New Research Report Endorses Common Core in MA

Today Massachusetts’ education standards received a significant endorsement from the non-partisan, independent Worcester Regional Research Bureau. The bureau’s new report, Toward a Common Understanding of the Common Core, examines the origins and merits of the Common Core standards, and concludes that they, and the movement toward aligned assessments, represent “the best thinking on educational policy and learning standards by national, state, and local leaders.”

The report disproves several common misconceptions that have been inserted into the debate over Common Core. Opponents are using standards (learning goals), curriculum (materials), and instruction (classroom teaching methods) interchangeably, misleading parents and others about the impact of the new standards. The report debunks other falsehoods, including that the standards usurp curriculum flexibility at the local level, by showing that suggested readings are not required readings; that while these are national standards, they are voluntarily adopted by states and not a Federal mandate; and that they are merely a core set of goals that “identify the minimum level of understanding required, not the maximum level of achievement possible.”

The report is perhaps most significant because it comes from Worcester, where debate about the Common Core has been more heated than in other areas of the state. Polls, however, show 70% of teachers in Massachusetts are enthusiastic about implementation, while the same percentage believes current Curriculum Frameworks will help their students succeed.

The Research Bureau has produced a report that can serve as a vital source for citizens concerned about public education in Massachusetts and is timely as blatantly untrue information about the standards continues to spread. And while debate will continue, working towards a better, more efficient and more modern public education system is something we can hopefully all agree on.