Skip to main content
Add as a preferred source on Google

Education Policy Center at AIR Releases an Issue Brief Calling for Rigorous Student Performance Standards

  • 02/12/15

Washington, D.C. – The Education Policy Center at the American Institutes for Research (AIR) has released an issue brief citing the need for state policymakers to consider setting rigorous student performance standards to measure academic success and not focus primarily on content standards for teaching materials.

As the debate over Common Core State Standards intensifies, Aiming High: Setting Performance Standards for Student Success notes that, “Although the movement to adopt rigorous education content standards is evidence that states are motivated to raise academic expectations, current performance standards do not give accurate measures of student achievement. Without rigorous content and performance standards, we cannot adequately prepare students for the global marketplace.”

The issue brief cites a 2014 AIR study, International Benchmarking: State and National Education Performance Standards, which found that state performance standards vary widely, with many of them set low. Students in states with the lowest standards performed three to four grades levels below their peers in states with higher standards.

“If states adopt rigorous content standards but retain low performance standards, the number of students identified as “proficient” will give a false picture of the nation’s progress toward educational excellence in the global marketplace,” says the new brief written by Gary Phillips, an AIR vice president Institute Fellow, and Alicia Garcia, a senior researcher.

“States should use evidence-based methods of standard setting, such as the benchmark method, to create and adopt rigorous performance standards that prepare students to compete in the global marketplace,” the authors said.

About AIR
Established in 1946, with headquarters in Washington, D.C., the American Institutes for Research (AIR) is a nonpartisan, not-for-profit organization that conducts behavioral and social science research and delivers technical assistance both domestically and internationally in the areas of health, education, and workforce productivity. For more information, visit www.air.org.

Featured

  • Auburn University Debuts $224M STEM + Agricultural Sciences Complex

    Auburn University in Auburn, Ala., recently opened its new $224-million STEM + Agricultural Sciences Complex, the largest research construction project in the university’s history, according to university news. The facility measures more than 265,000 square feet and brings six departments from the College of Agriculture and College of Sciences and Mathematics together under one roof.

  • Phoenix High School Completes First Phase of Campus Renovations

    Metro Tech High School, part of the Phoenix Union High School District (PXU) in Phoenix, Ariz., recently announced the completion of the first stage of a campus renovation project, according to a news release. The school reopened a series of public-facing business operations spaces including credit union, daycare, floral, cosmetology, and culinary services. It also includes new CTE learning spaces for the school’s nursing assistant, pharmacy, and sports medicine programs.

  • Rethinking K-12 Schools as a Continuous Learning Experience

    Most students move through three or more separate facilities during their K-12 journey, yet the built environments they encounter at each stage have traditionally been designed in isolation, with little continuity in spatial language, learning philosophy, or physical resources. Each new school is a reset with different layouts, learning models, expectations, and ways of moving through a building. The next generation of school design is making the case that the first day of kindergarten and the last day of high school can and should feel connected through common support systems and infrastructure in the physical environment.

  • University of Kentucky Reopens Scovell Hall

    The University of Kentucky recently reopened Scovell Hall, part of the Martin-Gatton College of Agriculture, Food and Environment (CAFE), following comprehensive renovations to the 120-year-old facility in Lexington, Ky., according to a news release.