Support for a Big Opportunity: Transitioning to the Common Core State Standards

The Common Core State Standards require teaching more rigorous content in ways that emphasize higher-level thinking skills, such as analysis and application.

Schools and districts that are putting a Common Core State Standards–based curriculum into place are in the midst of “a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to reexamine their teaching practices,” says WestEd’s Robert Rosenfeld. He calls the effort nothing less than a “game changer.”

Adds Rosenfeld’s colleague, Liz Jameyson, “The standards are based on the best educational research we have. We have good reason to believe this will work. People are sitting up and taking notice.”

Rosenfeld, Jameyson, and other members of WestEd’s Local Accountability Professional Development Series (LAPDS) are working with educators in more than a dozen states, using strategies honed over the last decade by LAPDS, a customized service that helps schools and school districts meet their accountability goals.

LAPDS team members are drawing on successful strategies to help teachers shift what and how they teach in order to effectively meet the new standards. Learn more about these strategies in this free paper.