Thomas B. Fordham Institute - Advancing Educational Excellence

The State of State Math Standards 2005

January 5, 2005

by David Klein, Bastiaan J. Braams, Thomas Parker, William Quirk, Wilfried Schmid, W. Stephen Wilson, Chester E. Finn, Jr., Justin Torres, Lawrence Braden, Ralph A. Raimi

States still have far to go in setting rigorous, high quality expectations for K-12 math instruction. Although a majority have replaced or revised their math standards since 2000, many have failed to make substantial improvements. The review was led by David Klein, Professor of Mathematics at California State University-Northridge, and evaluates the content, writing quality, and clarity of K-12 math standards in each state. Klein and his team attribute many of  the shortcomings to overuse and wrong applications of manipulatives and calculators; wrong-headed guidance from the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics; and lack of true mathematics competence among those writing the standards.

Contents

Foreword by Chester E. Finn, Jr.

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Two decades after the United States was diagnosed as "a nation at risk," academic standards for our primary and secondary schools are more important than everand their quality matters enormously.

In 1983, as nearly every American knows, the National Commission on Excellence in Education declared that "The educational foundations of our society are presently being eroded by a rising tide of mediocrity that threatens our very future as a Nation and a people." Test scores were falling, schools were asking less of students, international rankings were slipping, and colleges and employers were complaining that many high school graduates were semi-literate. America was gripped by an education crisis that centered on weak academic achievement in its K-12 schools. Though that weakness had myriad causes, policy makers, business leaders, and astute educators quickly deduced that the surest cure would begin by spelling out the skills and knowledge that children ought to learn in school, i.e., setting standards against which progress could be tracked, performance be judged, and curricula (and textbooks, teacher training, etc.) be aligned. Indeed, the vast education renewal movement that gathered speed in the mid-1980s soon came to be known as "standards-based reform."

By 1989, President George H.W. Bush and the governors agreed on ambitious new national academic goals, including the demand that "American students will leave grades 4, 8, and 12 having demonstrated competency in challenging subject matter" in the core subjects of English, mathematics, science, history, and geography.

In response, states began to enumerate academic standards for their schools and students. In 1994, Washington added oomph to this movement (and more subjects to the "core" list) via the "Goals 2000" act and a revision of the federal Title I program.

Two years later, the governors and business leaders convened an education summit to map out a plan to strengthen K-12 academic achievement. The summiteers called for "new world-class standards" for U.S. schools. And by 1998, 47 states had outlined K-12 standards in mathematics.

But were they any good? We at the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation took it upon ourselves to find out. In early 1998, we published State Math Standards, written by the distinguished mathematician Ralph Raimi and veteran math teacher Lawrence Braden. Two years later, with many states having augmented or revised their academic standards, we published The State of State Standards 2000, whose math review was again conducted by Messrs. Raimi and Braden. It appraised the math standards of 49 states, conferring upon them an average grade of "C."

Raising the Stakes

Since that review, standards-based reform received a major boost from the No Child Left Behind act (NCLB) of 2002. Previously, Washington had encouraged states to set standards. Now, as a condition of federal education assistance, they must set them in math and reading (and, soon, science) in grades 3 through 8; develop a testing system to track student and school performance; and hold schools and school systems to account for progress toward universal proficiency as gauged by those standards.

Due mostly to the force of NCLB, more than 40 states have replaced, substantially revised, or augmented their K-12 math standards since our 2000 review. NCLB also raised the stakes attached to those standards. States, districts, and schools are now judged by how well they are educating their students and whether they are raising academic achievement for all students. The goal, now, is 100 percent proficiency. Moreover, billions of dollars in federal aid now hinge on whether states conscientiously hold their schools and districts to account for student learning.

Thus, a state's academic standards bear far more weight than ever before. These documents now provide the foundation for a complex, high-visibility, high-risk accountability system. "Standards-based" reform is the most powerful engine for education improvement in America, and all parts of that undertakingincluding teacher preparation, textbook selection, and much moreare supposed to be aligned with a state's standards. If that foundation is sturdy, such reforms may succeed; if it's weak, uneven, or cracked, reforms erected atop it will be shaky and, in the end, could prove worse than none at all.

Constancy and Change

Mindful of this enormous burden on state standards, and aware that most of them had changed substantially since our last review, in 2004 we initiated fresh appraisals in mathematics and English, the two subjects at NCLB's heart. To lead the math review, we turned to Dr. David Klein, a professor of mathematics at California State University, Northridge, who has long experience in K-12 math issues. We encouraged him to recruit an expert panel of fellow mathematicians to collaborate in this ambitious venture, both to expose states' standards to more eyes, thus improving the reliability and consistency of the ratings, and to share the work burden.

Dr. Klein outdid himself in assembling such a panel of five eminent mathematicians, identified on page 127. We could not be more pleased with the precision and rigor that they brought to this project.

It is inevitable, however, that when reviewers change, reviews will, too. Reviewing entails judgment, which is inevitably the result of one's values and priorities as well as expert knowledge and experience.

In all respects but one, though, Klein and his colleagues strove to replicate the protocols and criteria developed by Raimi and Braden in the two earlier Fordham studies. Indeed, they asked Messrs. Raimi and Braden to advise this project and provide insight into the challenges the reviewers faced in this round. Where they intentionally deviated from the 1998 and 2000 reviewsand did so with the encouragement and assent of Raimi and Bradenwas in weighting the four major criteria against which state standards are evaluated.

As Klein explains on page 9, the review team concluded that today the single most important consideration for statewide math standards is the selection (and accuracy) of their content coverage. Accordingly, content now counts for two-fifths of a state's grade, up from 25 percent in earlier evaluations. The other three criteria (clarity, mathematical reasoning, and the absence of "negative qualities") count for 20 percent each. If the content isn't there (or is wrong), our review team judged, such factors as clarity of expression cannot compensate. Such standards resemble clearly written recipes that use the wrong ingredients or combine them in the wrong proportions.

Glum Results

Though the rationale for changing the emphasis was not to punish states, only to hold their standards to higher expectations at a time when NCLB is itself raising the bar throughout K-12 education, the shift in criteria contributed to an overall lowering of state "grades." Indeed, as the reader will see in the following pages, the essential finding of this study is that the overwhelming majority of states today have sorely inadequate math standards. Their average grade is a "high D"and just six earn "honors" grades of A or B, three of each. Fifteen states receive Cs, 18 receive Ds and 11 receive Fs. (The District of Columbia is included in this review but Iowa is not because it has no statewide academic standards.)

Tucked away in these bleak findings is a ray of hope. Three statesCalifornia, Indiana, and Massachusetts have first-rate math standards, worthy of emulation. If they successfully align their other key policies (e.g., assessments, accountability, teacher preparation, textbooks, graduation requirements) with those fine standards, and if their schools and teachers succeed in instructing pupils in the skills and content specified in those standards, they can look forward to a top-notch K-12 math program and likely success in achieving the lofty goals of NCLB.

Yes, it's true. Central as standards are, getting them right is just the first element of a multi-part education reform strategy. Sound statewide academic standards are necessary but insufficient for the task at hand.

In this report, we evaluate that necessary element. Besides applying the criteria and rendering judgments on the standards, Klein and his team identified a set of widespread failings that weaken the math standards of many states. (These are described beginning on page 9 and crop up repeatedly in the state-specific report cards that begin on page 37.) They also trace the source of much of this weakness to states' unfortunate embrace of the advice of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM), particularly the guidance supplied in that organization's wrongheaded 1989 standards. (A later NCTM publication made partial amends, but these came too late for the standardsand the childrenof many states.)

Setting It Right

Klein also offers four recommendations to state policy makers and others wishing to strengthen their math standards. Most obviously, states should cease and desist from doing the misguided things that got them in trouble in the first place (such as excessive emphasis on calculators and manipulatives, too little attention to fractions and basic arithmetic algorithms). They suggest that states not be afraid to follow the lead of the District of Columbia, whose new superintendent announced in mid-autumn 2004 that he would simply jettison D.C.'s woeful standards and adopt the excellent schema already in use in Massachusetts. That some states already have fine standards proves that states can develop them if they try. But if, as I think, there's no meaningful difference between good math education in North Carolina and Oregon or between Vermont and Colorado, why shouldn't states avoid a lot of heavy lifting, swallow a wee bit of pride, and duplicate the standards of places that have already got it right?

Klein and his colleagues insist that states take arithmetic instruction seriously in the elementary grades and ensure that it is mastered before a student proceeds into high school. As Justin Torres remarks in his Memo to Policy Makers, "It says something deeply unsettling about the parlous state of math education in these United States that the arithmetic point must even be raisedbut it must." The recent results of two more international studies (PISA and TIMSS) make painfully clear once again that a vast swath of U.S. students cannot perform even simple arithmetic calculations. This ignorance has disastrous implications for any effort to train American students in the higher-level math skills needed to succeed in today's jobs. No wonder we're now outsourcing many of those jobs to lands with greater math prowessor importing foreign students to fill them on U.S. shores.

Klein makes one final recommendation that shouldn't need to be voiced but does: Make sure that future math standards are developed by people who know lots and lots of math, including a proper leavening of true mathematicians. One might suppose states would figure this out for themselves, but it seems that many instead turned over the writing of their math standards to people with a shaky grip of the discipline itself.

One hopes that state leaders will heed this advice. One hopes, especially, that many more states will fix their math standards before placing upon them the added weight of new high school reforms tightly joined to statewide academic standards, as President Bush is urging. Even now, one wonders whether the praiseworthy goals of NCLB can be attained if they're aligned with today's woeful math standardsand whether the frailties that were exposed yet again by 2004's international studies can be rectified unless the standards that drive our K-12 instructional system become world-class.

Many people deserve thanks for their roles in the creation of this report. David Klein did an awesome amount of high-quality workorganizational, intellectual, substantive, and editorial. Our hat is off to him, the more so for having persevered despite a painful personal loss this past year. We are grateful as well to Bastiaan J. Braams, Thomas Parker, William Quirk, Wilfried Schmid, and W. Stephen Wilson, Klein's colleagues in this review, as well as to Ralph Raimi and Lawrence Braden for excellent counsel born of long experience.

At the Fordham end, interns Carolyn Conner and Jess Castle supplied valuable research assistance and undertook the arduous task of gathering 50 sets of standards from websites and state departments of education. Emilia Ryan expertly designed this volume. And research director Justin Torres oversaw the whole venture from initial conceptualization through execution, revision, and editing, combining a practiced editor's touch with an analyst's rigor, a diplomat's people skills, and a manager's power of organization. Most of the time he even clung to his sense of humor!

Chester E. Finn, Jr.
President
Washington, D.C.
January 2005

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