Partnership for the 21st Century Skills...Necessary?

These days everyone owns a computer, laptop, tablet, smartphone or some kind of electronic device that delivers news and information to their finger tips.  News spreads as quickly as the person who's typing it and some of these people can type very quickly like some of my students.  Students have access to so much information that it can almost feel like 'information overload' when they sit through an entire day of learning while taking in the day's worth of social media.

This week I was asked to check out a website called The Partnership for the 21st Century Skills and it seems like another case of 'information overload'.  It is a website that students, parents, educators, community members and politicians can view and understand the purpose of implementing new standards into our education system.  It gives us resources and links to other websites that describe the standards and the various things it wants educators to teach our students.  I believe that a new learning standard is being implemented without a proper way to integrate it to reach the goals the website describes.  

Teachers in my school have been asked to implement a new curriculum that the state cannot afford because of the cost of the new textbooks and materials needed to convey the visions of the Common Core.  How is this fair for our students?  I have always been told throughout graduate school to not reinvent the wheel, it seems that there is a school of thought that believes that reinventing the wheel is the way.  

Thanks for reading.

Reference

Partnership for 21st Century Skills. (n.d.). A report and mile guide for 21st century skills. Washington DC: Author. Retrieved from http://www.p21.org/