Part 2 of this series can be read at: Washington K–12 Return to Basics and Core Competencies – A Reform Plan For more than two decades, American education has accumulated reform after reform: standards-based education, testing reform, personalized learning, social-emotional learning, project-based learning, competency-based education, technology integration and, most recently, artificial intelligence. Many of these ideas have merit. The problem is that reform has too often been additive. We keep adding new objectives without removing old ones or asking the most basic question: Are students actually learning what they need to know? Washington should begin answering that question with … [Read more...]