Raising expectations
In a recent Ed Week editorial Marc Tucker at the National Center on Education and the Economy argues that the Common Core standards offer a way out of a twenty-year trend of declining expectations for students. He points to the notions of grade inflation and fewer hours of study per college course as evidence for these declining expectations, noting that students now receive credit for coursework that would have been deemed sub-standard twenty years ago. I find those points entirely valid. But in order for the Common Core—or any other set of statements regarding what students should know and be able to do as a result of schooling—to contribute to a solution we first need to examine the motivational system in which such a thing operates. By “motivational system” I mean the processes by which we attempt to induce behavior in teachers and students such that it moves us towards a better state. The motivational system in schools is pretty straightforward: students take s...