THIS SUMMER MARKS the 20th anniversary of the Commonwealth’s landmark Education Reform Act of 1993. That law ushered in a new era of clear, measurable academic standards for all students that were aligned to an accountability system that holds students, schools, and districts accountable for results. In return, the state committed to investing billions of new dollars in education aid.
Over the past two decades, Massachusetts’s public education system has become the envy of the nation. Our students are performing at ever-higher levels and are continuously improving. Massachusetts students lead the nation in reading and mathematics performance. The Commonwealth’s investment in public education is paying huge dividends.
Despite our success, challenges remain. Almost 40 percent of the Commonwealth’s high school graduates who enroll in our public higher education campuses are placed in at least one remedial, non-credit-bearing course. Students from low-income families, English language learners, and students with disabilities still lag behind other student groups. These proficiency gaps demonstrate the work that remains to be done to bring all students to high levels.
Tackling these gaps and inconsistencies in educational attainment requires adjustments to our current educational system. You can’t create the future by clinging to the past. This work at its core requires that all Massachusetts students—and really, all students in the United States—experience a course of study that will prepare them for success in college, career, and life.
When I became commissioner in 2008, Massachusetts was already engaged in a process to upgrade its English language arts (ELA) and mathematics academic standards that had been in place since the early 2000s. It is standard practice for states to update academic standards periodically to ensure students and teachers have access to new content knowledge, new approaches to teaching and learning, and new technologies. Around the same time, a bipartisan initiative of the nation’s governors and chief state school officers (my counterparts in other states) called on states to adopt “a common core of internationally benchmarked standards in math and language arts for grades K-12 to ensure that students are equipped with the necessary knowledge and skills to be globally competitive.”
In short, in a world where political boundaries (state and national) are increasingly irrelevant to economic opportunity, it makes little sense for 50 states to develop 50 different targets for literacy and numeracy competence. So in the spring of 2009 Gov. Patrick and I signed agreements to support the development of the Common Core State Standards with the explicit understanding that we would not accept standards that failed to match or exceed our own in rigor and comprehensiveness. Taking this path was the right way for Massachusetts to demonstrate leadership and influence the outcome while enjoying the considerable national and international expertise that was brought to this task.
Throughout their development, our ELA and mathematics staff collaborated closely with the Common Core writing teams, providing our revisions as well as advice on the content, wording, and organizational structure of the standards. Massachusetts had a profound influence on the concepts, wording, and overall structure of the final Common Core documents published in June 2010. Our own analysis of the degree of match between the Common Core and our own revised, draft standards showed a remarkably high degree of consistency between the two documents. Where the two sets of standards did not match, it was often a reflection of the Common Core going into more depth.
The Massachusetts Board of Elementary and Secondary Education adopted the Common Core State Standards in July 2010, contingent upon augmenting and customizing the standards. This ability to add state-specific standards was paramount to adoption in Massachusetts. It allowed Massachusetts to include key elements not contained in the Common Core, including pre-kindergarten standards essential to providing a strong foundation for the kindergarten standards as well as author lists from our earlier ELA framework. In December 2010, our state boards of Elementary and Secondary Education and Early Education and Care both voted to adopt state curriculum frameworks in English language arts and literacy and in math that incorporate the Common Core State Standards.
The new Massachusetts Curriculum Frameworks capitalize on feedback from employers and higher education about where our graduates were most often lacking in terms of their literacy and mathematical skills. The frameworks provide a signal to students in prekindergarten through grade 12 about their readiness for the next grade level and, in high school, their readiness for college and careers.
The new ELA standards reinforce the importance of teaching reading and writing across disciplines, which reflects the expectations of colleges, universities, and employers. The standards place important attention on speaking, listening, and vocabulary and the importance of students reading literary and informational texts of higher complexity than they commonly read in the past. The new standards also incorporate the skills needed for the critical appraisal of digital and print sources—the so-called “new literacies”—to enhance research and production and distribution of ideas.
The new mathematics standards capitalize on understandings gained over the past decade about the learning progressions that lead to stronger mathematical competence, as well as the approach taken in some of the highest achieving nations. They provide greater focus and clarity for teachers and students at each grade level. In the early grades, teachers concentrate on developing students’ fluency with numbers and operations, while the middle grades will focus on proportional reasoning (ratios, proportions, fractions, decimals), which is an essential conceptual underpinning for algebra and higher level math. Individual grade level standards are united by a set of overarching “standards for mathematical practice” that describe intellectual qualities that students develop over time, such as perseverance in solving problems, the ability to reason abstractly and quantitatively, and the capacity to construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning of others.
Over the past two years, I have seen that educators are energized by the new standards and the resources that are emerging here and in other states. Educators’ attention to the new standards has resulted in an energetic focus on improving teaching and learning. Massachusetts has partnered with Ohio to establish a new online teaching and learning system that supports implementation by providing a digital library of online resources; tools for creating standards-based curriculum maps, curriculum units, and lesson plans; and the ability to build and deliver interim and formative assessments. Massachusetts is also collaborating with two dozen states to build a next generation assessment system aligned to the Common Core.
Some critics suggest the Common Core standards are a creature of the Obama administration, and represent federal coercion and overreach. Some claim that federal funding of Common Core implementation initiatives through Race to the Top and two multi-state assessment consortia represents improper federal involvement in curriculum. I disagree. From a policy perspective, it strikes me as quite appropriate for the federal government to expect states to aim high in their aspirations for student achievement in return for federal funding to support educational programs.
Common Core critics also wrongly assert that the new standards water down the skills and knowledge that Massachusetts expects of all students. In reality, the Common Core was more rigorous, coherent, and focused than our previous standards. Even E.D. Hirsch, Jr., the chairman and founder of the Core Knowledge Foundation who often touted our earlier state Curriculum Frameworks, endorsed the value of the Common Core and encouraged us to incorporate it into our new Curriculum Frameworks.
Critics also perpetuate inaccuracies that the Common Core is expelling literature from the curriculum, and that students will no longer have access to great literary works like Tom Sawyer and Moby Dick. This is simply not so. By addressing literacy (reading, writing, speaking, and listening) across subjects, and not just in ELA, students will continue to study great works of fiction along with high-quality non-fiction and informational texts that will strengthen their preparation for higher education and workplace expectations. To help schools and teachers select literary works, the Commonwealth has augmented the Common Core by including suggested author lists contained in our earlier Curriculum Frameworks. In both cases, Mark Twain and Herman Melville—as two examples—are authors whose works we recommend be part of ELA classes.
Finally, critics argue that Common Core adoption is too costly. In reality, the costs to districts associated with implementing new standards include professional development and updated instructional materials. High quality school systems routinely devote resources to improving teaching and learning. States are pooling resources and tapping into new sources of funding to support the development of curriculum resources. Our Race to the Top grant alone brought $250 million into the state over four years to support the new frameworks implementation and other initiatives.
Adoption of the new Massachusetts Curriculum Frameworks that incorporate the Common Core is a major advancement for the Commonwealth. We remain dedicated to improving education for all children. The Patrick administration’s investments in public education, including the adoption of new, rigorous academic standards, and its commitment to building a 21st century education system in Massachusetts, are instrumental in preparing all students for success after high school.
We are doing the right work, students are benefitting, and educators are excited about the future.
Mitchell D. Chester is commissioner of the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education.
Read Jim Stergios’ Counterpoint.