Arizona’s College and Career Ready
Standards
Myths vs. Facts
Myth: Arizona’s
College and Career Ready Standards are national standards.
Fact: The Standards were developed through a state-led initiative spearheaded
by governors and state school chiefs. The federal government was not involved
in the development of the Standards.
Myth: The standards are federally mandated.
Fact: The Standards
are not federally mandated. Arizona, along with 46 other states, voluntarily
adopted the standards.
Myth: The new
standards shifts control away from of education from local school boards
to the federal government.
Fact: Local school boards retain their
same level of authority as they had prior to the adoption of the Standards.
Myth: Arizona’s
College and Career Ready Standards will impede the work of charter schools.
Fact: Charter schools in Arizona generally support the new standards because
they can keep their unique missions.
Myth: Arizona
is locked into the College and Career Ready Standards and cannot make
changes.
Fact: Arizona is committed to staying the course and supporting the
implementation of the College and Career Ready Standards. However, the State
Board of Education can make changes to academic standards at any time. Good
standards shouldn’t change too often, but over time should evolve based on what
is learned from research, from educators in the field, and from student
assessments.
Myth: Arizona’s
College and Career Ready Standards won’t prepare students for college and
career.
Fact: The Standards reflect the real-world expectations of what is necessary
for students to succeed in higher education and the workforce, including
critical-thinking, problem solving, and effective communication skills. To this
end, the standards were developed using evidence that includes scholarly
research; surveys on what skills are required of students entering college and
workforce training programs; assessment data identifying college and
career-ready performance; and comparisons to standards from high-performing
states and nations, among other data. Together with highly trained,
well-supported teachers, the Standards will better prepare Arizona students for
college and career.
Myth: Arizona’s
College and Career Ready Standards are not internationally benchmarked.
Fact: The Standards draw from the best existing standards in the country and
are benchmarked to the top performing nations around the world, ensuring that
our students are well prepared to compete with their peers abroad for the jobs
of the future.
Myth: Arizona’s
old standards are better than the Arizona’s College and Career Ready
Standards
Fact: The Standards
have been well-received and are regarded by most commentators – across the
political spectrum – as an improvement on the state standards they replaced. For
example, in a recent analysis, the Fordham Institute found that the College and Career Ready Standards are an
improvement over the Arizona’s past standards.
Myth: Arizona’s
College and Career Ready Standards are a curriculum that tells teachers
what to teach.
Fact: The Standards are not a curriculum. Rather, they
are a set of goals that outline what students should be able to know and
do in each grade in English and math. Decisions about how to teach the
standards (e.g., curriculum, tools, materials and textbooks) are left to local
decision-makers who know their students best.
Myth: Implementing
Arizona’s College and Career Ready Standards will not require any big
changes in teaching or learning.
Fact: The Standards
will require new methods of teaching that lead students to become critical
thinkers and problem solvers with higher levels of subject mastery. Arizona
teachers will need additional training and time to adopt more innovative
instructional methods and deepen their content knowledge.
Myth: Arizona’s College
and Career Ready Standards do not have enough emphasis on fiction and
literature.
Fact: While there
is a shift towards including informational text in the standards, literature is
included. The Standards require certain critical content for all
students, including: classic myths and stories from around the world, America’s
Founding Documents, foundational American literature, and Shakespeare.
Appropriately, the remaining crucial decisions about what content should be
taught are left to state and local determination. In addition to content
coverage, the Standards require that students systematically acquire knowledge
in literature and other disciplines through reading, writing, speaking, and
listening.
Myth: The math
standard does not address algebra until high school.
Fact: There is a great deal of algebra in the 8th
grade standards and a strong focus on the prerequisites for algebra in the
elementary grades. If a student is ready to move on to algebra in 8th
grade or before, the decision will be made with the student’s parents, teacher
and school district, as has always been.
Myth: Arizona’s College
and Career Ready Standards were developed quickly and with little
public comment.
Fact: The Standards were developed by a thoughtful and transparent
process led by the National Governors Association and Council for Chief State
School Officers. The process relied on teachers, experts from across the
country (including Arizonans), and feedback from key stakeholders and the
general public. NGA and CCSSO received nearly 10,000 comments in response to
the draft standards, which were incorporated into the standards.
Myth: Arizonans
were not involved in the creation of the standards.
Fact: Experts from Arizona were involved in the development of the standards. One
example includes Dr. William McCallum, the University Distinguished Professor
of Mathematics and Head of the Department of Mathematics at the University of
Arizona, who was one of the lead writers of the math standards. Sarah Baird,
the 2009 Arizona Teacher of the Year, served on the Common Core State Standards
Validation Committee. Arizona teachers, superintendents, staff from the Arizona
Department of Education, and others were also involved in reviewing and
providing input to the standards.
.jpeg)
