Texas, South Carolina, Alaska and Missouri are the only states not on board with the effort to create voluntary national education standards. The National Governors Association Center for Best Practices (NGA) and the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) officially announced the effort this morning. From the news release:
By signing on to the Common Core State Standards Initiative, governors and state commissioners of education across the country are committing to joining a state-led process to develop a common core of state standards in English-language arts and mathematics for grades K-12. These standards will be research and evidence-based, internationally benchmarked, aligned with college and work expectations and include rigorous content and skills.
The Washington Post’s Maria Glod turns in a curtain-raiser on the effort, making it sound as if we should expect a whole lot of process and not a lot of content. “By July, groups of experts already at work are expected to unveil ‘readiness standards’ for high school graduates in reading and math,” she writes. “ Then, with each grade considered a steppingstone toward that goal, they will set out the skills students must master each year to stay on track.”
Skills, readiness, staying on track. You get the picture. Edweek’s Michele McNeil has more on the tick-tock of the adoption process:
Both the NGA and the CCSSO plan to create a ‘validation’ committee made up of independent national and international experts in content standards to review and comment on the drafts. The experts will be nominated by states and organizations, but ultimately chosen by those two organizations. Once the standards are agreed to, it will be up to the states to get them adopted. The signed memo stipulates that the common core must represent at least 85 percent of a state’s standards, and that the common core needs to be adopted within three years.
Until we see what they come up with, there’s every reason to be skeptical that we’re going to get meaningful content standards. ”There will be no prescription for how teachers get there, avoiding nettlesome discussions about whether phonics or whole language is a better method of teaching reading; whether students should be drilled in math facts; or whether eighth-graders should read “The Great Gatsby” or “To Kill a Mockingbird,” Glod writes. It’s entirely likely the entire exercise will amount to nothing more that replacing 46 sets of squishy, non-specific standards with one set of squishy, non-specific standards. But if we end up with a single yardstick — one set of national assessments — the transparency in state-to-state comparisons will be worthwhile. Alas, that may end up as the only reason to be excited about national standards.
Recent Comments