I’ve published a number of posts critical of the Common Core State Standards [1] (here’s one [2] and here’s another [3]), but but below is a piece by an award-winning teacher in support of the initiative, says columnist Valerie Strauss for the Washington Post. This was written by Sara Brown Wessling, the national 2010 National Teacher of the Year and an English teacher Johnston High School in Johnston, Iowa. She is also the Teacher Laureate for Teaching Channel and hosts “Teaching Channel Presents” on public television stations around the country. The standards were created n an effort to ensure that students in every state are learning and being assessed on the same standards. Forty-five states have approved the standards and new standardized assessments are being created now that are supposed to replace the assessment systems in these states…