I've talked extensively about this with a former 7th grade math teacher of both my kids. This guy has been teaching for over 25 years, kids like him, and parents request him as a math teacher because he is good.
He has grown very tired of a system where the bottom of the class is where he finds out if he meets CC requirements. Some of these kids barely make it to school, and have almost no intention of finishing, and don't care, yet his success hinges on them.
He spends most of his time meeting with parents from the bottom of the class while the kids who are doing average and up are left alone.
This is the problem with public education in general. You either deal with the slow learners at this point or they leech off of society later on. In a school with limited staff to deal with those unable to maintain pace, this can mean that regular ed. classroom time is burned trying to keep these students at par with the baseline learner. Tying teacher pay, etc, to student success in a public school is a poor idea. This is particularly true in smaller schools where a statistically significant number of students in any given class may not have a background that promotes success and/or they lack the ability to be successful. Look to the oilfield and inner city schools to see this type of learner. Very difficult to measure student success when the prominent culture rejects those who are academically successful, therefore the majority of students lack motivation in regard to standardized testing.
The stuff that talks up Obama's accomplishments, etc. is totally a local/state issue. Nothing to do with CC. From what I have seen of the math standards, the idea is to create a greater familiarity with all of the processes, as well as to promote multiple ways of looking at a given type of problem. Not perfect by any stretch, and possibly an unnecessary complication, but not a dumbing down of curricula.
