Common Core example

Posted by $ jbrenner 11 years, 10 months ago to Education
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My younger daughter is taking an Advanced Placement US History exam. The following question is an entirely valid question to ask. I just am very curious as to how her and our essays, substantiated by facts, might get graded.

For more detail, see the above URL. Briefly, students are asked to "evaluate the effectiveness of Progressive Era reformers and the federal government in bringing about reform at the national level. In your answer be sure to analyze the successes and limitations of these efforts in the period 1900-1920 (i.e Teddy Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson).
SOURCE URL: http://apcentral.collegeboard.com/apc/public/repository/ap03_frq_us_history_b_23077.pdf


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  • Posted by khalling 11 years, 10 months ago
    I was also interested in the very last question. You were to contrast three presidents - JFK( camelot) , Johnson ( Great Society) and Nixon (Watergate) in terms of media. The interesting thing here is all three Presidents shared Vietnam and all three had executive power over -reach and secret enemy lists. But the students are to draw clearly biased political conclusions and see the media as transparent and truth -seeking. Frustrating.
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    • Posted by $ 11 years, 10 months ago
      JFK - had his good (economic) and bad points (Bay of Pigs, and more)
      Johnson - all bad
      Nixon - only good was China and perhaps ending Vietnam; enemies list only surpassed by the current looter-in-chief; worst part was regulation like EPA
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      • Posted by teri-amborn 11 years, 10 months ago
        JFK was BIG into anti-trust legislation ... so I beg to differ on the economic front.

        As far as all three go, they are all Progressives. Big overreaching government and the guns and whips to back it up.
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        • Posted by Robbie53024 11 years, 10 months ago
          I'm not sure that I'd call Nixon a Progressive. Wrong headed on some things, but certainly not a socialist. Price controls and going off the gold standard were not done for some ideological reasons, rather due to incorrect understanding of the causes and effects of the actions.
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          • Posted by khalling 11 years, 10 months ago
            1. price controls
            2. took us off the gold standard
            3."we're all Kenysians now"
            4. created the EPA
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            • Posted by Robbie53024 11 years, 10 months ago
              You'll get no argument that those things occurred. Just that it wasn't from an ideological perspective, merely bad judgment based on bad counsel.

              The statement that "we're all Keynesians now" was not in support of Keynesian economic theory, rather the acknowledgment that the government, through the Fed, was manipulating the economic system instead of allowing the system to self-regulate. That's not to say that that was a good or proper way to address the problems, as I said, he had bad counsel and made bad decisions. But it was merely the acknowledgment of what was happening.
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        • Posted by $ 11 years, 10 months ago
          You are correct about the antitrust legislation. I had forgotten that one, but who can forget the top tax rate going down from 70% to 28%? Between the implementation of the income tax and Reagan, that was the only tax cut I can remember.
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  • Posted by LetsShrug 11 years, 10 months ago
    "successes and limitations" why does that not say "successes and failures"??? I don't like the word "reform" either...unless it's referring to being reformed from freedom to slavery. bla
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    • Posted by $ 11 years, 10 months ago
      I noticed the "successes and limitations" phrase as well. If that person were conducting a scientific survey, use of the word limitations instead of failure would be treated as an example of bias, and the survey results would be challenged during peer review. That was part of why I associated the assignment with Common Core.
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  • Posted by Robbie53024 11 years, 10 months ago
    Yes. What would be interesting to see would be the answer guide. What themes are given credit, and which are deducted.
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  • Posted by ObjectiveAnalyst 11 years, 10 months ago
    Good thread. Some excellent discourse. As usual I find myself in total disagreement with the definition of progress as defined by the progressives. I agree with LS. "Successes and Limitations..." generally the problem is that there were not more limitations.
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  • Posted by $ Susanne 11 years, 10 months ago
    It's not a bad exercise to determine if the candidate can actually construct a well-written argument versus a pile of anti-grammatical space filler (from years of getting rewarded fully for "at least trying", even if they got it totally wrong)...

    They're all fairly interestingly worded questions... even more interesting especially since it assume those who will be scoring the questions have such little knowledge about any of the aforementioned historical occasions they must include "cheat sheets" to score them.

    >=~(
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    • Posted by $ 11 years, 10 months ago
      To be fair, the cheat sheets are to ensure uniformity in scoring. Uniformity as in stormtroopers-like uniformity that is.
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      • Posted by $ Susanne 11 years, 10 months ago
        But of course, as if, say, some student had the wrong ideas, say a non-socialist anti-apologist viewpoint, regarding, well, for example, the stono rebellion, it would be a way for the proctors to insure only those with the proper and right-thinking attitude progressed into the hallowed halls of higher education...
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  • Posted by Stormi 11 years, 10 months ago
    I could not stand Nixon, however, Watergate was more complicated than it is usually reported. Don't overlook Jerry Ziefman's reports that Hillary's role in the Watergate investigation was "ethically flawed" - and had an impact on the outcome. Working on her own, not reporting to Ziefman, she manipulated both law and evidence.
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  • Posted by $ 11 years, 10 months ago
    JP Morgan, John Rockefeller, and Andrew Carnegie worked together to get President McKinley elected. Teddy Roosevelt was actually put in to the VP role to put a muzzle on him. This is well documented in The Men Who Built America on the History Channel.

    When McKinley was assassinated, the aforementioned producers had the biggest "O s***!" moment of their careers. Was this just pumishment for what some might consider non-Galtish values, or were those titans of industry justified in trying to protect themselves from William Jennings Bryan, the first progressive presidential candidate? I don't think there is any doubt that Hank Rearden is based off of John Rockefeller, especially the "monopoly trial". I am curious to hear others' opinions on that part of American history. One could certainly argue that both Rockefeller and Carnegie shrugged late in their lives.
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    • Posted by straightlinelogic 11 years, 10 months ago
      Of the three, Andrew Carnegie probably went off the Galt path the least. As far as I know, after he sold Carnegie Steel to Morgan, he spent the rest of his life giving away his money. JP Morgan and Rockefeller were prime movers behind the Federal Reserve and the income tax, which would get both of them kicked out of Galt's Gulch. Neither man could be called a champion of capitalism, and both used the government to tilt the playing field in their favor. Of course, books have been written and the Internet is filled with various allegations about Rockefeller's sub rosa activities and world government designs. Both Rockefeller and Morgan make appearances in my book, The Golden Pinnacle, a novel set during the Industrial Revolution.
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      • Posted by $ 11 years, 10 months ago
        Up until 1895, one could argue that all three belonged in the Gulch and were champions of capitalism. Most people, like Rearden, grow weary of all the looters and moochers, and then veer from the Galtish path. It is like being attacked by a plague of locusts.

        After that, at best only Carnegie belonged there, and as straightlinelogic argues, they strayed from the path.

        This should be a lesson learned from both the book and from real life.
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    • Posted by Stormi 11 years, 10 months ago
      Have you noticed that the Carnegie and Rockefeller Foundations are always the financial backing behind all progressive movement to this day? Every wrong headed school reform has had their backing. There are producers and then their is oligarchy and manipulation.
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      • Posted by $ 11 years, 10 months ago
        Looter Sen. Jay Rockefeller talks disparagingly about his forefather (a Galt or Rearden if there ever was one). I guess that makes Jay kind of like Phillip Rearden in my Atlas Shrugged: Now Non-Fiction cast.
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        • Posted by Robbie53024 11 years, 10 months ago
          The worst sort - makes me believe that 100% inheritance tax might not be such a bad thing (only for a nano-sec).

          Here's a person who bought a senate seat, never earning anything that he received, nor working an honest day in his life, yet feels morally compelled to tell the rest of the nation what they should have, how they should live, and what they should think and value.
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