Today We VOTE

November 8, 2016 Alice Linahan

By Alice Linahan | 11.08.2016

T

he Rebuilding of America starts on November 9, 2016 and it begins at home. As I wrote in my book… Your Child’s #1 Threat: 21st Century Learning and the Common Core

As Moms and Dads, we need to step back and start asking ourselves a couple of questions…

1. Can we accept an educational program as a truly solid academic education that will serve our children and their futures well, if our children graduate from high school or college with the attitudes, values, beliefs, behaviors, and a worldview that we oppose, which has been presented by teachers trained to believe it is their responsibility to be the devil’s advocate, and who teach our children to question and even oppose the foundational beliefs of our families?

2. Is it more important for our children to receive college credits in high school, or more important to establish and protect their minds and souls?

3. If your child graduates from college and attains a great, high paying job, but no longer respects – much less believes – that they are worthy of a strong marriage, a free and prosperous country, and that by the grace of God anything is possible – have we done our best to give our children a strong foundation for a happy, joy filled life?

In America, lead by Democrats and Republicans, we have shifted from a kindergarten through 12th grade system of education, to what is known as a P-20 W (Preschool through the Workforce) education of equity (equal outcomes), which will result in a loss of freedom, liberty, and opportunity for the next generation of individual citizens. Children today are seen merely as “Human Capital” for the government and are being trained for the workforce from preschool through 12th grade. e Common Core National Standards shift our educational process from the “Mental” (Academics and Knowledge Based Tests) to “Behaviors” (Performance Standards and Competency for the Workforce). This globally coordinated effort is about equalizing and controlling the economy of the United States and the citizens of America. You are no longer that boy from Amarillo, Texas who was a baseball star or in the band. You are now a global citizen.

American children are no longer to believe they are Americans living in a global economy; they are global citizens who happen to live in America. With this shift in educational focus-

  • Nationalism is being destroyed.
  • U.S. Constitution becomes null and void.

Now the question is, what are we going to do about it?

The Power of Compounding Activists (Moms, Dads, Grandparents, and Tax Payers) is how we will rebuild America.

The Challenge…

How do we take inside information to the parents, so they can be empowered with knowledge, and can take back their God-given parental authority over their own children?

The Answer…

We create the environment for good content to be developed from the ground up. We teach everyday moms, dads, grandparents, and taxpayers how to aggregate and disseminate information to reach the passive majority.

By reaching the following groups, we can make a difference:

• Passive Majority

• Engaged Minority

• Connected Authority

The Result….

By empowering the engaged minority with information and knowledge, they will pass it onto the passive majority, resulting in informed parents and teachers. This strategy will reverse the stronghold of power brokered by the public/private partnerships with the political elites (and their PR campaigns and big media buys), taking back our children, and taking America back to a Constitutional based government. A government where power is in the hands of the people – determined by their knowledge of the facts on the ground, and how they are negatively impacting our children.

Step 1: Lead by Developing a Local Organization, such as Truth in Texas Education (TITE)

In the book Tribes, Seth Godwin says, “People don’t believe what you tell them. They rarely believe what you show them. They often believe what their friends tell them. They always believe what they tell themselves.”

So this begs the question. What is the best way to begin the conversation in your local community about what is happening in our schools in America?

Step 2: Build a Communication Team:

Lead the Local Conversation

The goal of the communication team is to become the experts in their local area for education news and information.

This is done by:

• Gathering content from credible sources

• Connecting the dots when state and national stories about 21st Century Learning/College and Career Ready/Common Core connect locally.

• Create and cover education events in the local area

• Create education issue-based content around local and state elections

Communication Teams Consist of 4 Lead Directors

These “lead” people are as follows:

• A Communications Director

• A Content Director

• A Rapid Response Director

• A Social Media Director

Communication Teams Job Descriptions

• Communication Team Director: Lead contact and coordinator for all communications.

• Contact Creation Director: Lead on creating content. Identifies areas of media specialty, of membership, research, photos,    videos, editing, and writing.

• Rapid Response Issue Director: Lead for rapid response via press releases/conferences.

• Social Media Director: Lead for social media outreach and “Generation Mentor” training.

Step 3: Start or join the network of other communication teams in your local state.

Step 4: Join the network of national communication teams.

This network comes together every Wednesday night on the Women on the Wall weekly conference call.

Step 5: Have Hope Know that you are not alone.

You are not crazy. Your children and grandchildren are worth taking the time to educating yourself and taking a stand. We are ready to expose the facts behind the global transformation in education! I certainly am on a journey and know there is still so much more to learn.

The blessing is this: We are not alone. Check out what Texas Moms, Dads and Taxpayers are up to.


Next week, November 15, 16, 17 and 18, 2016 the Texas State Board of Education (SBOE) will be meeting. 

Katy ISD mom, Kim Gutierrez has been published in the Texas Insider.org. Her article: COMMON CORE MATH WAR RAGES IN TEXAS: THE PARADOX OF LOCAL CONTROL IN TEXAS EDUCATION has been noticed by a key expert who will be testifying next week in Austin, along with Leander ISD, Mechanical Engineer Dad, Randy Houchins.

As Texas education activist Donna Garner reported, below are the comments from Nakonia Hayes written in response to Kim Gutierrez’s article published in Texas Insider on 11.7.16.

Ms. Hayes served on the Math TEKS Writing Team when the 2012 math curriculum standards were adopted by the elected members of the Texas State Board of Education]:

FROM NAKONIA HAYES:

“Wow! Kim Gutierrez’s article is clear, succinct, and is an accurate portrayal of our math education problem in Texas. Randy Houchins has done yeoman service in his effort to get the board members to understand the mess in the math TEKS, largely because of Common Core process standards being inserted in them. Now we know an open statement was made by a TEA leader that process standards would be tested in STAAR as well. That means more than results in mathematical fluency are being tested. It means reading fluency around the “process” is being tested. It is, in truth, based on reading ability first and mathematics, second.

I kept asking how it is that Common Core-aligned materials are being purchased and used by school districts. Education Service Centers, who train the teachers, say it’s because our TEKS and Common Core standards overlap. Well, yes and no. What we may have in first grade, Common Core may teach in third grade. So that’s not really a “matching” situation. The money being made by vendors who rushed to create materials aligned with Common Core is staggering. By our school leaders being willing to fudge on TEKS and Common Core comparisons, they justify the purchase of those CC-aligned materials. It’s easier than finding non-CC materials in today’s flooded market of “CC-aligned” teaching materials. But they do exist. They still support classical teaching precepts long recognized with their proven methods and materials.

The history behind all of this mess is deep and sad. Basically, adults are putting ideology and partnerships for power and prestige over children’s real learning needs. The adults defend it as “social justice” for girls and non-Asian minorities. They claimed in 1989 that traditional math is designed for white males and Asians. (This is a strange accusation since mathematics is 4,500 years old and is the product of many races worldwide.) So, girls and non-Asians were being discriminated against in math classrooms. That had to be corrected. In the process, the whole discipline of mathematics had to be reinvented, American style.
“Process” became the product of math education, not results. More than 200 mathematicians called this wrong in 1999 and urged an end to the unproven and weak “reform” materials. They were ignored by the U.S. Department of Education.

By the way, mathematicians are totally different from math educators. One must prove his/her creativity with a new discovery in higher mathematics in order to earn his/her academic credentials; the other must know how to design curriculum. One works with the historical discipline of mathematics. The other works with methodology of teaching. Since the math educators are in charge of school curricula nationwide, they don’t have to take advice, and rarely do, from mathematicians when planning math education materials and teacher training. (Dr. Jim Milgram’s comments are proof of that.) This cloistered self-protection from challenges by experts in mathematics has been our undoing. It’s so wrong on so many levels. Just ask the students (and parents) from elementary school through college who are helping build the $5-8 billion private tutoring industry in America today. Most of that money goes for math tutoring.

I will be testifying at the SBOE meeting on Nov. 16th, along with Randy Houchins and Dr. Milgram. My goal is to get the Common Core process standards out of the TEKS Math Standards. We need only to tell teachers what to teach; how they do it depends on their students’ needs, not some central office ideology. Results, after all, do matter.”
Nakonia (Niki) Hayes
Waco, TX 

Along with exposing the Common Core push in Texas, parents and tax payers are exposing the real agenda behind the push to destroy true local control through an initiative called District of Innovation (DOI)

Texans are questioning- What is the agenda behind the District of Innovation (DOI) Institute?

Texas’ Districts of Innovation (DOI) Initiative is NOT what you think……

The latest Reform movement push by Raise Your Hand Texas and the Texas Association of School Boards (TASB) is an initiative called ‘District of Innovation’.
The District of Innovation concept, passed by the 84th Legislative Session in House Bill 1842, gives traditional independent school districts most of the flexibilities available to Texas’ open-enrollment charter schools. As exposed in this video, DOI is nothing more than experimentation on Texas students. There is no research and they are just experimenting as noted by Raise Your Hand Texas non-profit lobbyist, David Anderson. It is merely political and does not address the real issues in Texas education that are harming children in the classroom daily.

DOI as stated by Jeffrey Horn seems to be based on this ALEC legislative template: The Innovation Schools and School Districts Act

The gimmick behind this is to say that public schools have their hands tied by unnecessary legislation and regulation and someone (a panel, the state superintendent of education, the state school board, etc.) should be given the power to consider requests to opt out of certain regulations. As such, those touting it see it (or at least market it) as a liberty issue, pushing back (albeit modestly) against State power.

It begs the question though… If there are regulations or legislation that really ties the hands of schools, why wouldn’t a legislature simply repeal that legislation so that all schools are free from the tyranny of the State? Why hand over the decision making power to an executive or to a (possibly unelected, unaccountable) board to decide?

There are several concerns with these Districts of Innovation:
* States will hold these “opt outs” of state regs over the heads of districts the same way Obama’s US DoEd has held NCLB waivers over the heads of districts to force its will (High Stakes Testing, Common Core, etc.)

* It essentially puts entire school districts into a status much like charter schools who’s charter can be revoked at the will of the state, even for altogether different reasons than the waiver was awarded to address. As such it takes governance of the district away from the locally accountable school board and moves it toward the State.

* It might allow “modernization” like removing of teachers in favor of remote teachers or computers or awarding students for work they do at local businesses with skills badges. It may allow for waivers from grades at all in favor of badges.

* It might (as I understand the impetus in Wisconsin) allow districts to combine with neighboring districts into “Super Districts” or “Regions” to reduce administrative overhead and other infrastructure costs. This again removing local control away from individual schools and districts to a remote governing body or administrative unit. This all in the name of “efficiency” and “saving the state money it needs to dole out to support all those administrators.

*This seems to be touted from the Left as a way to help public schools “compete” on a fairer playing ground with charters and voucher programs.

I would concur that DOI and Education Savings Accounts (ESA)s are ways to dismantle traditional public schools in favor of charter like structures (public private partnerships) that will be forced to generate student data for corporate profit and State control.
— Jeffrey Horn

Speaking of Education Savings Accounts (ESA)s, parents who are already utilizing all education options are pushing back. Texas mom Meg Bakich, lays out the best argument against the so called “School Choice” legislation. Parents and Tax Payers are ready to expose the facts behind this global transformation in education! We understand A FEDERAL UNCONSTITUTIONAL SYSTEM has been locked in place through the passage of federal and state legislation, designed like a set of gears, “rigged,” if you will, to sort our children into positions within the workforce, based on the soviet model.

Specifically by the passage of the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) and the Every Student Succeed Act (ESSA). We ask you to join us as we SEEK the FACTS, SHARE the FACTS and STAND UP for the FACTS as we fight for our children’s MINDS, fight for their SOULS and fight for AMERICA’S STORIES to be told. 

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Alice Linahan

Alice Linahan is a politically-active Texas mom, and Founder of Voices Empower. When it comes to challenging the educational system, and its link with the those in government who seek to hijack parental rights, Voices Empower provides the platform and inside knowledge to fight and win the battle against the social conditioning of our children.

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