Will Common Core stifle brightest pupils?

Huffington Post:  Common Core Math In North Carolina Would Keep Elementary Students From Taking Middle School Courses

...In an effort to phase in a set of national education reforms knows as the Common Core -- an educational initiative that seeks to improve American education through unified and rigorous teaching across state lines -- North Carolina has voted to install a more difficult curriculum for the 2012-2013 academic year.
Officials say that middle school math courses currently taken by gifted elementary school students will be too difficult for them after the curriculum changes, theMcClatchy-Tribune reports. As a result, middle school courses will no longer be available to advanced elementary school students.
These changes fuel an already heated national debate on education reform. They raise the question of whether compliance to national educational standards such as the Common Core can stifle individual schools, preventing them from being able to push -- and conversely, alienating -- their brightest pupils...