Education Standards by State: A Comprehensive Comparison

State education officials play a crucial role in shaping the curriculum for public schools by developing content standards. These standards serve as educational learning and achievement goals that state education officials either require or recommend that local schools satisfy in K-12 instruction. The approach to developing these standards varies significantly across the 50 states, reflecting diverse educational philosophies and priorities.

The Role of Content Standards

Content standards are the backbone of curriculum development, outlining the knowledge and skills students are expected to acquire at each grade level. These standards provide a framework for teachers to design lessons, select materials, and assess student progress. They also ensure that all students, regardless of their location within the state, have access to a consistent and high-quality education.

Alignment and Compliance

The level of adherence to content standards varies from state to state. Some states mandate that local schools align their curriculum with these standards, establishing them as a minimum course of study. In these states, schools or districts may be required to adopt the content standards directly or demonstrate that students have mastered them through state assessments. Conversely, other states offer more flexibility, recommending but not requiring local schools to follow the state content standards.

Currently, 39 state entities or agents require local compliance with state content standards, while 11 recommend adherence. This difference highlights the ongoing debate about the appropriate balance between state-level control and local autonomy in education.

Entities Responsible for Establishing Standards

The responsibility for establishing content standards typically falls on state-level entities, such as state boards of education, state departments of education, or state education agency leaders. These bodies are composed of educators, policymakers, and community members who work together to define the knowledge and skills that students need to succeed.

Key Elements of State Academic Standards

State academic standards establish the core content of the curricula taught, specifying the core content knowledge and skills that K-12 public school students are expected to acquire. These standards must be rigorous and relevant, providing for the logical, sequential progression of core curricular content that incrementally increases a student’s core content knowledge and skills over time.

Curricular content for all subjects must integrate critical-thinking, problem-solving, and workforce-literacy skills; communication, reading, and writing skills; mathematics skills; collaboration skills; contextual and applied-learning skills; technology-literacy skills; information and media-literacy skills; and civic-engagement skills. The standards must include distinct grade-level expectations for the core content knowledge and skills that a student is expected to have acquired by each individual grade level from kindergarten through grade 8.

The State Board of Education shall establish uniformly sequenced content standards that each student is expected to master prior to completion of the student's public school education. The state board shall adopt content standards for students in kindergarten through grade 12. Each local unit of administration may expand and enrich the content standards to the extent it deems necessary and appropriate for its students and communities.

Examples of State Approaches

To illustrate the diversity of approaches to content standards, let's examine specific examples from various states:

Delaware: 14 DE Code § 152 B1 outlines the duties of the State Board of Education, including establishing academic standards that define the core content of curricula and the knowledge and skills students are expected to acquire. The standards must be rigorous, relevant, and provide a logical progression of content.

Read also: Maximize Savings on McGraw Hill Education
Vermont: V.S.A. (12) tasks the state board of education with prescribing a minimum course of study in common schools, minimum competency requirements for promotion from third and eighth grade. The state board prepares a fiscal impact statement of any proposed changes to the minimum course of study or competency requirements and sends a copy to the director of the joint legislative budget committee and the director of the school facilities division within the department of administration.
Hawaii: ’’’§302A-201 Statewide performance standards.’’’ The board shall establish statewide performance standards and the means to assess the standards based upon the recommendations in the final report of the performance standards commission established pursuant to Act 334, Session Laws of Hawaii 1991; provided that the board may review and modify the performance standards, as the board deems necessary, to reflect the needs of public school students and educational goals adopted by the board.
Indiana: The state board shall adopt clear, concise, and jargon free state academic standards that are comparable to national and international academic standards and the college and career readiness educational standards adopted under IC 20-19-2-14.5.
Iowa: Adopt a set of core content standards applicable to all students in kindergarten through grade twelve in every school district and accredited nonpublic school. For purposes of this subsection, “core content standards” includes reading, mathematics, and science. School districts and accredited nonpublic schools shall include, at a minimum, the core content standards adopted pursuant to this subsection in any set of locally developed content standards. School districts and accredited nonpublic schools are strongly encouraged to set higher expectations in local standards.
Kentucky: The department shall establish four (4) standards and assessments review committees, with each committee composed of a minimum of six (6) Kentucky public school teachers and a minimum of two (2) representatives from Kentucky institutions of higher education, including at least one (1) representative from a public institution of higher education.

Read also: Becoming a Neonatal Nurse
Maine: Only a public school, a public charter school as defined in section 2401, subsection 9 or a private school approved for tuition purposes that enrolls at least 60% publicly funded students, as determined by the previous school year's October and April average enrollment, is required to participate in the system of learning results set forth in this section and in department rules implementing this section and other curricular requirements. The commissioner shall develop accommodation provisions for instances where course content conflicts with sincerely held religious beliefs and practices of a student's parent or guardian. The system must be adapted to accommodate children with disabilities as defined in section 7001, subsection 1-B.
Maryland: The board shall direct the commissioner to institute a process to develop academic standards for the core subjects of mathematics, science and technology, history and social science, English, foreign languages and the arts. The standards shall cover grades kindergarten through twelve and shall clearly set forth the skills, competencies and knowledge expected to be possessed by all students at the conclusion of individual grades or clusters of grades. The standards shall be formulated so as to set high expectations of student performance and to provide clear and specific examples that embody and reflect these high expectations, and shall be constructed with due regard to the work and recommendations of national organizations, to the best of similar efforts in other states, and to the level of skills, competencies and knowledge possessed by typical students in the most educationally advanced nations.
Michigan: In addition to the requirements for accreditation under section 1280 specified in that section, if the board of a school district wants all of the schools of the school district to be accredited under section 1280, the board shall provide to all pupils attending public school in the district a core academic curriculum in compliance with subsection (3) in each of the curricular areas specified in the state board recommended model core academic curriculum content standards developed under subsection (2). The state board model core academic curriculum content standards shall encompass academic and cognitive instruction only.
Minnesota: (7) the arts, for which statewide or locally developed academic standards apply, as determined by the school district. Public elementary and middle schools must offer at least three and require at least two of the following four arts areas: dance; music; theater; and visual arts.
Missouri: 4. e. The department of elementary and secondary education shall develop standards for high-quality early childhood education no later than June 30, 2007.
Nebraska: Except as provided in subsection (2), the board of public education shall define and specify the basic instructional program for pupils in public schools, and this program must be set forth in the standards of accreditation. The State Board of Education shall adopt measurable academic content standards for at least the grade levels required for statewide assessment pursuant to section 79-760.03.
New Mexico: I. 4. a. The State Board of Education shall review and update the core curriculum content standards every five years. The standards shall ensure that all children are provided the educational opportunity needed to equip them for the role of citizen and labor market competitor. The Commissioner of Education shall develop and establish, through the report issued pursuant to subsection b.
New York: a. Administration of elementary and secondary schools. The board of education of each school district shall employ and assign to each school under its supervision a full-time principal holding the appropriate certification as required pursuant to section 80.4(b) of this Title. Upon the submission of evidence that there are circumstances which do not justify the assignment of a principal to a particular school, or that another mode of building administration would be more effective, the commissioner may approve an alternative mode of building administration. b. State syllabi. In grades kindergarten through 12, the use of a State syllabus, where available, is recommended for all subjects.
North Carolina: The general supervision and administration of the free public school system shall be vested in the State Board of Education. The State Board of Education shall establish all needed rules and regulations for the system of free public schools, subject to laws enacted by the General Assembly. In accordance with Sections 7 and 8 of Article III of the North Carolina Constitution, the Superintendent of Public Instruction, as an elected officer and Council of State member, shall administer all needed rules and regulations adopted by the State Board of Education through the Department of Public Instruction.

Common Core State Standards Initiative

A significant development in the landscape of state education standards was the Common Core State Standards Initiative. This initiative aimed to establish a common set of educational standards in English language arts (ELA) and mathematics for grades K-12. The goal was to ensure that students graduating from high school would be prepared for college and careers, regardless of where they lived.

Adoption and Withdrawal

The Common Core standards were initially adopted by many states, with Kentucky being the first in 2010. However, the initiative faced considerable controversy, leading some states to withdraw from the standards. Four states that never adopted the Standards are Virginia, Texas, Alaska, and Nebraska. The four states who have successfully withdrawn from the curriculum are Arizona, Oklahoma, Indiana, and South Carolina. While still technically adopted as the official curriculum, at least 16 states have begun or passed legislation to repeal the standards. These states are Alabama, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Kansas, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, West Virginia, and Maryland.

Impact and Assessment

The Common Core standards have had a lasting impact on education in the United States. They have influenced curriculum development, teacher training, and assessment practices. However, the extent of their influence varies across states, with some having fully embraced the standards while others have modified or replaced them.

NAEP as a Common Metric

Given the diversity of state education standards, it is challenging to compare student performance across states. To address this issue, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) serves as a common metric for comparing state proficiency standards.

Purpose and Methodology

The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) produces reports that compare states’ reading and mathematics standards for proficient performance in grades 4 and 8 using NAEP as the common metric. NAEP scale scores equivalent to state proficiency standards are estimated using state public school assessment results for a school year that aligns with NAEP assessment results in reading and mathematics for grades 4 and 8.

Because all states participate in NAEP for these grades and subjects, per a federal law, NAEP can be used as the common metric to compare the relative stringency of states’ proficiency standards.

Achievement Levels

NAEP uses achievement levels to indicate what students should know and be able to do. The NAEP Proficient achievement level demonstrates solid academic performance, indicating competency over challenging subject matter, application of knowledge to real-world situations, and analytical skills appropriate to the subject matter.

Limitations

It is important to note that comparing state standards using NAEP has limitations. State assessments and NAEP assessments may vary in purpose, format, and administration. Additionally, this comparison focuses on performance standards, not student achievement. NAEP achievement scores of states’ student populations would be a better measure to compare achievement across states than where states set their bar for proficiency.

EdGate's ExACT Standards Alignment Platform

EdGate provides solutions for understanding the differences between state standards and other widely used libraries such as Common Core, NGSS, and C3. ExACT can also provide accurate comparisons between any two states and even a state’s new version to an older version of learning standards.

tags: #education #standards #by #state #comparison