Now that the excitement of being part of the new Consortia formed around the Common Core State Standards has begun to wear off, some of the states that are participating are beginning to realize they may not be ready to administer the new high-tech online assessments these Consortia are designing.
Despite the new initiative by President Obama and the FCC, called ConnectED, to improve broadband Internet connectivity over the next 5 years, some states have already begun to pull out of the Consortium they joined, or are planning on postponing their rollout of the new assessments.
In fact, one of the biggest topics at this year’s ISTE conference (International Society for Technology for Education) was how much work still needed to be done to prepare school districts’ technology infrastructure for the new online assessments and learning tools. Computer hardware varies from district to district, even between schools within a district. Some schools have the same broadband Internet connection standard for a household – except 2000 students share it.
Certain states like Texas and Georgia are choosing to go it alone, developing their own Common Core-based curriculum and assessments, minus the timeline dictated by a multi-state consortium.
Yes, there have been bumps in the road for the consortia but it’s important to recognize that they’re still making progress. With the shared goal of providing innovative, high-tech assessments they continue to build more opportunities for their students to achieve college and career readiness.
[Header image from American School's March 2011 Issue]
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