By David Tulis

A Common Core critic in the Chattanooga area appears to have made an important conceptual break with the public school system, organizing a group that views an exodus as vital as her effort to rid the state of Common Core.

Karen Bracken holds elected office as commissioner in Polk County, Tenn. She is active in opposition to the idea of regional government and the Thrive 2055 program centering on Chattanooga that seeks to delocalize politics and reorganize municipal and county governments into a harmonious whole to better solicit funds from Washington, D.C.

In her frustration with the idea of public school reform, Mrs. Bracken is launching a group, Starve the Beast. http://www.starvethebeastusa.com/

Her effort in Tennessee Against Common Core implies that with removal of the federally directed program, public education might be restored to family and state. She appears to have given up hope for that group’s success.

The solution to Common Core is abandoning state schooling for private and Christian education. “The best alternative is to get our children out of harm’s way,” she says, “and that means get them out of the public school system and into the safety of their home to be educated by people that care about them and love them.  Or to remove them from public school and enroll them into a true Christian Classical private school.”

For the double-minded

Mrs. Bracken admits that many parents will continue to remain two-minded about the state system and will insist on remaining patrons of its free school. For these die-hard consumers of the state freebie, Mrs. Bracken urges a strong dose of nay-saying.

Parents who “cannot under any circumstances provide homeschool or private school alternatives” should become refuseniks.

You are the parent(s) that REFUSE high stakes tests (including NAEP), REFUSE all surveys (even those given during test taking), REFUSE free meals in school, REFUSE any and all medical services provided inside the school (this includes BMI weight and height measurements), REFUSE AP courses, SAT, PSAT (there are 800 colleges today that accept students without SAT-this part of Component 2 is meant to starve the College Board), REFUSE to enroll your child into a Charter School, REFUSE vouchers, REFUSE digital learning (you want books and paper and pencil tests).

Parents with growing suspicions should “DEMAND to see EVERY test that has an impact on your child’s final grade, DEMAND to visit and observe your child’s class,” Mrs. Bracken says.

Moms and dads in Tennessee should stop patronizing a school system that has no genuine local control and does not reflect the interests of the ostensible client, the local family. “It is our hope by starving the beast eventually the beasts will die,” Mrs. Bracken says on the Starve the Beast website. “The beasts need our children and their data to survive.  If we could reduce the current public school enrollment by 25% we could destroy the beasts.”

The fight against the globalist and egalitarian-oriented Common Core will have limited success, Mrs. Bracken indicates. “They say they want equity with all children having a fair shot at a good education (they actually had more equity years ago than now) but what they really want is equity in outcomes. The only way you provide equity in outcomes is to dumb down the system to the lowest denominator so all children can achieve the same outcomes.”

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