The Most Important Standard

You cannot walk into a discussion about education and not hear the word ‘standard’ mentioned at least 16,432 times. I may be exaggerating, but the focus on Common Core, on rigor, on assessing kids knowledge has become the entire discussion. What about kids? What about guiding them to think about others? What about helping them understand that they can make a difference? This quote sums up everything about education. We want our kids to excel academically. We support them in learning to read, write, and problem solve.  We want them to do well in their studies, to achieve standards, to reach goals. But beyond that?  Do good. We want that too.   Even more importantly, we need to guide learning experiences so that students can have the opportunity to want it.  Inspire them.  I’m not saying standards aren’t important, but standards won’t change the world. Our kids will.