(Madison, WI) Resounding Books officially announced publication of Common Ground on Common Core: Voices from across the Political Spectrum Expose the Realities of the Common Core State Standards. The 18-essay volume uniquely gathers twenty top education experts and activists. The authors hold widely varied political and ideological viewpoints, yet they stand firmly united against the Common Core. Standards expert Sandra Stotsky and prominent mathematician R. James Milgram are among the book’s authors. Both served on the national Common Core validation committee but refused to sign off on the standards. Former U.S. Congressman and presidential candidate Ron Paul contributed to the foreword.
Edited to ensure that readers of any political stripe could inform and empower themselves and others in the growing fight to push back against the controversial education initiative, Common Ground on Common Core enables understanding and appreciation not just of the basics but also crucial anti-Common Core arguments and insights they might not otherwise encounter, because those concerns have been raised principally on only one side of the political continuum.
“Common Ground on Common Core takes the fight against Common Core to new levels by encouraging open dialogue and alliances across political lines,” asserts Resounding Books’ Founder and Editor, Kirsten Lombard. “Interacting with Common Ground’s many authors – who self-identify as everything from radical leftists to social conservatives to libertarians – has made it clear to me that we have a lot more in common than we’d previously been led to believe.”
The book stands out in yet another way. All of the authors agreed to forego royalties so that Resounding Books, established in early 2013 as a Super PAC, could dedicate a significant percentage of the book’s proceeds to funding anti-Common Core activism at the state and local levels. “Resounding Books is strongly committed to encouraging and funding citizen activism around the subjects on which we publish,” Lombard asserts. “We look forward to realizing that goal.”
In addition to Stotsky and Milgram, other contributors to Common Ground on Common Core who will be more familiar to readers include Ze’ev Wurman who helped to review the standards for the State of California, education researcher Christopher H. Tienken (author, The School Reform Landscape: Fraud, Myth and Lies) as well as activists Kris L. Nielsen (author, Children of the Core), Jane Robbins (American Principles Project), Ceresta Smith (United Opt Out National), William A. Estrada (HSLDA) and Shane Vander Hart (Truth in American Education). There will also be plenty of new and valuable discoveries for readers among the essayists.
The essay collection has already begun to receive nods from key individuals in various political corners. In addition to Ron Paul, New York State Senator George Latimer (D-Rye) describes the book as “a thoughtful presentation of why we must have a slow, deliberate government that always asks who will benefit when we implement any new programs, but especially in education.”
Dr. Gary Thompson, a Utah psychologist who has become known for his opposition to the experimental nature of Common Core assessments calls the book a “brilliant, diverse compilation… which forever will put to rest the notion that Common Core critics emanate exclusively from the Right Wing.”
Common Ground on Common Core is currently available in print ($25.00, 436 pages, 5.5” x 8.5”, perfect-bound quality paperback, ISBN 978-0-9908809), with two digital formats planned. It is available for purchase on the Resounding Books website, www.resoundingbooks.org.