Assemblyman Steve Hawley (R,C,I-Batavia) rolled out the Assembly Minority conference’s APPLE Plan to reform Common Core. The APPLE Plan, which stands for Achieving Pupil Preparedness and Learning Excellence, was created over the course of five months with the input of parents, students and teachers at 11 forums across New York. The APPLE Plan includes:

• Stopping the rushed implementation of the Common Core State Standards;
• Providing funding for professional development;
• Eliminating the Gap Elimination Adjustment (GEA);
• Reducing the over-reliance on student testing;
• Reasserting that an IEP is the supreme document for the education of a child with special needs; and
• Requiring that parents must consent to any disclosure of student information to a third party.

“The Common Core mandates are a massive overreach of government power because they were implemented without the input of parents, students, and teachers or legislative approval. The APPLE Plan is our effort to rein in the Common Core mandates and restore sanity to our classrooms,” said Hawley. “There is considerable anger about Common Core, so the people who are responsible for its implementation in our state need to take a hard look at our plan, and I’ll be making sure they do.”