New Common Core standards are right for California

It is perhaps the worst-kept secret in public education: Too many students leave school with a diploma in their hands, but without the knowledge in their heads they need to start college or pursue a meaningful career.

We pay a steep price for the skills gap. More than 72 percent of our graduating students go to postsecondary institutions, but many are funneled into remedial, noncredit classes. Employers spend time and money training new workers. But it's students who suffer most, finding themselves unprepared for the challenging world outside the classroom. The Common Core State Standards represent a big part of what California - and 44 other states - are doing to address the problem.

But adopting the standards, as the State Board of Education did in 2010, was the easy part. The challenge is bringing these standards to life in our schools, work that will require significant effort from every part of our education system - and key decisions from everyone from the statehouse to the schoolhouse. Academic content standards are simply a list of the things we want students to know and be able to do, like drawing the yard lines on a football field. We put the goal line in the right place, at career and college readiness. And we've set out, step by step, the progress each student needs to make in each grade and subject to get there.

That's no small achievement. Before 1997, California had no grade-by-grade standards. A student moving from one school to another might find little in common between the old class and the new. The 1997 standards represented real progress at the time, but we've learned a lot since then.

The former standards were a mile wide and an inch deep. The list of things we asked students to learn was so long, important topics got superficial treatment at best. What was covered one year didn't necessarily build toward what came next.

The Common Core standards change all that, focusing on key knowledge students need in a logical sequence. Fourth-grade math, for example, becomes a master class in fractions. Why fractions? They're the key to unlocking the language of algebra. Algebra, in turn, is the gateway to probability, statistics and higher mathematics.

The new standards for reading and writing take a similar, staircase approach through the grades, with students asked to gradually understand more and more challenging texts, and compose arguments based on evidence and research. Students will write less about their feelings, and more about what they can prove - better preparation for both college term papers and reports to the boss.

No one is more crucial to this work than teachers, who will need time and training to replace the old emphasis on rote memorization with new lessons that include student ability to analyze, evaluate, derive and model concepts.

Schools will need new instructional materials. Common Core wisely leaves curriculum development to the states and districts, including the design of curriculum frameworks that provide research-based approaches for instruction. School districts will determine their own priorities and adopt materials suiting their needs.

The right tests are vital as well. Multiple-choice assessments were never designed to measure the deeper learning called for by the Common Core, so we must transition to ones that measure learning in new ways. The new, computer-adaptive tests will include performance tasks and questions that require extended responses. No doubt it will take our students time to learn these new skills, so it's important to remember that test results are meant to provide information about student progress, not a measure of their potential.

Accountability systems will also need to change. California's was designed for an old model based solely on test scores. We must bring this system up to date, combining student achievement with other measures of success, including graduation rates, chronic absence, suspensions and college and career readiness.

Of course money is an issue. This year's state budget sets aside $1.25 billion for school districts to put these new standards in place. The overhaul of our school finance system through the new local control funding formula will give districts unprecedented flexibility about how to allocate resources, with additional funds set aside to help students most in need.

The task list is long and the challenges are real. Meeting them will take persistence, patience and support from parents and the public. But moving forward is California's best hope for making sure all children - no matter where they come from or where they live - receive the world-class education they deserve.

Michael W. Kirst, professor emeritus at Stanford University, is president of the State Board of Education. To comment, go to www.sfgate.com/chronicle/submissions/#1.