BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — In the heated debate over Common Core, supporters of the education standards resorted Wednesday to the mythical, distributing pink and white unicorn stuffed animals to state lawmakers.
The pitch? Unicorns aren't real, and the political action committee calling itself Alliance for Better Classrooms says many of the criticisms lawmakers have heard about Common Core aren't real either.
The fluffy-tailed creature was an attention-grabbing salvo in the fight over whether to keep the English and math standards adopted by more than 40 states in Louisiana's public school classrooms.
Gov. Bobby Jindal has made scrapping Common Core one of his top priorities in the legislative session, calling the standards an effort by the Obama administration to nationalize education.
The Alliance for Better Classrooms PAC said the standards better prepare students for college and the workforce and announced it will have a session-long marketing campaign to urge the Legislature to keep the standards in place.