A national set of standards for high school education?

Would standards improve test scores?

The National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers have joined forces to come up with a national initiative to create a set of standards for grades K-12. This set of standards is meant to be internationally based so that U.S. students will be able to compete better on a global basis.

This week, the National Parent Teachers Association endorsed the initiative.
Charles J. "Chuck" Saylors, National PTA's Incoming-President, says, "No longer should states have different expectations for what students should know. We should all be on the same page. This is important for parents because we need to be able to articulate to our children what they need to know and be able to do to be successful in college and in their career."

The set of standards is called the Common Core State Standards Initiative.

There is agreement that the initiative should be:

• Aligned with college and career expectations;
• Internationally benchmarked against high performing nations;
• Reflective of vital cross-disciplinary skills such as critical thinking, problem solving, logical reasoning, communication, and team work;
• Fewer in scope and deeper in meaning; and
• Clearly written and user-friendly to educators.