Will Other States Follow Indiana And Opt Out Of Common Core?

Well, it’s a start.

Less than four years after Indiana became an early adopter of the national Common Core education standards, Gov. Mike Pence signed legislation Monday making Indiana the first state to opt out of the controversial K-12 guidelines.

But the law does not prohibit parts of Common Core from being written into new standards that are expected to be voted on by the State Board of Education late next month.

Pence said his signing of Senate Bill 91 — one of 20 education related bills he signed into law Monday — would make Indiana a model for other states to follow in taking control of what their students are taught.

Indiana’s early support may be a key in helping other states take another look at implementation. As we have all too often
seen, federal "solutions" rarely solve anything other than adding a layer of bureaucracy that will inevitably do more harm than good. If one early adopter had the temerity to rethink its position and find Common Core wanting, perhaps it will make it easier for others to do so.

The press keeps saying that many Republicans support Common Core but they only ever mention one Republican-Jeb Bush. In reality, neither Common Core nor Jeb Bush are as popular in the GOP as the mainstream media so desperately want them to be.

Sometimes all it takes is one to get a party started and FoxNews.com wonders whether Indiana’s move will "open the floodgates".

Indiana has become the first of 45 states to opt out of the national education standard known as Common Core, and critics of the controversial K-12 program say the move could "open the floodgates" for others to follow.

Growing criticism over costs imposed by the program, as well as fears that by setting a national education standard, the program has already begun dictating curriculum, has made Common Core an increasingly polarizing issue. Although the program has both Republican and Democrat supporters, Indiana Gov. Mike Pence predicted his state will be the first of many to rethink participation.

"I believe when we reach the end of this process there are going to be many other states around the country that will take a hard look at the way Indiana has taken a step back, designed our own standards and done it in a way where we drew on educators, we drew on citizens, we drew on parents and developed standards that meet the needs of our people," Pence said.

There are two obvious choices to soon follow Pence’s lead.

Wisconsin’s Scott Walker told a convention in January that the Common Core standards should be revisited and Louisiana’s Bobby Jindal used the Indiana news as an opportunity to express his support for a state-level approach.

Pence may have unlocked the floodgates but these two could really push them open and get the tide flowing against this ill-conceived federal intervention.