In 2013, he briefly suggested that Secretary of Education Arne Duncan was «impolitic» to place opposition to the Common Core State Standards upon «white, suburban moms» who don't want to find out that their
children are not brilliant — just before he
jumped in and declared that Secretary Duncan was right to be concerned that «a laudable set of guidelines» would be rejected
for making kids work too hard, characterized most opposition to the standards as «welling hysteria» from the right and left wing, and chided parents concerned about the increasing lack of
joy in school with declarations that portions of school ought to be «relatively mirthless» while blaming stories of students breaking down from stress upon their parents.