Next Generation Science Standards: Which States Adopted and When?
Over the last 16 months, here at Education Week we've been covering state adoptions of the Next Generation Science Standards.
So far, a dozen states and the District of Columbia have adopted them. The K-12 science standards, finalized in April 2013, were developed by 26 "lead state partners" in collaboration with several national groups. Key dimensions of the standards include providing a greater emphasis on depth over breadth of science content and asking students to apply their learning through the practices of scientific inquiry and engineering design.
As I wrote in January, the pace of adoption has been somewhat slow, especially when compared to that of the Common Core State Standards. Those standards, which cover math and English/language arts, were approved in rapid succession by most states in the months following their release. However, proponents of the science standards say slow and steady is just the pace they'd expected given that states are caught up implementing the common core. And many say they're still hopeful the majority of states will adopt over the next several years.
So who exactly has adopted so far, and how quickly did that happen? The timeline below takes stock of where things stand and how we got there. I'll try to update as states adopt. In the meantime, feel free to use this as a handy reference tool.