Resources

Since the beginning of the standards-based movement under the Improving America’s Schools Act (IASA) continuing through the implementation of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), national observers have lamented the uneven rigor of standards developed by individual States. Peer review guidance first developed to implement IASA required states to document the rigor of their standards. The writers of the NCLB Act sought to correct what they viewed as a continuing lack of rigor in most state standards by requiring documentation of rigor through comparisons between state assessment results and the National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP) assessments. These efforts did not produce the rigorous state standards many sought.

In June of 2010, the National Governors Association Center for Best Practices (NGA Center) and the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) released the results of a two year effort to develop Common Core State Standards (CCSS). Development began with College and Career Readiness Standards (CCR) that described expectations for students exiting the K-12 system. These exiting expectations were then expanded to delineate grade by grade from kindergarten through grade twelve (http://www.corestandards.org/the-standards). These expansions were intended to lead to the CCR that served as anchors for the development of the grade specific expectations. A twenty-five member validation committee provided expert validation of the process for identifying the CCSS. (NGA & CCSSO, 2010).