Common Core Standards Overview Notes: This is an overview of the Common Core Standards. This should be accompanied by the two overviews for mathematics and English language arts. © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association

The Common Core Standards (CCS) were developed by the Council of Chief State School Officers and the National Governor’s Association Center for Best Practices, and were formally released on June 2, 2010. Notes: The CCS are not National Standards – they are common standards that were developed by the Council of Chief State School Officers and the National Governors Association. Work began on the standards in the fall of 2009. The work began with the development of the College and Career Standards so that all future standard development would keep this end goal in mind. It is amazing that the standards were developed so quickly. © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association

The focus of the CCS is to guarantee that all students are college and career ready as they exit from high school. Notes: One of the main focuses of the Obama administration is that students will be college and career ready when they exit high school. This will also likely be one of the main goals of the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) in the coming years. © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association

Overarching Goals for K-12 CCS Ensure that our students are: Meeting college and work expectations Prepared to succeed in our global economy and society, and Provided with rigorous content and applications of higher knowledge through higher order thinking skills. Notes: The first goal addresses the overarching goal of college and career ready. All twenty first century students also need to be prepared to compete in a global society – the CCS are internationally benchmarked. The CCS were developed to cause students to develop and use problem-solving and higher order thinking skills. They were also developed to assist with the application of skills. © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association

The CCS build upon the strengths and lessons of current state standards. Notes: California and Massachusetts currently have some of the highest quality standards. The Fordham Group has consistently given California standards high marks. For that reason, California’s standards greatly aided in the development of the CCS. Many of the authors of California’s standards also worked on the CCS. This is particularly true for elementary mathematics and foundational reading. © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association

What are the benefits of the CCS? Internationally benchmarked Student expectations are clear to parents, teachers, and the general public Allows for collaboration with other states on best practices, instructional materials, and professional development Reduces costs to the state Notes: Reviewers of the CCS have found them to be clearly stated so that all stakeholders can understand them. In the past, there was little basis for collaboration when states each had their own standards. The CCS allows California to work with other states and have a common element for dialogue about best practices, instructional materials, pedagogy and professional development. Potentially, this could create common instructional materials between states, possibly reducing the costs of development of instructional materials. © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association

The Common Core State Standards A voluntary state-led effort coordinated by the CCSSO and NGA Includes parents, educators, content experts, researchers, national organizations and community groups from 48 states, 2 territories and the District of Columbia Notes: Not only were many experts involved in the development of the CCS, but the CCS standards group also provided several opportunities for electronic feedback, and they received thousands of comments. Each comment was reviewed and considered. © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association

4 expert groups were involved in the development of the standards: An advisory group A standards development workgroup An expert feedback group A validation committee Notes: Over 200 experts have been involved in the development of the CCS. Their names can be found on the common core website (http://corestandards.org). The advisory group set policy for the process. The main work was done by the standards development workgroup. California had several experts on this workgroup, such as Dr. Wu from UC Berkeley. The validation committee was given the task of affirming that the standards met the fundamental criteria – such as “research-based.” California had 6 members on this committee. Over 85% of the committee’s membership validated the standards. © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association

Students with Disabilities The CCS provide an historic opportunity to improve access to rigorous academic content standards for students with disabilities. Many experts in this area were involved in the development of these standards. Notes: It is important to note that there is only one set of standards for all students. The goal is that the needs of students with disabilities should be met with additional time, carefully selected teaching strategies, and carefully crafted Individualized Education Plans (IEPs). © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association

English Learners The CCS articulate rigorous grade level expectations to prepare all students to be college and career ready, including English learners. Notes: Similarly, the needs of English Learners should be met with research-based teaching strategies. © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association

The development of the ELA CCS involved linguists and EL experts The development of the ELA CCS involved linguists and EL experts. And they had a huge impact on the language and vocabulary standards. The developers of the CCS will consider the development of ELD standards for the CCS. Notes: Members of the California Academic Content Standards Commission with expertise in the area of English Learners felt that the standards were responsive to EL needs. Representatives from the national groups have indicated that they hope to have a draft of the ELD standards for the CCS in about two years. © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association

California Academic Content Standards Commission (CACSC) SB X5 1 created the 21 member standards commission: 11 Governor Appointees 5 Senate Appointees 5 Assembly Appointees Not less than half must be current teachers. Notes: The appointments to the CACSC were made on or around June 2, 2010. The 21 members included classroom teachers, administrators, college professors, professionals and researchers. © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association

Timeline for Work June 2, 2010 – July 15, 2010 The State Board of Education had until August 2, 2010 to take final action. Notes: The timeline was very quick and only allowed for 3 two-day meetings. Commissioners and staff completed a great deal of work between the meetings, so that the CACSC could accomplish the most work during the meeting times. The final motion from the CACSC occurred at 10:56 pm on July 15, 2010. © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association

The primary goal of the Commission is to ensure that the rigor of the state’s reading, writing, and mathematics academic content standards, curricula, and assessment is maintained... Notes: The work of the Commission was not to develop a set of standards, but instead to consider the CCS to determine if they are as rigorous as California’s academic content standards. © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association

…so that all high school graduates are prepared for college and careers by establishing a process to adopt new standards based on the Common Core State Standards Initiative. © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association

For California, 85% of the standards recommendation must be the CCS. 15% could be additional standards added by California to ensure the rigor. Notes: The 15% is difficult to measure. If you use a word count, then California added about 8% in ELA and 14% in mathematics. On the website http://www.scoe.net/castandards, the posted versions of the standards have the California additions bolded and underlined. © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association

California’s Additional 15% Based on the following criteria: Substantively enhance Address a perceived gap Be defensible to classroom practitioners Keep the original standard intact Ensure the rigor of California’s existing standards is maintained Notes: The Commission used the criteria above to determine whether additional standards or information should be included for California. The Commission used the notion that they could use a pencil rather than an eraser in their work. This means that sometimes, just a clarifying short phrase was added to a standard rather than an entirely new standard. Details of California’s additions are in the PowerPoints for mathematics and ELA. © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association

On August 2, 2010, the State Board of Education adopted the standards recommended by the California Academic Content Standards Commission. http://www.scoe.net/castandards http://www.cde.ca.gov/ci/cc Notes: The CACSC provided background about the standards and the work of the Commission during the Board presentation. The State Board of Education vote was unanimous to adopt the standards. © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association

The State Superintendent and the State Board of Education shall present to the Governor and appropriate Legislature Committees a schedule and implementation plan for integrating the CCS into the state educational system. Notes: The CDE has developed two implementation timelines. The first timeline depends on the legislature taking action to allow CDE and the SBE to return to the work of developing frameworks and professional development prior to 2013. Both timelines are available on the CDE website. © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association

This includes the development of: frameworks instructional materials professional development assessment (2014-2015) Notes: Work is also being done at some county offices to ensure that ELA materials from the 2008 adoption are aligned to the CCS. Some publishers are developing ancillary materials to fill in any gaps. © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association

What Now? Stay the Course! More similarities than differences in the standards Implement a truly balanced instructional program as this will support the transition Continue to use quality assessments to inform and drive effective instruction Provide opportunities for teachers to collaborate and plan Notes: Since the similarities between the two sets of standards are far greater, the very best strategy for the present is continuing to implement your adopted instructional materials with fidelity. We are all still accountable to the STAR assessment program. In the longer term, developing local implementation plans that include professional development for teachers is valuable. © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association © 2011 California County Superintendents Educational Services Association