Budget Committee ‘Hits Pause Button’ On Common Core Standards

Some of the controversial Common Core standards for Wisconsin’s public schools would be put on hold under a measure passed by the legislature’s budget committee.

The measure would require Wisconsin’s Department of Public Instruction and a special legislative committee to study the Common Core standards, which are replacing older, less rigorous learning standards in Wisconsin. The committee would have to hold public hearings and get an analysis of how much implementing the standards would cost. Summaries of these studies would have to be furnished to the governor and the legislature, and only then could the state continue to move forward with Common Core.

State Rep. Dean Knudson (R-Hudson) supports the delay.

“What we’re doing here is hitting the pause button on the Common Core. It was implemented in Wisconsin – like a lot of states – without much public notice, without legislative action, without any public hearings.”

Under the plan that passed the budget committee on a 13-to-3 vote, schools would continue to use the English and Mathematics Common Core Standards that the state’s already developed. It would be the learning standards for Social Studies and Science that would get put on hold.