Common Core Forces Autistic Student in Missouri into Class He Cannot Understand

As the Missouri Senate Education Committee meets this week to debate the state’s Common Core education scheme, testimony has been revealing if not disheartening. In one case, an autistic teen testified that Common Core’s one-size-fits-all policies are so out of tune with the needs of individual students that the standards thrust him into class work that he was unable to understand.

Earlier, Breitbart reported that a Missouri teacher was bullied by her school administration in order to silence her from speaking out against Common Core. Elementary school teacher Susan Kimball testified that she was warned, “Don’t say anything negative” about Common Core. She was also warned that if she did speak out, “It could affect your job.”

During the same day of testimony, the Missouri Torch reported that Common Core was forcing special needs student Bryce Mulhull into class work that he was unprepared to fully comprehend.

Bryce said that due to Common Core he was enrolled in a science class that he just couldn’t grasp.

“I struggle with math and don’t understand abstract concepts,” the autistic student told the committee. “I was enrolled in the only 9th grade science class offered, ‘Physic First.’ It was higher level math and has very hard concepts that I don’t usually understand because of my disabilities. In contrast, my math class in special ed is adding simple fractions.”

Bryce testified that his parents tried to reason with school officials, but the school said they could not reassign his class load.

The young man also pointed out that his ill-fitting classes force him to rely too much on others, taking away some of his ability to rely on himself. The Common Core class requirements, Bryce said, “[make] me very dependent on others instead of allowing me to learn in my own way.”

Testifying with him, the teen’s mother, Cindy Mulhull, wondered just whom these standards are supposed to help. “I ask you, is this a proper and appropriate education? Is education’s purpose to train or to enlighten?”

Cindy Mulhull also insisted that a “one-size-fits-all education does not, and cannot, work for all kids.”