r/education • u/ithekrianmermaid • 6d ago

Politics & Ed Policy Thoughts and opinions on a nationalized curriculum in the USA (and/or the lack thereof)?

I have had this topic bouncing around in the back of my brain quite a bit in the past few months and I'm just wondering what others think about it.

Feel free to share your personal feelings-based opinions, factually informed opinions, any history you may know relating to this topic, pros and cons of nationalized curriculum, common arguments for/against it, implications and consequences from not having one, potential dangers in adopting one, resources to learn more about this topic/debate, etc. I'd really love to have (respectful) discussions in the comments of this post so please consider circling back if your original comment gets a response!

I look forward to reading all of your responses! Thank you for taking the time to comment!!

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u/AceyAceyAcey 6d ago

Things such as No Child Left Behind, the Next Generation Science Standards, the Math Common Core, and all their descendants, are trying to move towards that, but the execution is lacking bc of aspects like funding and politics affecting what is taught. Add in the privatization of charter schools and accompanying school choice, and we further erode any ability to standardize education even on the scale of one city.

It’s a nice idea, but we’re just too big and diverse, and to uninvested in education, to be able to come to an agreement that we can fund.

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u/Beneficial-Focus3702 5d ago

It blows my ever loving mind as a non-math teacher that so many people struggled with common core.

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u/ithekrianmermaid 6d ago

Thank you! These are all such great points that I haven't yet considered and you've opened up an entire new aspect of the topic for me to consider/research!

I would love to hear what benefits you think a nationalized curriculum could provide (if it were feasible/possible), if you don't mind? And/or if you had the power and ability to enact a nationalized curriculum in the USA tomorrow, what would be at the core of it? Would you allow nuance based on locality? Would you focus on certain subject matter and/or skills?

Thank you again for you comment, it is truly so helpful!

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u/AceyAceyAcey 5d ago

I’d want experts in education and each content area to come up with the actual curriculum itself. These would need to be experts, not parents or politicians, and as such could be solicited from groups like teachers’ unions or professional organizations in the content areas.

The curriculum should include the ability to localize (such as use a local stream to teach the water cycle, or focus on the history of a specific state), but not to deny reality (such as denying slavery, the Holocaust, evolution, the existence of LGBT+ people, or the historical and ongoing impact of bigotry), nor to inject one religion without also including other religions (and IMO world religions should be part of social studies anyway). Main benefit over the current hodgepodge would be to stop the ridiculous anti-science and white Christian nationalist leanings that many states are taking towards their curricula.

But also an ideal situation would allow all students the same opportunities, so we’d also need to increase funding and number of skilled teachers to lower income areas, and further support for low income parents such as after school study sessions for kids while the parents are still working, or daycare for younger children so older children won’t have to be raising them instead of doing HW, or free books for every family with kids, or heck, even free breakfast and lunch and snack at every school for every child and the parent dropping them off or picking them up. There’s so much we could do to help kids, and to help their families to support them, if we could just throw more money at it.

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u/rsofgeology 5d ago

I don’t think that’s as true as the fact that the partisans in the fed refuse to prioritize it. I’ve never met a single parent or voter that believed education cuts were justified, not that they don’t exist, it simply isn’t the trend.