As more classrooms across the country roll out universal math and reading standards, a growing group of critics are pressing officials to slow their implementation or dump the learning goals entirely.
This is the first school year that most states are using voluntary academic standards known as Common Core, which lay out what students should know from kindergarten through 12th grade. Written by a group of governors, state school officials and other experts with the goal of better preparing students for college and careers, the standards have been adopted entirely by 45 states and the District of Columbia since 2010. A 46th state, Minnesota, has adopted only the language-arts portion.
A sampling of learning benchmarks under the Common Core.
3rd Grade Math
- Recognize and generate simple equivalent fractions (e.g., 1/2 = 2/4 or 4/6 = 2/3). Explain why the fractions are equivalent, perhaps by using a visual model.
3rd Grade Language Arts
- Describe characters in a story (e.g., their traits, motivations or feelings) and explain how their actions contribute to the sequence of events.
8th Grade Math
- Apply the Pythagorean theorem to determine unknown side lengths of right triangles in real-world and mathematical problems in two and three dimensions.
8th Grade Language Arts
- Analyze how particular lines of dialogue or incidents in a story propel action, reveal aspects of a character or provoke a decision.
- Interpret complicated expressions by viewing one or more of their parts as a single entity. For example, interpret P(1+r)n as the product of P and a factor not depending on P.
9th/10th Grade Language Arts
- Analyze how an author draws on and transforms source material in a specific work (e.g., how Shakespeare treats a theme or topic from Ovid or the Bible).
Source: Common Core State Standards Initiative
Now, the Common Core effort is under attack from an unlikely coalition: conservatives who decry the implementation costs and call the standards an intrusion into local education decisions; union leaders who worry that states have tied, or plan to tie, teacher evaluations to new Common Core exams; and some parents who contend their children are ill-prepared for the Common Core tests.
Indiana's Republican-controlled legislature passed legislation Friday that calls for the state board of education to hold hearings on the standards and reconsider its 2010 decision to adopt them. Legislatures in Michigan, Alabama and several other states are considering anti-Common Core bills, and the Republican National Committee in April called Common Core a "straightjacket on academic freedom and achievement." Sen. Charles Grassley (R., Iowa) is seeking to prohibit federal funding for any Common Core efforts.
Tuesday, Common Core was dealt a blow by one of its staunchest supporters. Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, called for a moratorium on linking teacher evaluations to Common Core assessments until the standards are "properly implemented and field tested." While teacher unions have complained about using test scores in performance reviews, Ms. Weingarten has championed Common Core. She said Tuesday the standards are "creating a serious backlash as officials seek to make them count before they make them work."
The Obama administration has embraced the standards and prodded states to adopt them in its $4.35 billion Race to the Top initiative. Education Secretary Arne Duncan acknowledged that some teachers are "pretty stressed about the pace and sequence of change," adding it is "a concern that we've heard and are thinking through carefully."
Common Core grew from an effort by the National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers to create a list of college- and career-ready skills that students should possess before high-school graduation. Groups of subject experts created detailed goals. Most states have yet to roll out Common Core tests, but most have said they will do so by 2015.
Supporters say Common Core prepares students for college and for global competition better than earlier state standards.
David Coleman, president of the College Board and widely considered the architect of Common Core, said any public debate that prompts more people to study the standards would lead them to see that they include "work in high-quality fiction and nonfiction, math that is precise and demanding, and a platform for more kids to achieve at a high level."
Some critics decry the quality of the standards, including their focus on adding more nonfiction or "informational" text to classrooms, which they argue crowds out literature. Others worry implementation has been so rushed teachers aren't prepared to teach the standards and students aren't ready for the tests.
In Kentucky, the first state to replace state exams with tests based on Common Core, the percentage of students meeting math and reading goals dropped by about one-third last year. In New York, some parents and teachers said students froze or broke into tears because they ran out of time to finish new tougher tests in mid-April.
No state has completely pulled out of Common Core, but Utah and Alabama have backed out of the consortium of states working to create computer-based Common Core exams.
Indiana has gone the farthest in slowing things down, thanks to two Indianapolis mothers. Heather Crossin learned of Common Core in the fall of 2011 when her daughter brought home a math book linked to the standards that she found to be weaker than the previous textbook. She was incensed the standards were adopted with little public comment and teamed with another mom to lead a statewide effort to drop the standards. The proposal failed, but lawmakers voted last week to reassess the state's participation.
"This is an unprecedented loss of local control and we were not going to stand for it," Ms. Crossin said.
Ashley Hebda, an English teacher at George Washington Community High School in Indianapolis and a supporter of Common Core, said the fight over standards is causing "massive confusion" in classrooms. "I can see these standards are helping my students and a lot of us are worried this back and forth and indecision will only hurt our kids," she said.
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