“Thanks to relentless pressure from the Assembly Minority, who brought this issue to the forefront years ago, and the outcry from parents, teachers and students, the New York State Education Department is backing off their once rigid enforcement of the Common Core Standards. The Common Core Task Force, fortunately comprised of front-line educators, has made recommendations to cease the practice of having test scores count against teacher evaluations and to make formation of the new standards more inclusive to teachers and parents. As a longstanding member of the Assembly Education Committee, these are measures I have been calling for since day one.”

“I have been advocating since the initial implementation of Common Core for more input from the groups actually involved in education, rather than faceless bureaucrats and politicians. We need to let teachers teach and give control back to classrooms, not the NY State Education Department. I am proud to say I have been influential in bolstering the re-evaluation of Common Core and opt-out movement we saw last spring, especially on Long Island. I will continue to fight for the repeal of Common Core during the upcoming legislative session.”