Ever since the United States of America became the United States of America, we have cultivated a legacy of being uncommon. We have been uncommon ever since We the People redefined what it meant to have life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. We have been uncommon ever since we created a cultural melting pot, and wove a beautiful tapestry of individuality that includes all people of different religions, ethnicity, personalities, and appearances. We have created a rich, diverse, uncommon culture. Furthermore, we have been proud of it, as we join together and sing of our country, America the beautiful, land of the free, and home of the brave. With such a proud heritage then, why are U.S. policymakers trying so hard to implement a one-size-fits-all system of education? Why have 42 states accepted this cookie cutter style of teaching? Why is a country that is so proud of being so boldly uncommon bribing its states and school districts to use the Common Core standards of curriculum?

The idea of a standard-based education system has been around for decades, dating back to the Clinton administration in '94 with the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA). This was followed by the Bush administration's No Child Left Behind Act of 2001; in 2010, we got President Obama's Race to the Top, and now we have the Common Core standards initiative. Each of these programs are simply an evolution of its predecessor, a single curriculum for every kid in America, designed to turn schools into assembly lines where all children are forced into the same mold to be transformed into the same product. A single curriculum that is based on standards that have been set by people who have no business deciding what kids should be learning in the classroom and how they should be learning it.

Of course, the common core standards website (www.corestandards.org) claims the framework for its curriculum is the same standards of the National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP), which it claims is drawn from "scholarly research and evidence." However, the people in charge of setting those same frameworks is actually the National Assessment Governing Board, which is appointed by the Secretary of Education and consists of governors, state legislators, local and state school board officials, business representatives, and members of the general public. Out of hours of research, neither my co-author Annette nor I have been able to find any of the actual scholarly research and evidence that is accredited to setting these standards of curriculum.

However, let's forget just for a second that the standards of Common Core are set by a board of politicians and businessman who have failed to provide any detailed proof or evidence that their curriculum actually prepares kids for college level courses and life. Let's take a minute to focus on the people who are affected the most by Common Core: Those who are actually inside the classroom. The hard working teachers, who do their incredibly important jobs out of passion, to educate and expand the minds of future generations, and of course the students themselves who need to be prepared for the life ahead of them, whether it's for freshman-level university courses or for entry level jobs and careers.

When we start to focus on the classrooms themselves and the people inside them, we can see the fundamental problem of Common Core and all other standard-based curriculum programs: They are all different. They are full of kids who learn in different ways and teachers who are passionate about different subjects, who each have their own preferred method of teaching. There are students who will retain absolutely nothing by cramming for benchmark tests, and students who require more than textbook definitions to fully understand a concept that has nothing to do with the life they want to lead. Some need hands-on experience; others are just fine with a visual and an explanation. But the most important part of this whole learning process are the teachers, who need to be able to work with their students individually, and help them get what they need to fully understand the material. However, all this cookie cutter system of standardized education has been able to accomplish is stripping the teachers of their passion, telling them they cannot teach, they can only rinse and repeat.

The truth remains: Standard-based education systems like No Child Left Behind, Race to the Top, and Common Core are all based on similar program’s performances in other countries and a theory that is fundamentally wrong. We did not fight for our independence to meet the standards of every other country, but to create our own. Education should be seen as more than a race to the top, and a nation that is founded by uncommon people should not be teaching it’s children to simply be common. Curriculum needs to be set by teachers and school officials who know their students, not government policy. Furthermore, policymakers need to let teachers get back to their jobs and stop creating new standard-based education systems because a one-size-fits-all lesson plan just does not exist.

Additional reporting and words by Annette Kirk.