The Great Standards Struggle

As a future educator, there is one thing that is really plaguing me right now. STANDARDS! I've most certainly got a love-hate relationship with them. Let me start by saying that standards are completely necessary and really important for both educators and students. But, let me combat this statement by asking, WHY ARE THERE SOOO MANY?! Would it kill us to have on set of national standards? No wonder all of are high school graduates are at different ability levels. As I am working on a unit for one of my methods courses I am told to align my objectives and lessons to standards. Then the great debate is which ones to choose?! I need to look at the new Iowa Core Curriculum and the NCTE standards and then its probably my duty as well to look at the NETS-S standards as well since I'm an instructional technology minor. What a mess! I'm not really sure that at this point I feel comfortable giving advice to the standard writers across the nation, but I am just venting. I'll end by saying that I'm certainly glad that this many people are concerned about the future of our students and our current education practices. This probably isn't such a bad problem to have. Just a messy one.