. 6) Curriculum not standards! Again! We cannot afford to change the curriculum, so it will either stay this way forever or go back to the way it was before. 7) The kindergarten standards are false. Okay, so you took a survey of how high all your sisters friends can count, huh? Well. Maybe this statistic is false for your school, but according to the Economist most kindergarteners cannot count to 100, and that is a much more reliable source than an estimated stat from your sister's class, so this point remains valid. 8) Tests cannot take that long. They are spread out over a period of days, and I remember my sister taking them last year..this is not an estimated statistic by the way, she had 3 hours of testing a day for two days. And she was in first grade. So they can take that long, just not al, at once. And my information came from my sources, listed at the bottom of my previous argument. 9) People need math and creativity. Absolutely true! However, not once did I say that people didn't need math at all. I simply stated that creativity is very important, because it leads to innovation and new ideas, and we can not have new technology without the creative, innovative minds. So yes, math is necessary, but without creativity it is not as useful. I have now met my BoP, because I have proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that all my claims are true, and all of my opponent's are false. Thank you for your time, and since Con has no points and no valid refutes, I strongly urge you to vote for Pro on this debate. SOURCES Please refer to the list at the end of my previous argument.