Education name is misleading

The Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) is still trying to deceive the people, in my opinion, by boldly calling the Common Core State Standards, Missouri Learning Standards. Let it be known that these common standards are to be fully implemented in more than 40 states by 2014-2015 and are copyrighted by two national private trade organizations who claim their development and ownership. They were not written by Missourians for Missouri students, and I find the name "Missouri Learning Standards" very misleading. In fact, parents and teachers say to me daily, "Our school doesn't use the Common Core Standards. We use the Missouri Learning Standards."

Fact is, if you go to www.missourilearningstandards.com and click on Learn About the Standards, you will find a list of academic subjects. I encourage you to click on the link for English Language Arts and Literacy. This link takes you to www.corestandards.com, the Common Core State Standards Initiative literacy home page. Here you can read about the development of the standards and how the Literacy Standards include history/social studies, science and technical subjects and are designed to supplement these subjects as well.

Public schools, including our own, have spent thousands of dollars aligning curriculum to the standards, preparing teachers through conferences and workshops, increasing technology to meet the Common Core assessment guidelines, and participating in pilot programs. Call them what you wish, but the truth is Missouri has signed on to use the Common Core State Standards Initiative and they are being used to teach the children of Missouri.

BRAD NOEL, Jackson