What is one topic that some of our most famous conservative and liberals agree on?

Would you believe education?

As the superintendent of Bentonville Schools, I am a bit amazed and very appreciative of the stances some of our most famous political families have taken on the implementation of Common Core.

The Bush family and the Clinton family have become advocates for this new curriculum that 44 states have agreed to move toward. I realize over the past six months an orchestrated effort to backtrack away from Common Core has become an outcry.

I hope we all look more deeply at this important issue. Many of us remember in 1987 when a book called "A Nation at Risk" hit the streets. It shared how public education was falling behind our peer nations and something needed to be done.

Comparisons on international testing continue to take place, and the U.S. ranks anywhere between 15th and 25th on most of these assessments. These results have led educators, school board members, parents and business leaders to search for tactics that will allow us to compete.

The natural result of this work has come in the form of the Common Core curriculum.

Maybe the best way for me to describe Common Core is to ask each of you to go back to when you were in high school.

For many of us, we were taught geometry in 10th grade and it was sandwiched between Algebra I and Algebra II, all of which was to prepare us for calculus and trigonometry in our senior year.

Under Common Core, most of the principals of geometry will now be taught in the eighth grade year. Changes such as this are implemented in the Common Core curriculum, which has amped up rigor in all subjects.

I think most patrons will like the fact there is a renewed intensity to the "three Rs" with rigor being incorporated to these critical subjects.

So why are folks upset with this strategy and approach?

Many dislike the fact that this looks like a national curriculum. Maybe it is, but I like the fact that at the local level we determine how to best meet these new standards at each level and within each discipline.

In Bentonville we have been working on this for at least four years, and I can guarantee you it has been a collaborative approach and our teams are determining the best way to meet these new rigorous standards.

I am sure you can find detractors on our staff who do not like the approach, but on the whole I believe our staff are excited about this new opportunity to better prepare students for a world that is constantly changing and will require adults who can think critically, utilize a variety of resources, work in collaborative environments to problem solve and, of course, be able to share conclusions and results via effective communication both in writing and through oral presentations.

Will this work? I wish you could visit a first-grade classroom with me to observe the high level work and results the young students are producing. To this end, I wish I could show off the entire spectrum of grade levels and subjects to you so you can witness the wonderful efforts being made to ramp up rigor in our classrooms.

I will use this column to once again thank our staff for the work they have done to introduce this curriculum. We are so blessed to have such a talented staff.

This is a sound approach and is not only supported by the Clinton and Bush families, but also the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National School Board Association, the American Association of School Administrators, the Boeing Company, The Association of American Publishers, the Business Coalition for Student Achievement, IBM Corporation, Intel Corporation and Dell Inc.

We are approaching the political season. Primaries are right around the corner and there are important races playing out at the state and national level right here in our own state.

I hope all of you listen carefully to the candidates speak about what they value and seek in education over the next several years.

Common Core is not the enemy. In fact, it is the tool to help us step up our game and deliver graduates that will be ready for this new global economy.

NW News on 04/24/2014