Joel and I vs. The New Common Core State Standards

Joel Stein. I think I found a new favorite columnist! I love his word choice, especially because it is much easier to comprehend, as compared to the majority of other writers. In this article Joel Stein goes on about how students are now slowly, and surely losing connections to literary pieces of fiction. From the article, I learned that the Common core State Standards are issuing new curriculum standards, dramatically transitioning half of the nation's high school English reading lists toward emphasis on nonfiction.

As true as the new president of College Board David Coleman's opinion may be, "As you grow up in this world, you realize people don't really give a s--- about what you feel or what you think" I disagree with him. For one, I believe we are modernizing too fast and too much, in such little time. What I mean is, as growing students and young adults, we are losing our senses and abilities of creativity and critical thinking. If we continue down the path of nonfiction, we will slowly and surely lose our abilities to use language to our advantages, i.e. persuasion.

If we solely rely on hard facts for literature and history alike, where will the deeper understanding come from? It will become buried. Underneath. "Why?" you may ask? It is exactly the same reason why you can't win any arguments. Because you don't know how to persuade. In other words, manipulate the English language.

In the long run, by following the new curricula starting in 2014, school is going to become a lot like a robotic training facility or factory, call it whatever you like. Without advantageous communication skills, the future young adults will inevitably have a hard time achieving their goals of success. The reasoning behind my statements can be concluded by one simple example.

You may ask, "What helped people like Bill Gates, Donald Trump, Steve-O, and Drake become the people they are today? They are all rich and successful, but how?" The answer my friends, is pretty damn simple-- Language. Creativity. Self-expressionism. Everyone is different and special in their own way, it's up to you how you're going to put it to use to make yourself stand out. After all, success doesn't come to all the dull, "regular" people. It presents itself to those who aren't afraid to show their creativity to the rest of the world.

When you think about it, this article isn't just about some change literature and history. There's much, much more to it. The results of shifting from a balanced fiction and nonfiction curriculum to a majority nonfiction curriculum pretty much shapes the developing communication and social skills of all incoming high school students. Joel Stein concludes the idea that this curriculum has major flaws and long term negative results. I for one, definitely agree with him!