Tuesday, February 10, 2015

Testing Giant Pearson, Inc. Devours the World of Education

With the talk of cash-strapped school budgets, you'd never think there is millions to be made in the world of public education. But, that's because you are not a text book and test-making company that is feeding off the education reform era. That's because you're not Pearson. As the growth and influence of Common Core and PARCC testing guides nearly all the discussion of public education, some people are beginning to wake up to the monopolistic behavior of a one-hundred-year old British company that began in construction. Pearson moved heavily into the education market nearly fifteen years ago in a prescient move to buy a testing company just as the United States Congress passed the No Child Left Behind Act, which kicked off an era of testing the likes of which schools had never seen. In the years since, Pearson has had its hands in nearly every aspect of "education reform." It's now clear that the un-due and dis-proportionate control that Pearson has over public education in America demands investigation. To that end, Stephanie Simon has amassed some impressive information that calls into question the ethics of a profit-driven company influencing public education, as she exposes how Pearson is really about "No Profit Left Behind."


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