More information
about the increasingly unpopular Common Core Curriculum is beginning to reveal
itself, and it isn’t pretty. Not only does this new curriculum attempt to
standardize education on a national level; it also appears that there is a
massive data collection system in place to track our children’s educational
progress as well as their behavior, emotional responses, facial expressions,
pulse and the rate of blood flow in response to a certain stimulus. Known as
the State Longitudinal Database System or SDLS, personal information about your
children (and their parents incidentally) will be obtained, tracked and kept in
a national database using technology known as data mining or affective
computing. Quoting a report published by the Department of Education called,
“Promoting Grit, Tenacity and Perseverance” data mining is defined as-
“The study and
development of systems and devises that can recognize, interpret, process and
simulate aspects of the human affect.”
What we are
essentially talking about here is the integration of the same type of
technology that is being used in national security in combination with surveys
that allow researchers to understand an individual’s behavior, attitudes and
personal beliefs. Facial recognition cameras will be in place in the classroom
according to this same report as well as heart rate monitors that will allow
researchers again to come to conclusions about individuals behavior based on
how they are responding to given stimuli. This doesn’t sound like a bad idea
and in fact many parents would probably be oblivious to the potential dangers
believing that this information will only aid in the learning process. It seems
logical to assume that learning how one individual child learns will only help
them achieve greater success.
The information
obtained through the SDLS is being used for another purpose however. It is
being sold to educational technology companies to aid in their research. One
such company is InBloom incorporated which is funded by the Bill and Melinda
Gates foundation. Over time the information obtained through data mining
technology will be used to help educators and researchers make predictions
about the student’s future performance and even guide them in a particular
direction based on emerging patterns of behavior and learning. In other words
the technology will help determine the career of your child instead of your
child being able to use their own minds to determine which direction they want
to go. This Common Core Curriculum is aiding in the creation of the good little
“global citizen” that serves the system rather than living a life based on
freedom.
The different
types of information that will be obtained by the data mining systems are
separated in to two categories; direct identifiers and indirect identifiers.
Direct identifiers would obviously be made up of information such as date of
birth, addresses, social security numbers or anything else that could be used
in the direct identification of students as well as their parents. This isn’t
unusual as all schools keep this information. Indirect identifiers however
would include that which was obtained through the use of data mining and would
include the following- political and religious affiliations, mental health and
criminal records, sexual behavior, health problems and even prevailing social
attitudes. Given the fact that this information is being sold to companies to
be used as “research” is it possible that someday your children’s political
beliefs or religious affiliations would be used against them? This is an alarming intrusion into the
privacy of our children’s lives and it must be stopped.
In my opinion this
is an advancement of the Fabian (incremental) socialism that I have recently
been writing about. This goes all the way back to John Dewey and his admiration
of the Soviet Model of education which trained you for a job rather than taught
you how to think. This is essentially the same thing, though it seems appealing
because they seem to be preparing your child for the future, they are in fact
preparing them for a life of servitude. Not only are tests being standardized
on the national level but it appears researchers are searching for a
“standardized behavior” in which they believe they will be able to optimize
learning potential. It must also be noted that tyrannical regimes of the past
were also interested in parent’s beliefs and organizational affiliations for
the purpose of turning children values against their parents. Today they
achieve this by using a technique known as “values clarification.”
Regardless of how
well one receives this information it must be understood that the founders of
this nation knew that in order for liberty to survive, our future generations
would have to be trained in preserving it by learning the science of government.
We can see that our educational system has failed miserably at teaching our
children the constitution and the true history of this nation. Common Core
curriculum will further do so by standardizing learning behavior and training
our children how to best perform to the desires and aspirations of the ruling
elite as opposed to their own self discoveries and individual talents. If you
have any doubts just ask yourself how successful state standardized testing has
been and now imagine that on a national level. I can only hope that my opinion
is wrong.
Nces.ed.gov/pubs2011/2011602.pdf
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