For a few years now I’ve been among the education experts who oppose the Common Core effort to establish a single national curriculum in all schools. My particular bugbear has been that a national curriculum, in addition to being a bad idea for many other reasons, would reignite the culture wars, as the two sides mobilize to fight for control of what students across the country would learn.

I had no idea how quickly the problem would escalate. In Crisis magazine, Anne Hendershott describes how Catholic schools across the country are overturning their curricula in order to “align” with Common Core. They are doing so in large part because the SAT, ACT and GED are making big noise about how they’re all going to be CC-aligned just as soon as they can figure out what on earth that means.

Herndershott wants to know why the bishops haven’t approved, or even been consulted about, this sweeping overhaul of Catholic education. It would appear that Catholic schools are now more responsive to the USDOE than the bishops. So much for religious freedom!