Many States Adopt National Standards for Their Schools
This is a step in the right direction. But two things:
1. History and Literature standards are a touchy subject. While it’s perfectly fine to say that a student must be familiar with the American Constitution and know how to analyze an author’s work, it’s not okay to tell states that students must understand X interpretation of history or read Y authors (well, maybe there are some important authors to which students should be exposed, but it’s highly subjective and no one will ever agree on which authors are “valuable” for students).
2. The standards must be rigorous. WestEd’s done some pretty interesting work on the subject. I’d be interested in reading it.
