Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools to adopt new academic standards

Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools will implement new academic standards by the 2012-13 school year.

The school board met on Thursday to discuss the status of the project, which the state board of education passed in June 2010.

The Common Core State Standards and N.C. Essential Standards program is a statewide effort to equip K-12 students with the skills necessary for college, work and competition with the international community.

The district is now working toward preparing teachers to change to the new curriculum.

Mia Day Burroughs, vice chairwoman of the board, said N.C. districts will be using federal money from the Race to the Top grant, which provided about $400 million to the state, to fund the effort.

The Chapel Hill-Carrboro School district received $533,792 from the grant.

The curricula for English, language arts and mathematics will be restructured to fit the new standards.

New English standards aim to help students improve logic, research, vocabulary and reading skills, according to the Common Core website.

Colin Batten, principal at Carrboro High School, said the new standards are expected to improve literacy and to promote higher order thinking skills.

Batten said he expects the transition to the new standards to go smoothly.

Carrboro High School has been exploring the new standards well in advance of implementation to prepare teachers, Batten said.

Teachers and principals attended summer-long training sessions last summer and will participate in similar sessions next summer to prepare for the change, said Rodney Trice, executive director of curriculum and instruction.

“Teachers and principals are very motivated about the new program,” he said.

A third of the teachers have attended the sessions thus far.

“Teachers have to get used to the new system. This is a multi-year process,” he said.

Jamezetta Bedford, chair-woman of the school board, said in an email that the time left before starting the project may be an issue.

“Being able to give both faculty and students additional time on topic/study is always a big issue,” Bedford said. “I think that will be the case with this new curriculum.”

She said a central aim of the national Common Core standards is to fix the international achievement gap.

“We not only have a minority achievement gap,” she said. “We have a global achievement gap as our children are compared to those in other nations.”

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