About the bloggers

First, our pledge:
We, the bloggers, hereby affirm that we have a particular interest in improving mathematics education and will do what little we can to further that worthy cause in the space of this blog. 

Since it is impossible to expound on all that is right and wrong with Common Core in one fell swoop, we can only address issues piecemeal, at the risk of occasionally sounding incoherent, or even worse, looking like bloviating ignoramuses.  We also know that we may contradict ourselves at times.  Writing a blog is difficult; kudos to you bloggers out there.

We should interpose that the authors of this blog are not salaried educators, we are not political ideologues, we have no personal vendettas, we are not self-absorbed egoists, we have no children in school, and we have no pecuniary interest in the future success or failure of various educational reform efforts.  We are disinterested parties, and we are not selling any product or service.  We own no stock in any education-related publicly traded company.  (Did we omit anything?)

Because we are unfettered and free of conflicts of interest, we are able to speak truth to power.

[It's remotely possible that someone will want to hire us in some capacity to spiel on their (more heavily trafficked) web site, so some of the previous statements may have to be superseded.  In the unlikely event that happens, we'll be sure to let readers know.  We believe in full disclosure about any financial or other potential biases.]

We have what we consider to be adequate credentials to comment on the matter (and we'll let readers be the judge of that last statement based on the content of our posts), but we remain anonymous to let our words speak, rather than potentially being directly assailed or having our credibility questioned.  We wish to draw attention to the issues, not to ourselves.

Hopefully, as we add to this blog, some central themes will become apparent, some glaring problems will be identified, and if there ever comes an end to this blog or not, some good outcomes will result (and we won't sound so much like raving lunatics).  At the very minimum, we hope our ideas and perspectives will add to the debate, even if we are roundly criticized.  We write this blog as our contribution to the global dialog, and accept the associated risks.

As is the world, curriculum reform is a continuously evolving project and we believe that even the creators and supporters of CCSSI know it is neither a final product nor immutable.  We should emphasize that we are not solely picking on Common Core, but also on the various iterations that led to its existence.  We just single out CCSSI for examination because it is current, landmark, and the culmination of all previous reform efforts.

We should mention that as our thinking evolves, we've been rewriting some blog posts.  The ability to amend sure beats getting archived in ink in The New York Times.  It's ``funny'' how something makes perfect sense when you write it one day, then when you re-read it another day, it sounds pedantic, or worse—as we said, writing a blog is hard.  We'll always be our own biggest critics.

Follow us on Twitter or via RSS, if you're interested...or email us.  There's a lot of noise out there and it's difficult to be heard through the din.

Also, feel free to join in the discussion.  This is not a competition; we are all working towards the greater good.