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As loud opposition to Louisiana’s ongoing implementation of Common Core State Standards and related assessments continues, the Terrebonne Parish School District is working to finalize the curriculum it will use to teach in line with the nationalized learning benchmarks.
Terrebonne administrators say the autonomy they have in determining what textbooks and related materials teachers will use to educate local students underscores their long-professed position that CCSS does not mandate inclusion of specific materials inside the classroom. They also stress that committees of district teachers ultimately have the most sway in the curriculum-selection process.
“We the district decides what curriculum (to use),” Assistant Superintendent Carol Davis said. “It’s always been that way.”
Louisiana in 2010 via the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education became one of 45 states to adopt the standards, which aim to align student output on a national level with uniform knowledge and skills benchmarks. Proponents claim CCSS will improve student learning while building a competent workforce for the future. Rigorous, elevated expectations will drive a learning renaissance, they say.
Opponents decry the standards as a federally imposed one-size-fits-all approach that mutes educational needs specific to their communities – the National Governors Association crafted the benchmarks, and states were granted federal money in part for adopting them. They express fear that inappropriate materials will infiltrate the classroom and concern that local educators have lost flexibility in what they can teach.
The chasm crosses partisan lines, exemplified by the Louisiana Association of Business and Industry’s fervent support cast against Gov. Bobby Jindal’s sudden condemnation of CCSS. It has spilled into parish school board meetings, where opponents regularly criticize the state’s adoption of the standards and where a resolution by Terrebonne board member Debi Benoit to request the state to scrap the reform was scheduled for a vote Tuesday night.
Consensus, though, emerges in conversation about how the standards have been implemented in Louisiana. Critics and proponents agree the rollout has been unpredictable, which has strained the educational ecosystem: students, parents, teachers and administrators.
Terrebonne scrambled to devise its own lesson plans and materials to align with Common Core for the current school year, Davis said. Now administrators say that as learning materials are adopted, the onus on teachers will stabilize and some of their stresses, inevitably passed along to students, should be alleviated.
“We were scrambling last year,” Davis said. “We learned a lot. … This year we want all of our teachers to have everything they need.”
The district relies on the advice of several teacher-led committees and curriculum specialists to review potential classroom materials and suggest the best. Administrators typically defer to teachers’ expertise, Davis said.
For math, Terrebonne in 2014-15 will use Pearson enVisionMATH for kindergarten through second grade and Eureka Math for third through eighth grade and algebra I.
The district is still in the process of choosing curriculum for other high-school math classes, as Eureka has not yet been completed for geometry or algebra II.
Geri Schexnayder, the district’s math curriculum specialist, said the district will inform teachers of those classes to revert to their lesson plans from the current year, which they can supplement with Common Core-aligned workbooks. “Eureka Math is my goal for those two subjects, but we have a year of transition to wait, only because it’s not ready,” she said.
Teachers chose enVision for K-2 prior to Eureka’s endorsement by the state, Schexnayder said.
“We’ve already purchased those materials, so we’re not forcing Eureka (a free curriculum) on K-2, but anything that is Eureka Math, we’re going to train K-2 and we’re going to make sure those teachers know those good strategies that work,” Schexnayder said. Teachers have the freedom to draw from Eureka and use some of the teaching tactics in conjunction with enVision without it being a conflict, Schexnayder said.
For ELA, Terrebonne will use Pearson Reading Street for kindergarten through fifth grade and supplement it with additional materials – such as an enhanced focus on phonics – pulled from units offered through the state. Students in sixth grade through English IV will be taught from Holt McDougal Literature Series 2012.
Terrebonne has rejected some materials suggested by the state because they could be perceived to subvert community principles, Davis said.
“We’re looking at those units, but a lot of the reading material and novels they have don’t fit the needs our community and our kids,” Davis said. “One of the units had the book, a wonderful book, ‘The Witch of Blackbird Pond,’ a Newberry Award winner. But right now there’s so much misunderstanding with Common Core, I wouldn’t want to use that novel because the word ‘witch.’ You don’t want people to get caught up and think, ‘This is Common Core – witchcraft.’”
The district also rejected a vendor with “a wonderful product, very aligned to Common Core,” on the grounds some of the reading material would not meet students’ “emotional” needs, Davis said. “We have those choices. We make those choices.”
The state introduced a three-tier system of classifying resources in terms of alignment with Common Core. Tier 1 is the material most highly recommended.
The Eureka programming – crafted at by Louisiana State University researchers – is in Tier 1 for kindergarten through 12-grade instruction. It is the only instructional material for math to reach Louisiana’s top threshold.
In English and language arts, the HMD Literature Series is a Tier-3 curriculum, and Pearson Reading Street has not been reviewed.
Superintendent Philip Martin at a board meeting last month intimated the constant assault on officials who stand behind Common Core is an affront to them, as it assumes they don’t care about the welfare of students in the system. Martin and Davis both have grandchildren educated in the Terrebonne School District.
“I have five grandkids that are being instructed with Common Core,” Davis said. “I would have nothing that I thought would hurt them or go against our highly Christian values. I wouldn’t allow it. Mr. Martin, he wouldn’t allow it. We’re Christian. Anything that’s going to interfere with any of that, we would not allow that.”
Linzey Foret teaches world geography to students at H.L. Bourgeois High School. The Terrebonne School District is finalizing reading, writing and mathematics curriculum for 2014-15.
