Stakehodler #2

Monschau, Oliver, Bundestag Government Building, 7/11/2015, via pixabay Public Domain Distribution License

The second stakeholder of note is the United States Department of Education. This department is in charge of the national regulations of education across all public schools. The department was first signed into law by President Jimmy Carter in 1979, after the interest in changing the mathematics common core had begun. The department has the following objective: collect data on education, regulate the money provided by the government going out to public schools, enforce federal and administrative laws. Probably the biggest concern about the department is its critics. Many people, mostly parents of current students, are criticizing the department for not doing enough to help improve schools. Currently, the department has over a 70 billion dollar budget, but most of this goes towards regulation of schools rather than improvements. Current issues like the Math Wars have the department at gunpoint by the public, for the government still hasn't come up with a reasonable alternative to the current policies being enforced in public schools.

Claims:

Reform Goals
"Today, more than 24 million students have access to higher standards than they did a few years ago. That includes approximately 4 million black students, 3.5 million Hispanic students, 2.8 million students with disabilities, and 1.5 million English learners. States are driving this effort."

Validation: This quote comes straight off one of the main pages from the United States Department of Education website. The following is one of the main accomplishments that the department has completed. This is absolutely a good thing, and the details of this statistic are given on the website, giving the claim a great deal of credibility. The main problem with this claim is that "higher standards" could honestly mean anything. The context of this quote is missing, which means 24 million students could still be experiencing the same level of education, except with an iPad or some sort of resource that may be useless to them. Still, this accomplishment is nothing to sneeze at, missing context or not.
NAEP 2015 Results for 4th and 8th Graders
"Between 2013 and 2015, national mathematics scores declined nationally for both 4th graders and 8th graders"

Validation: The video is a report from the results of a test conducted by the National Assessment of Educational Progress from one the tests of the US Department of Education (one of the objectives of the department is to collect and analyze data on educational prowess in the United States). The quote from this video is a cold hard statistic to show that there is a decrease in comprehensibility of two different grades of students across the nation (this study was nationwide). Although the mean score was only decreased by a few points, it was enough of a gap that variability could not be the only factor. The two tests were taken in 2013 and 2015 respectively, so this statistic definitely has some merit to show that the US Department has some work to do in order to back up their claims of giving 24 million students access to better education as of last year.

Reform Standards
"To date, 45 states and the District of Columbia voluntarily have opted to participate in the Common Core State Standards Initiative. The federal government has not been involved in the design of these standards, which were developed in a partnership between the Council of Chief State School Officers and the National Governors Association."

Validation: This claim is very interesting, since the department of education is in charge of creating and regulating the common core curriculum. This quote, which is straight off of the department's website, states that the department is actually not responsible for the common core curriculum used by public schools today. This statement may have something to do with the fact that the department has such a huge opposition, mostly do to its lack of action on the lackluster common core that exist in education today (such lackluster standards also include the controversial Math Wars). This quote may be a way to shift the blame of the inadequate standards to another party. Nevertheless, this quote came straight from the department's website, so its sfe to say that this opinion and possible blame shift is credible.

Comparison to other Stakeholders:

Unlike the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, this US Department of Education has the most to lose from the outcome of the Math Wars. If there is reform, not only will the regulations from the department be changed in order to match the new curriculum, but the public opinion of the branch as a whole will be lower. The entire nation will not be well informed on the context of the Math Wars, and any reform will be automatically be pinned on the US Department of Education. The department acts as a figure head for education nationwide, so any change or controversy will be pinned on them. Furthermore, since recent statistics have shown a decrease in math aptitude across all grades, the department is already losing support over time. The more time that the Math Wars take to be resolved, the more damage their reputation takes. If no conclusion is found, the department may have no support and may be demolished. Issues like the Math Wars mean life or death for this branch of government.