Tech Thursday: Career Readiness Pledge

Tech Thursdays
Can you believe the U.S. Congress has a CTE (adult CCSS) caucus??!! Wow!
Can you believe the U.S. Congress has a CTE (adult CCSS) caucus??!! Wow!

The picture you see above is from my May 2015 article where I exposed the Congressional Caucus for Career Technical Education. CTE (Career Technical Education) is the post-secondary version of Common Core. Others like myself have uncovered this truth and shared it many times over. I know that on my blog along there are many articles about the ties. Today, however, we’re going to dive into the CCSSO’s Career Tech Education interference. (CCSSO stands for the Council of Chief State School Officers) CCSSO is the half-owner of the “Common Core State Standards”.

If you missed the May 2015 article, please refer to:
https://www.commoncorediva.com/2015/05/14/tech-thursday-when-you-think-its-not-ccss-but-it-is/
The biggest ‘take aways’ you need to know from the above article are that (1) the House of Representative’s caucus has been in action since 2007, the Senate’s began in 2014. (2) The Association for Career Technical Education (ACTE) works hand-in-hand with the Congressional caucuses and has written a letter to the U.S. President concerning his Scholars Program and to push for even MORE CTE alignment for the sake of  their communities. (3) A current House Bill 2317 is titled “Career Choice Counseling” (4) glorifying more rigor, college, career readiness. (5) How Perkins Funding (used in post-secondary educational institutions) is being misused for the sake of the CCSS Machine’s agenda.

To see the CCSSO‘s ownership claim to Common Corehttp://www.corestandards.org/about-the-standards/branding-guidelines/ (*Note: look under the ‘trademarks’ and ‘copyright’ sections)

The CTE Pledge:

Announced yesterday by the CCSSO, was the news that Wisconsin had taken the CTE Pledge for their state’s education. See the screen shot below:
WICTEpledge

So, what’s the Pledge? There are 3 statements in the Pledge:
“1) make career and technical education (CTE) programs more responsive to the labor market by enlisting employers as lead partners
2) raise the threshold for quality career pathways, and
3) make career readiness a higher priority in state accountability systems.”

Let me pause for a moment, anti CC Warriors. Do you see the problems in the Pledge? I do!
Businesses as leaders in education? Where are the teachers, they should be the leaders! Then the Career Pathways is a huge issue. Why? It’s embedded at least 21 different times in the WIOA of 2014 (Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act of 2014). The US Dept. of Labor has joined with the US Dept. of Education and the US Dept. of Health, Human Services to push for a trained workforce in America. The goal? It isn’t so a person can get ahead in life, it’s so the nation can be globally competitive! Lastly, we know the CCSS Machine is trying to calm folks down by using different names for CCSS. “Career Readiness” and “Career Readiness Standards” are just two of those efforts.
Back to the Pledge, now. Wisconsin joins 16 other states who’ve taken the CTE Pledge. The others, according to the CCSSO’s press release, are “The 17 states are California, Colorado, Hawaii, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, New Jersey, New Mexico, Nevada, North Carolina, Ohio, Rhode Island, Tennessee, Wisconsin and Wyoming.” See the rest of the press release,
http://www.ccsso.org/News_and_Events/Press_Releases/CCSSO_Announces_State_Action_to_Advance_Career_Pathways_.html
The CTE Pledge is part of the “Career Readiness Initiative”. This Initiative, also from the CCSSO is to close the skills gap in America. Warriors, many anti CCSS researchers, writers, and reporters, have shared with us that the truth is there isn’t really a skills gap in America. It’s just another pro CCSS fallacy to throw us off the track. The Initiative is slam full of ‘collectivism’, ‘best practices’, and ‘incentives’ for states who ‘step up’ their plans to align to even more tied to the ‘Core’. To see the Career Ready Initiativehttp://www.ccsso.org/Resources/Programs/Career_Readiness_Initiative.html

According to the WI announcement, this move is happening because data collected in the other states already pledged have seen better results in graduation rates. Pardon me, if I’m not sold. Why? Look at how many OTHER pro CCSS/CTE reports we’ve seen where it’s shown as ‘great’, only to find out that when the truth comes out, the numbers are WRONG. That said, that’s not the worst part of the CTE Pledge. If you’ve already looked at the CCSSO’s resources I’ve shared above, you’ll notice that this ‘Career Ready Initiative’ is only ONE step in a multi-step process. The next step? It appears to the “The universal implementation of academic and career planning services in 2017-18” What ‘universal implementation’?!

Academic and Career Planning:
Here’s what the State Superintendent of WI has to say about ACP (Academic and Career Planning) under his authority:
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C4zalFqeRGI&w=560&h=315]

Wow! “Part of the agenda”, you heard him say that directly. The CCSS/CTE agenda is a trained workforce! How will these students plan? Well, most schools have trained staff counselors on hand to help guide our students, right? What happens when the COUNSELORS have been aligned to the CCSS/CTE agenda? Think it can’t happen? It already is happening. Read all about it in my previously published article where I lay out for you the White House Initiative for school counselors to become aligned to Common Core, Career Tech, and Career Pathways. Why school counselors? According to the White House presentation “school guidance counselors being in the BEST STRATEGIC position to steer our students to the CCSS, College/Career Ready path/track!!” One of the presenters of this presentation said, “‘They are the heart and soul of the agenda. They are uniquely positioned.’”
To see the rest of this extremely important news,
https://www.commoncorediva.com/2014/10/10/fridays-post-breaking-news-you-need-to-know/

To see the Wisconsin’s ACP Universal Implementation step-by-step, ACP Basics
When you open the document, be sure to note the school counselors position, the culture shift for education, and much more.
So what about those 16 other states? Are they ‘universally implemented’ as well? The links below may be of help in answering this question. If not, they are at least a place for you to start your own researching.

California,
http://www.connectedcalifornia.org/downloads/LL_Expanding_Pathways.pdf
Colorado,
https://www.cde.state.co.us/postsecondary/icaptoolkit
Hawaii,
http://www.academicinnovations.com/docs/PTP.pdf
Illinois,
http://pathways.illinois.edu/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/2013-Career-Cluster-Guide-Final.pdf
Kentucky,
http://education.ky.gov/CommOfEd/CDU/Documents/CCR%20Delivery%20Plan.pdf
Louisiana,
http://www.louisianabelieves.com/docs/default-source/teacher-toolbox-resources/district-planning-guide.pdf?sfvrsn=26
(see page 3 for the overall plan visual)
Maryland,
http://www.marylandpublicschools.org/msde/divisions/careertech/career_technology/cd.htm
Mississippi,
https://www.mde.k12.ms.us/docs/career-and-technical-education/ms-training-ce-cp-2014-15-flyer.pdf?sfvrsn=2
(this is from the education staff’s side of Academic and Career Planning)
New Jersey,
http://www.state.nj.us/education/cte/pslp/PSLPGuide.pdf
New Mexico,
http://ped.state.nm.us/ped/NexStepDocs/NSP%20Template%20manual%20v2%201final%205.7.12.pdf
Nevada,
http://cteae.nv.gov/Career_Guidance/
(from the school counselor’s role)
North Carolina,
http://www.dpi.state.nc.us/docs/cte/curriculum/planning.pdf
Ohio,
https://education.ohio.gov/getattachment/Topics/Other-Resources/Getting-Involved-with-your-Child-s-Learning/Your-4th-to-5th-Grader/Ohio-Middle-Grade-Resources/Individual-Academic-and-Career-Plan-Ohio-Career-Information-System.pdf.aspx
Rhode Island,
https://www.waytogori.org/
Tennessee,
http://www.planningyourdreams.org/
Wyoming,
http://www.wyo4ed.org/

For those with Special Needs students? There’s a Academic and Career Plan in place in some states. The Dept. of Labor has all the information on their website page from the Office of Disability Employment Policy. See: http://www.dol.gov/odep/ilp/map/

Oh, and for those states which didn’t adopt CCSS? They have CTE. The two examples I found popping up almost every time I searched for the 16 states above are VA and TX. Here’s VA’s Academic and Career Planning site: http://doe.virginia.gov/instruction/graduation/academic_career_plan/index.shtml
Texas also didn’t sign on for CCSS, but here’s their ACP site: http://www.achievetexas.org/Resources1.htm

Did you notice the ‘catchy’ names for some of the states? ‘Achieve’, ‘Way to Go’, ‘Planning Your Dreams’, to name 3. What a deception! What student, what teacher has dreamed of being so like everyone else? What student or guidance counselor has ever expected their task would be to assimilate rather than be free? Did you notice how young some of the states are starting their ACPs? What an abomination to our children!!

Warriors, we know from much research, the goal is a total cradle to grave mentality that accompanies the CCSS Machine. Wrapped in good intentions looms an education that is full of ill intent. We must call our U.S. Senators and Representatives to HALT any work on the re-authorization efforts connected to pre-K universal standards/elementary and secondary bills (HR5 and S1177), as well as efforts geared toward post-secondary education (HEA). Every one of these has MORE control via CCSS, CTE, Career Pathways, STEM, College and Career Readiness, and the other names CCSS hides behind. Everyone of these efforts has MORE data mining, high-stake assessments. Each of these efforts forces schools to cease teaching and becoming community one-stop hubs for ‘education’ purposes. We MUST contact our leaders. We are America, not other countries where their freedoms are neutered. Use this link to Tweet every Congress member:
https://twitter.com/verified/lists/us-congress/members
Don’t use Twitter, call the main Congressional switchboard and ask to be connected to your Congress member. The Capitol Hill main phone line is 202-224-3121

Not sure what to say to halt this massive continuation of CCSS? Please refer to the letter the FL Stop Common Core Coalition wrote and has had it delivered to Congress just a couple of days ago! I wrote about the historic move on my “From the Files” article. Many national publications have also picked up the story.
https://www.commoncorediva.com/2015/10/13/ftf-only-we-can-prevent/
Truth in American Education‘s: http://truthinamericaneducation.com/elementary-and-secondary-education-act/national-coalition-opposes-no-child-left-behind-rewrite-conference-bill/

4 thoughts on “Tech Thursday: Career Readiness Pledge

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *