Dear U.S.O.E. legal team,

 
Attached is the document I wrote to you about yesterday, and here is the link. http://www2.ed.gov/programs/racetothetop-assessment/sbac-cooperative-agreement.pdf
 
I continue to be shocked that our state's educational legal team has not even read the document.   Washington State, as the fiscal agent for Utah, should have been working very closely with Utah.  I have no doubt that the U.S. Department of Education kept their own copy very close at hand.
 
 Although I am not a lawyer, I did work as a full time grant writer for a consortium of Utah schools a few years back, and I do understand the wording and spirit of this cooperative agreement, which is in complete violation of G.E.P.A. laws and the 9th and 10th Amendments to the Constitution, which clearly spell out the fact that the U.S. Department of Education has zero authority to assert regulations, mandates, rules, coordination efforts or supervisory efforts in any way over any state's, or group of states', educational systems.
 
It is interesting to note that this document cites not a law, but money --a grant I.D.-- as its authority to regulate.  Line one.
It is interesting to note that this document clearly shows that ONE man, Arne Duncan, claims this money-based authority.  Line two.
It is interesting to note that on pages 3 and 4 the federal government outlines the precise ways in which it intends to trample on states' automony and sovereignty, including making sure the SBAC gives updated reports and shares data with them, for educational purposes, of course; also, the U.S. DOE asserts that the SBAC and the PARCC testing arms of the Common Core must coordinate their efforts "across consortia," which triangulates efforts and creates an undeniable centralization of personal and unique data, including test scores and identifiable student data.  I do not think the citizens of Utah would vote for this.
 
I would ask you to send out notification to all school boards, districts and LEAs that it has been brought to your attention that Utah does not "have local control" because they truly believe your words and have not done their homework, trusting you to have done so.
 
As a legal team, I am sure you will make every effort to clear up this gross misstep, called "adopting the Common Core initiative" that our Utah State Superintendent of Schools Larry Shumway and the Utah School Board has made, in signing documents that forego state sovereignty and all common sense to legally bind our state under what Governor Herbert has aptly called "the ever-encroaching hand of the federal government".
 
Thank you for your time.
 
Christel Swasey
 

Christel is a friend of mine that has been researching with me into what Common Core really means for our state.  It is beyond just raising our standards.