California in a ‘Race’ to consider new common standards
Published: July 1, 2010
For better or worse, ready or not, California is considering whether to align its academic standards in English-language arts and math with those of dozens of other states. The state has until Aug. 2 to accept or reject standards proposed by the Common Core State Standards Initiative if it is to receive maximum credit on its application for a federal Race to the Top grant.
The common standards movement, originally a voluntary, state-led effort by the National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers to establish more consistent expectations for student learning, shifted into hyperdrive when Race to the Top set an August deadline for adoption of such standards. Normally, state review and adoption could be expected to take months or years.
The State Board of Education, advised by a state-authorized Academic Content Standards Commission, will decide whether California will incorporate the CCSSI standards into its own blueprint for K–12 education. The commission is expected to present a new set of English and math standards, consisting 85 percent of the common core plus 15 percent of additional standards tailored to California, to the State Board this summer. If the State Board rejects the common core, California stands to lose 40 of the 500 possible points on its Race to the Top application. At stake is as much as $700 million over four years for California and the nearly 300 school districts, county offices of education and charter schools that signed on to the application.
International standards
CCSSI’s standards outline a progressive pattern of specific knowledge and skills that aim to prepare students to succeed on the job and in college. They draw in part from standards used in areas such as Hong Kong, South Korea and Singapore that perform well on internationally benched tests of academic performance.
Key aspects of the English standards are a “staircasing” of increasingly complex writings meant to help students develop the critical thinking skills they will need in college or in the workplace. Designed to build toward the college- and career-ready standards the CCSSI developed last year, the proposed K–12 standards address reading; writing; speaking and listening; language; and media and technology.
The math standards progressively build a foundation for learning fractions and abstract thinking in grades 5–7 to prepare students for success in algebra. One criticism of the math standards, however, is that in high school they are not linked to specific courses such as Algebra II or geometry, but rather deal with conceptual categories including number and quantity, functions, modeling and statistics, and probability, which cross over a number of courses.
The standards’ focus solely on English-language arts and math also concerns educators who lament the narrowing of the curriculum already promulgated by the federal No Child Left Behind Act. CCSSI says it does plan to develop common standards in science and other subject areas in the future.
Must meet or exceed current standards
Since California’s own academic standards have long been touted as among the nation’s best, the concern is that adopting the common core could dilute the rigor of the state’s current standards.
The state’s new standards commission was scheduled to meet for the first time June 17–18 to review the CCSSI standards and consider pertinent questions, such as whether and where California’s existing standards meet or exceed the rigor of the common core. Ultimately, the commission will incorporate or exceed the substance of the common core in a new set of proposed California standards that state law requires to be “internationally benchmarked and to build toward college and career readiness by the time of high school graduation.”
Many educators and advocates, including CSBA, have long called for a process to review the state’s current academic standards, which have never been reexamined since they were adopted in 1997. The standards commission’s work of evaluating the common core for possible adoption does at least allow for that overdue reexamination, said Holly Jacobson, CSBA’s assistant executive director of leadership development and policy analysis.
“If the common core is adopted, it gives us an opportunity to provide vertical alignment of the standards. We just have too many standards right now, so it will help provide more focus and coherence. That’s what we would hope could be achieved through this process,” Jacobson said.
California: Committed to common core?
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who has twice committed the state to adopting the common core in Race to the Top applications, nevertheless remains ambivalent in his comments about the new standards. For example, he has said the standards commission will “consider” the common core standards and make recommendations to “ensure” California’s standards are at least as rigorous.
The standards commission is composed of 10 members chosen by the state Legislature and 11 chosen by the governor. Ze’ev Wurman, one of the governor’s picks who helped develop the state’s current standards, has been critical of the common core standards, saying in a recent white paper (tellingly titled “The Emperor’s New Clothes”) that the “concept of college and career readiness Common Core is promoting may decrease, not increase, student achievement and harm national economic and scientific competitiveness.”
One issue is that the governor and the State Board have been determined to see all eighth-graders take Algebra I. The common core—however well it might prepare students through grade 7—does not anticipate Algebra I to be the default curriculum in grade 8.
If the State Board does accept the new standards, the process of creating curriculum frameworks and adopting instructional materials will begin immediately. A February policy update from CSBA advised local governance teams to monitor the SBE’s actions and participate in the process if they wish.
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