California embraces Common Core testing

March 13, 2015

grade schoolThe state of California is abandoning its school ranking system in favor of a scoring method that will align with Common Core standards. [OC Register]

California has been implementing the Common Core State Standards Initiative since the beginning of the 2013-2014 school year. Common Core is supposed to increase the use of technology in the classroom and align California’s math, science, history and language arts K-12 curricula with those of 44 other states.

On Wednesday, the California Board of Education voted unanimously to suspend the state’s Academic Performance Index (API), which gives schools a composite score that factors in results from several standardized tests. The vote marked the second consecutive year that the board of education suspended the release of API scores.

California is not doing away with the API entirely. Rather, the education department is determining how to incorporate scores from the new Common Core testing system into the API, state superintendent Tom Torlakson said.

Students in California have already begun taking the Common Core-aligned standardized tests. The new testing system in conducted on electronic devices.

Critics say the new system will make it more difficult for parents, teachers and real estate agents to determine how well a school is performing. In the past, the API has boiled school evaluations down to a single score.

Additionally, many people nationwide have opposed the implementation of Common Core, arguing that the federal government is dictating school policy.


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Maxfusion,


Not everyone is blessed enough to afford to send their kids to a private school in Scotland.

Maybe you should be a little more considerate to those that can only afford public school.

We have plenty of private institutions of higher learning that I’m sure are at least as good

as you speak about as well, but most people cannot afford this.


Our public education system does need a good overhaul obviously. Much of what children

learn should begin at home.


With all due respect sarge, there was never a blessing. In 1983 when we observed the direction the public school system was taking we decided we wanted no part of it. I’m no bonus baby, and worked as a finish carpenter at the time. We mortgaged our home to send our daughter to a private school in Carpinteria, Ca. That commitment to a better education is why my

three grandchildren are in a top notch Scottish school today, and not because of a blessing. I would sell my organs before I let a child of mine attend a public school. Forty five years ago that wasn’t the case, but alas, that’s before the “progressives” hijacked the system.


Wages haven’t really gone up since 1983, when you adjust for inflation.


Glad your grandkids are doing well. Truly.


You didn’t do something superior to us though. You were simply fortunate to live through a generation where your income scaled with cost of living. Where did your wife work? How much was that mortgage? How much was that private school?


My grandchildren attend private school in Scotland. When Liam graduates this June he’ll leave with math training that includes algebra and geometry, and language studies that include two years of Latin, a year of French, and English. History, a subject Scots are passionate about given their own, and the list goes on——–. By the way, he’s graduating from form eight, the equivalent of our sixth grade. That’s the difference. How’s your sixth grader doing in that wonderful California public school system?