Collaborative members Arun Ramanathan, CEO of Pivot Learning Partners, and Rick Miller, Executive Director of the California Office to Reform Education, spoke as panelists at a conference hosted by the Policy Analysis for California Education (PACE) entitled, Implementing the Common Core in California: Reports from the Field. Ramanathan emphasized that adjusting to new standards is not a completely foreign process, but rather one that education leaders have simply not engaged with in recent years. He highlighted findings from Pivot’s recent report, Getting to the Core: How Early Implementers are Approaching the Common Core in California, which suggests that successful implementation is possible in districts that steadily integrate small pieces of the Common Core requirements and that have teachers that collaborate together on assessment methods. Ramanathan also observed that conversations about the Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) tend to be detached from the Common Core in many districts. He advised that the discussions should be in tandem with each other, especially since LCFF’s explicit commitment to equity can propel the Common Core to be seen as a vehicle to get there.
Rick Miller concluded the panel by expressing his concern about the limited amount of time districts have to implement the Common Core. He encouraged the use of collaboration, both as a state and a nation, to share best practices in this process.
A link to the conference video recordings can be found on PACE’s website.