Are the new standards really different from Common Core?

Louisiana educators will teach under new standards next year, after an eight-month review process and years of public disagreement about the Common Core State Standards.

Both proponents and opponents of Common Core say the new standards aren't too different. They're still split over whether that's a good thing.

"We are not anticipating massive changes," said Kim Bennett, assistant superintendent of curriculum and instruction of Rapides Parish schools.

The Louisiana Board of Elementary and Secondary Education (BESE) replaced the state’s Common Core standards March 4 by approving the Louisiana State Student Standards in English, language arts and mathematics.

"This action by BESE replaces the Common Core State Standards with unique state standards developed through a collaborative statewide process that included extensive public input and the work of Louisiana educator-led committees," according to the state Department of Education.

The state department stated that the review committee changed 21 percent of the standards. But Common Core opponents say the new standards are just a "rebranding" of the old.

"This isn't a re-write, it's a 're-brand' of the same standards," said Stephanie Riley, a Central Louisiana parent who strongly opposed Common Core and related curricula like Eureka Math and subsequently moved her children to private school this year. "Only 20 percent of the standards were changed, and the majority of those were only slightly 'tweaked.'"

That wording also comes from the other side of the coin, those on the committee and the ones left to implement any changes.

Bennett said the district already has a "framework" that serves as a guide to implementing curricula, much like a map.

"We will be tweaking what we already have (the framework) and embedding the new," Bennett said, adding that the implementation will be gradual and in "transitions."

She said "massive" changes would be unfair to teachers.

"Our teachers have gone through so much change in the last three years, so we are being conscientious in trying to stay the course and not causing an upheaval," Bennett said. "That's not good for teachers, so it's not good for students.... We will make adjustments, but they will not be massive because that's not fair to them."

Opponents like Riley argue the review process was "tacked heavily against change," from the makeup of the committee to the process for the public to submit feedback. She said the panel was "pro-Common Core ... from the beginning" and that the "public portal" was over-complicated to suppress comments from those against the previous standards.

"I actively participated in the online review that was open to parents and teachers," Riley said. "The process was made extremely difficult to navigate. Agreeing with the standard required only a single 'click,' whereas any suggestions for changes or elimination of a certain standard required multiple steps to input your information.

"When you add that up with all of the standards being reviewed, it required hours and hours of time to review all of them, making it almost impossible for any parent or teacher to complete," she continued.

Charlotte Boothe, chairperson of the mathematics content sub-committee for grades 3-12, agrees that reviewing the standards took a lot of time. She said the entire committee, which includes her sub-committee, spent on average 9,000 hours on developing the standards.

She said the portal was set up that way to provide more information and direction to committee members about what to change instead of just saying they disagree with or don't like the standards.

But Boothe said she and her committee looked at public feedback and talked with teachers in their district as they reviewed the 433 math standards in Common Core.

"Every standard was looked at, open for public review and studied by committee members," Boothe said.

And about 80 percent of members of the 3-12 math committee were current Louisiana educators, she said.

"For the most part the ones doing the work were the ones in the classroom," Boothe said. "That was important."

She said public feedback came up a lot in the committee's discussions, especially at the beginning, and that it affected some their decisions. Like moving a third-grade standard about area to fourth "solely based on public portal and teacher feedback," Boothe said.

Changes

Adding and subtracting of integers was a sixth grade standard until it was moved to seventh under Common Core, Boothe said. The committee suggested moving it back to sixth, but after talking to teachers they decided to keep it in seventh because sixth "already has so much on their plate" with mastering fraction operations and so on.

"So decisions like that were made," she said.

The committee also worked on the vertical transition of the standards.

"A big, big part of our work was to ensure a smooth transition grade to grade," she said.

For example, money is taught in second-grade math under Common Core. Committee members felt like students needed it earlier than that, so they added a kindergarten standard introducing coins and another in first grade about money values. And then in third grade students will solve work problems involving currency, she said.

Another change was the removal of part of eighth-grade standards dealing with transformations, she said. Her committee felt like it was inappropriate for eighth grade or would be better understood in ninth.

One piece of the review process, Boothe said, was clarifying standards, especially in high school. For example, many standards are shared in Algebra I and II.

"A lot of our work was to determine proper placement," she said. "How far would those Algebra I teachers need to go?"

So they added "clear definitions" to those to prevent making teachers interpret standards.

"Some standards were very vague, open to interpretation," Boothe said. "We took out a lot of the vagueness."

She said a "crosswalk" document on the state website shows the standards before and after the review and edits.

"It looks like we just clarified a lot of language," Boothe said. "But that's what was confusing to a lot of the teachers."

She said the state has reached out to the committee about developing a companion document with suggested strategies and more.

Implementation

The district has begun the implementation process, beginning with some crosswalk documents already sent to teachers, Bennett said.

"We're talking to curriculum specialists now about the easiest way to implement this," Bennett said. "So the process has already started."

But the main rollout of new standards will begin at Summer Institute, the district's professional development sessions in June and July. Implementation will be gradual and continue throughout the year, Bennett said.

Boothe is ready.

"I just fully believe in the work we did," Boothe said. "I'm very happy with the end results. ... I'm ready for implementation."

She called the eight-month review process of the standards "eye-opening."

"I wish every teacher in our state had the opportunity to sit and discuss the vertical progression, the grade-level progression of the standards like we did," she said.

Riley hopes there's still more change to come, but she's not that hopeful.

"I would like to think that the Legislature will refuse the rewrite as approved by BESE and send them back to the drawing board, or that our new governor would veto the new standards, which would also force them to start over," Riley said. "But I am not terribly hopeful. Politics in Louisiana does not support children and teachers in education. It supports big business, and education has become just that — a business."