Who Sets the Standards?

A policy brief in Education Week reports that two national organizations coordinating a push for common academic standards have named the 29 people who are deciding what math and language arts skills students will need to know and when. All but 4 states have signed on. The list of those who will write the standards is dominated by three organizations: the Washington-based Achieve Inc., which works on college- and career readiness; the New York City-based College Board, which sponsors the SAT; and ACT Inc., the Iowa City, Iowa-based organization that administers the college-entrance test of that name. The article doesn't indicate that teachers will be a part of the process. The questions that occur to me are "what counts as knowledge?" and "whose knowledge is of most worth?"