State- and local-level mandates are currently being implemented to ensure strict compliance to the new national Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts (CCSS for ELA) and related assessments. These standards provide many potential opportunities to improve literacy education nationally and locally. However, the CCSS for ELA will…

This article addresses West Virginia's public schools, and their long struggle with student achievement levels in reading and math. Levels are significantly below the national average and there are poverty-based achievement gaps within the state. In 2013, a cross section of educators and education policy leaders from a range of experiences,…

In countless discussions over the past ten years with educators considering the adoption of the Quality Matters (QM) Rubric™, the most common question asked is, "Can you prove that applying the QM Rubric to an online course improves outcomes--retention, grades, learner satisfaction?" This question seems necessary, reasonable, and even…

Teacher performance evaluation represents a high stakes issue as evidenced by its pivotal emphasis in national and local education reform initiatives and federal policy levers. National, state, and local education leaders continue to experience unprecedented pressure to adopt standardized benchmarks to reflect and link student achievement data to…

The purpose of this article is to empower those interested in teaching students powerful and engaging social studies. Through the lens of Supreme Court simulations, this article provides educators with a viable, classroom-tested lesson plan to bring Problem-Based Learning into their classrooms. The specific aim of the lesson is to provide students…

This article examines those aspects of curriculum relating to programmes that have developed across the further and higher education divide. It analyses one particular spiritual direction formation programme that has transitioned from a vocational training programme in the further education mode to a post-graduate academic programme in a higher…

Nationally, the recent focus has been on adopting state-developed standards in English language arts (ELA) and mathematics that build toward college and career readiness. Of the states that have elected to adopt the Common Core State Standards (CCSS; National Governors Association, Council of Chief State School Officers, 2012), states either (a)…

Most current approaches to improving teaching and learning in American public schools rely on either market pressures or bureaucratic controls to leverage performance. In this article, however, authors Joshua Glazer and Donald Peurach examine occupational control as a third approach, whereby the internalization of norms, technical language, and…

Existing literature is polarized and primarily conceptual on the topic of student-customer orientation. Research into this phenomenon has failed to realize that higher education as such consists of several different educational experiences and has therefore addressed and studied the issue at too general a level, i.e. at the level of the higher…

Continual assessment of student understanding is a crucial aspect of teaching. The adoption of the Common Core State Standards for Mathematics (CCSSM) represents raised expectations for the level and depth of mathematical understanding that is expected of our students. But new standards also mean new tests. What those tests will be like is of…

This paper examines Plato's Philosophy of Education asking what he would say about the current Common Core initiative which is to better help students to become college and career ready. Plato would be in favor of the common core in as much as the standards are tied to specific skills needed in various career jobs as he was a proponent of…

In 2015, leaders within Achieve's Competency-Based Pathways State Partnership set out to more clearly understand the potential of learning progressions research to transform instructional practice and what is being done to translate that research into training and tools for educators. After a series of conversations with experts in the learning…

As science teacher educators attempt to prepare teachers to underscore the aims of the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS Lead States, 2013) alongside the Common Core State Standards for Mathematics (NGAC and CCSSO, 2010), they must pay close attention to the intersection of these two content areas. To address this challenge, the authors (a…

As of January 2012, 45 states and the District of Columbia have adopted the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) in English language arts and mathematics developed through the leadership of the National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers. Released in June 2010, these voluntary standards outline the knowledge and…

In this article, the author discusses how to implement the Common Core State Standards in the classroom. She presents examples and activities that will leave teachers feeling "rosy" about tackling the new standards. She breaks down important benchmarks and shows how other teachers are doing the Core--and loving it!