This briefing paper is the first in a series published by the Charter Schools Development Center about charter school accountability. It addresses one of the most difficult, important tasks which charter school developers must undertake: developing clear, measurable performance standards for their students. This is the fourth brief published by the Center to advise charter school developers, operators, charter-granting agencies, and other concerned parties to better understand California's charter school reform efforts. While tailored to address California's charter schools, many of the fundamental concepts will be of interest to readers in every state with charter legislation and schools.

 California's Charter Act clearly states that charter school developers must include measurable "pupil outcomes" as a required element of their charters. However, many charter developers and operators are finding it extremely challenging, at times overwhelming, to determine what those pupil outcomes will look like in practice. This brief suggests how schools can reconcile standards recommendations and related assessment requirements from the national, state, district, and school levels to create realistic, appropriate performance outcomes for their students.

 Much of the information in this brief is topical. Readers should check the Center's website at www.cacharterschools.org and the federal charter school website at www.uscharterschools.org to stay updated.

 Future briefs will address other crucial accountability topics, such as aligning student performance standards with curriculum and assessment, school operations elements including governance and finance, and charter renewal.

Goals 2000...statewide curriculum frameworks...district-level content and performance standards...school-based student outcomes...classroom skills...Where to begin in this maze of standards? The more public attention that school reform gets, the greater the number of voices and opinions as to what today's students should know and be able to do.

As a charter school developer or operator, how does one make sense of the myriad, multi-level outcomes and standards? California's Charter Schools Act (enacted 1992, revised 1996) lists "measurable pupil outcomes" as a required element of charter petitions.¹ There is thus a clear, legal expectation that charter school developers will articulate assessable performance standards for the students participating in their programs. But what does this mean exactly? What are "standards" and "outcomes?" Do charter school operators have complete freedom to determine their own home-grown standards as they see fit for the population of students they are serving, or must they pay attention to the other outside voices in this conversation?

There is a clear, legal expectation that charter school developers will articulate assessable performance standards for the students participating in their programs.

 Before going any further, it is important to clarify some terms. Like much of the vocabulary in the field of Education, standards and outcomes mean different things to different people. Some people define them as sweeping, general targets of necessary qualities to be found in an "educated person in the 21st century," and others define them according to extremely narrow, content-specific skills. Rather than getting hung up on semantics, charter school developers and operators should ask key underlying questions and define their terms accordingly.

Creating Standards at the School Level: Process Overview

 Since developing pupil outcomes is legally required by the Charter Schools Act, California charter school developers should begin the process of developing student performance standards at a very early stage in their charter development process. Indeed, student performance outcomes should drive the educational program of the school. As is discussed below, the standards that are created will directly influence the school„s curriculum and assessment measures.

 Existing charter school operators, if they have not developed school-based standards, should begin the process immediately, especially if they will soon be undergoing renewal. Even if they already have a list of student outcomes, current operators should take a closer, more critical look at their list. Many early charter documents contain only a vague, incomplete description of qualities the school is looking for in its graduates, instead of a thorough, benchmarked list of specific skills and outcomes to which students will be held accountable. Existing charter schools may need to rewrite the pupil outcomes section of their charter or to develop side agreements with the district regarding student performance standards.

 Whether developing student outcomes for the first time or reviewing previous ones, the process for developing standards at the school level includes four key steps.

 Step 1: The charter school standards team reviews the school„s mission to reflect on what its purpose is, whom it hopes to serve, and what its expectations for those students are.

 Step 2: The team develops a list of exit outcomes, or "graduation standards," of those qualities and skills it feels its graduates should achieve.

 Step 3: The team creates a list of interim skills and "benchmark" outcomes which allow the students to demonstrate their progress in attaining the exit standards.

 Step 4: Teachers develop lists of specific academic skills which students will demonstrate in each subject area and class.

 Steps 1 and 2 (reviewing mission and developing exit outcomes) should be done "in a vacuum," without consulting any outside standards documents. During steps 3 and 4 (developing benchmark and classroom-level skills), charter developers should consult as many standards documents as possible to help inform their work. As will be discussed in more depth below, in California, state-level standards will be the most important outside documents to consult. One reason is that California charter schools are legally required to meet the state standards. Further, charter students will have to take the state test, which is designed to assess the state standards.

STEP 1: Beginning with the Mission

The best way to begin the standards-setting process is by reviewing the charter school's mission. Always have at the forefront of the discussion, "Who are we as a school?" "What type of students do we serve or hope to serve?" and "What do we expect from our students?" An equally important question to consider is "What don't we expect from our students?" For existing schools, it is often helpful to use examples of current students and to focus on actual school or classroom situations and realistic "what ifs." As you engage in this discussion, ensure that everyone involved has his or her heart in essentially the same place about what kind of a school it is and what they hope their students will walk out of the school knowing and achieving.

Know who you are first, then create and find standards to match and elaborate that vision.

 Developing standards for one's students is perhaps one of the hardest tasks in which a charter school can engage. It forces the school to articulate who they are, what they believe in, and how they feel their students can best learn. Getting all of the involved parties on the same page about these questions may be tough enough. Even if the charter school group is of one mind, expressing their beliefs in a coherent, understandable, specific fashion is extremely difficult. However, having engaged in this process, the school will have laid a solid foundation that will provide a firm base as they revisit these questions later. Any healthy school will evolve over time, modifying its standards and other educational program elements to best meet the needs of the students they are serving. Having a clear vision from the outset will only make this process go more smoothly in the future.

 A strong recommendation would be to begin the standards developing process "in a vacuum," without consulting any other standards documents. It is all too easy to begin this process by grabbing as many outside standards documents as possible, reading through them all and trying to figure out where your particular school fits in. In fact, the opposite process is more authentic and will ultimately have more staff, parent, and student buy-in: Know who you are first, then create and find standards to match and elaborate that vision.

 STEP 2: Developing Exit Outcomes

 Within the context of the charter school„s mission, the first essential question is, "What should our students understand and be able to do?"² Based upon their vision of education, the school should begin by developing a list of qualities and skills they would like graduates of their program to have and be able to demonstrate. Some schools refer to these as "exit outcomes," others as "graduation standards."

 This level of standards and outcomes tends to be more general and encompassing. For example, a Boston high school has as one of its exit outcomes, "Our students will demonstrate academic competence in math, humanities, science, and technology."³ A California charter middle school has participation in community service as one of its graduation standards.⁴ According to one standards expert,

 Meaningful [exit] outcomes are broad enough to encompass smaller skills, but narrow enough to be specific and clear. At their best, outcomes emphasize useful knowledge and complex performances benchmarked against international academic standards and against the work-ready skills desired by employers....Ideally, the outcomes will call for critical thinking and actual application of learning, and combine traditional academic outcomes with communication and lifelong learning competencies.⁵

 How these overall outcomes and standards become specifically defined within the school program/curriculum and how students are assessed to determine whether they have the knowledge and can demonstrate the required skills become lively topics of debate among school stakeholders as the school's exit outcomes get played out concretely. Because the waters can become murky in the day-to-day extrapolation, it is all the more important to have a clear set of school exit standards laid out from the outset.

STEP 3: Creating Benchmarks of Student Progress

 Once the charter school standards development team has taken some first, concrete steps on their own towards articulating what skills and experiences they are looking for in their students, they should then consult as many outside sources as appropriate and necessary, including national, state, and district standards. As mentioned previously, in California, the state standards will be the critical ones to consider. Outside standards documents will provide ideas to expand and refine the school's exit outcomes, and they can provide suggestions for more specific level outcomes, such as benchmark standards and classroom-level outcomes.

 After the charter school develops its overarching exit outcomes, it will need to benchmark these standards to determine whether the students are making progress in achieving them. The next key question becomes, "How will we know if our students are attaining the knowledge and skills we would like them to have? Are there some interim skills we can define and some demonstrations we can have them perform so that we will know when they are ready to leave here?" It is at this point that more traditional schools decide what the requirements will be to pass from one grade into the next. Schools with less traditional groupings or individual student education plans decide what their students will need to understand and to be able to do in order to pass from one skill level to the next.

STEP 4: Articulating Content Area and Classroom-Level Skills

 After creating an overall structure of exit outcomes and interim standards that benchmark student progress, the school can flesh out the more specific content area and classroom-level skills. The underlying questions now become, "What do our student outcomes mean specifically, in our educational program and curriculum?" A school may push itself to answer more specifically, "What does it mean to be 'academically competent' in math, humanities, science, etc.?" For example, a science teacher may want to articulate what particular skills students will need in her biology, chemistry, and environmental science classes. A school with a community service standard may ask itself, "What sort of participation in the community will we require of our students?"

 There are an overwhelming number of content and performance standards developed in the core academic areas by state, district, and private groups.⁶ California charter school developers should take a close look at current state-level standards drafts and documents when developing their classroom-level skills, just as they did when developing their benchmark standards. Many existing content-based standards have come under attack for being culturally-biased, especially in the humanities fields (language arts, social science/history, the arts). However, many of them provide a helpful means to concretely describe what knowledge and skills students should have in different academic areas.

 Unfortunately, there are fewer materials developed for such "non-core" subjects as world languages, community service learning, physical education, and the arts. Furthermore, schools that choose a less departmentalized, more interdisciplinary curriculum may not want to break their classroom-level skills into what may be perceived as artificially-imposed categories and boundaries. Nonetheless, they may still find content-based standards to be a helpful tool in determining which subject-specific skills they are weaving together and often perhaps overlapping.

Types of Standards: Content-Based and Performance-Based

 As charter school operators engage in the rich process of developing their three levels of standards - exit, benchmark, and classroom level - what kind of standards to develop becomes a key issue. Most people differentiate the type of standard according to two definitions, content-based standards and performance- (or outcome-) based standards. School staff may find themselves asking, "When should we focus on 'what students should understand or know' (i.e. content-based standards), and when should we focus on 'what students are able to demonstrate and do' (i.e. performance-based standards)?" What a student knows and how he or she demonstrates that knowledge are so closely linked that content- and performance-based standards can be viewed as two sides of the same coin.

 Some schools develop extensive lists of exit outcomes that are largely content-based. Their graduates are required to have read a certain type and list of literary works, to do a writing sample of a set length, or to do a research project on pre-determined scientific topics. Other schools focus more on performance-based exit criteria, with flexibility in the content that may be used to demonstrate the desired skills. For example, many schools list "critical thinking" and "communication" skills among their desired student outcomes. Students may demonstrate their critical thinking skills by analyzing a math problem or poem, writing an opinion paper about a topical issue, preparing and performing a public debate in social studies class, etc.

 Still other schools develop their standards at all levels by blending both content and performance in various ways. For example, a school espousing this approach may require as part of its benchmark standards that its students master certain content skills, i.e. basic algebra by the end of ninth grade. At the same time , it may allow the same students to demonstrate their communication skills by the end of ninth grade with evidence from various classes and educational experiences, such as giving a presentation describing their science projects or their school-to-career internships.

Aligning Standards, Curriculum, and Assessment

Determining what its students should understand and be able to do is just the first step a charter school must take in developing its educational program. Once it has developed its standards at the different levels discussed above, the school developers then need to create a curriculum that is an appropriate vehicle for teaching these standards, and an assessment system that accurately and effectively determines whether the students are achieving them. Again, using essential questions, the process becomes:

1) "What do we want our students to understand and be able to do (standards)?"

2) "How can we best teach these things to our students - using what educational means or vehicle (curriculum)?" and

3) "How will we know whether our students have learned these skills and are able to do these things (assessment)?"

All three elements - standards, curriculum, and assessment - must be closely aligned in order for the school to have a healthy, coherent educational program. A standard is of little value if it cannot be measured/assessed; curriculum that does not provide an effective way of teaching the standards will not engage the students or motivate them to learn, and an assessment system that is detached and does not accurately reflect what the students are learning will not truly measure student growth. No matter how excellent the standards and outcomes are that a school develops, they are only as valuable as the greater context of which they are a part. While an important component of a school's educational program in of themselves, standards have an even more powerful "ripple effect," backwashing into curriculum and assessment.

 Making Sense of National, State, District, and Local Standards

 Developing school-based standards is an overwhelming task. Many charter school developers and operators would be happy to go home and take a nap after having completed that experience, even before contemplating aligning their standards with the rest of their educational program. However, hammering out standards on the school level is only one, albeit complex, layer of the cake. In addition to the multitude of voices being heard in the school community around standards, charter schools must also listen to those who are concerned with district, state, and national level standards.

 How closely do charter school developers and operators need to pay attention to those other voices? Can they ignore the local standards that non-charter schools in their district are required to demonstrate? Can they graciously receive the volumes of state-level curriculum frameworks and academic standards, then let them gather dust on their shelves, or must they follow them verbatim? What is happening with Goals 2000 and other national level standards these days? Will charter schools be held accountable to them?

National-Level Standards and Assessment

 In 1990, President Bush announced "America 2000," a call for national education standards. President Clinton modified Bush's plan and introduced "Goals 2000" in 1993. Since the announcement of these federal initiatives, much has been misunderstood about what national education standards are and what schools are accountable for.

 Goals 2000 presents a set of voluntary national standards that are meant to inform the work that states are doing in developing their own standards; they are not federally mandated. National academic standards have been developed or are currently being developed in mathematics, the arts, science, history, civics and government, geography, economics, and foreign languages by committees of teachers and scholars in such groups as the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics and the National Geographic Society.

 In his State of the Union Address in February 1997, Clinton proposed a voluntary national test that will assess reading in grade 4 and math in grade 8. Clinton proposed this test as a means of ensuring that all of America's children "master the basics," which for him means that every 4th grader should be able to read independently, and every 8th grader should know algebra. A new national test will be developed that is based upon the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) for the reading component and upon the Third International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) for math. The test items for both the reading and math tests will be based on the content frameworks that were developed for the NAEP. An important distinction about the new test is that it will report individual student scores, which NAEP and TIMSS do not. The intent of the new national test is to allow students, parents, and teachers to compare individual student performance to national and international standards. Apparently, there will be no alignment of the new national test with the national academic standards mentioned previously.

 ...to date there are no nationally-mandated standards or assessments that charter schools must take into account while developing their own standards and student outcomes.

 The test is due to be administered in March 1999. Once again, participation in the test is voluntary, not mandatory. To date, seven states have chosen to participate, as well as several districts. While California is not on the state volunteer list, two California districts, Fresno and Long Beach, have opted to give the national test a try. (Los Angeles recently pulled out after discovering that the reading test will only be given in English, which will hinder the large numbers of limited English proficient students in that district.)⁷ There is a federal website which provides detailed information and updates regarding the national test.⁸

 To sum up, while some states have used the national academic standards to inform the development of their own state-level standards, and some states are having their students take the national test, to date there are no nationally-mandated standards or assessments that charter schools must take into account while developing their own standards and student outcomes. Charter school developers and operators may want to consult the national standards, however, as a valuable resource of ideas about specific subject area standards from experts in the field.

California State-Level Standards and Assessments

 While charter schools may effectively ignore national-level standards at this time if they so choose, charter school operators and developers in California should pay close attention to the more directed efforts at standards and assessment that are currently underway by groups at the state level. Although California charter schools were created to be highly independent entities, with great freedom to develop their own innovative educational programs, they were not given a carte blanche when it comes to standards and assessment. The California Charter Schools Act explicitly states that charter schools "shall meet the statewide performance standards and conduct the pupil assessments...."⁹ The intent of this legislation was to ensure that there would be a common comparison measure to assess student performance in charter and non-charter schools in the state.

 The California Charter Schools Act explicitly states that charter schools "shall meet the statewide performance standards and conduct the pupil assessments...."

 What does this phrase mean exactly? The pupil assessment part is fairly straightforward. Whatever statewide assessment measure California decides to use, charter schools must also administer this state test to their students.

Waiting for a New State Test

 Originally, charter school operators were required to administer the California Learning Assessment System (CLAS), an assessment test developed in alignment with the state curriculum frameworks. When CLAS was eliminated in 1994, charter schools and other public schools were left without a statewide assessment program. As an interim measure developed in 1995, districts were encouraged to participate in a state pupil testing incentive program whereby they would get $5 per student to administer a basic academic skills achievement test of their choice (chosen from a selected list of approximately thirty State Board-approved instruments). Several charter schools in California chose to participate in this program.

 There is still no new state test to date. However, plans for developing one are currently underway. Assembly Bill 265, which passed in October 1995, contains extensive language describing the test's purpose and objectives. The new state assessment will be administered to students in grades 4, 5, 8, and 10 in the core academic areas. First and foremost, the purpose of the new testing program is to provide information on the academic status and progress of individual students to those students, their parents, and their teachers. In addition to reporting individual student results, the new state assessment will also be used to assess the academic achievement of schools, school districts, and the California education system as a whole. The test will be carefully monitored to ensure that it is not culturally or racially biased and that it includes a balance of assessment instruments, such as multiple-choice questions and written essays. As will shortly be discussed, the new state test must align with the new state content and performance standards which are currently being developed.

 Mandatory Interim State Test

 In order to fill the void while waiting for the new state test, the Legislature recently passed a bill (SB 376) on September 13, 1997 mandating another interim statewide assessment, the Standardized Testing and Reporting (STAR) program, to replace the previous testing incentive program. At the November 14, 1997 State Board of Education meeting, the Board chose the Stanford Achievement Test (Ninth Edition, Form T), published by Harcourt Brace, as the test to be used for STAR. All schools, including charter schools, will be required to administer this test to students in grades 2-11 by May 15 (with two make-up days no later than May 25) of each fiscal year, beginning in 1997-98.  Students in grades 2-8 will be tested in reading, writing, spelling, and mathematics. Students in grades 9-11 will be tested in reading, writing, mathematics, science, and history-social science.

Special needs students may be exempt from taking STAR if their Individualized Education Plan dictates the exemption. At the option of the district, limited English proficient (LEP) students in grades 2-11 may be allowed to take a second achievement test in their primary language. If they have only recently enrolled in a California public school (within the past twelve months), LEP students in these grades are required to take both the Stanford Achievement Test in English and a test in their first language if such a test is available. Individual student test scores will be reported to the student's parent or guardian by June 30 of each year and will go in the student's school records (only to be released with parental permission). Grade-level, school-level, district-level, and state-level results of STAR will also be made available on the Internet by June 30.

 The State Board of Education is authorized to administer the STAR test for an indefinite number of academic years, based upon available funding, until the development of a new, more "permanent" statewide assessment that will be closely aligned with state-level academic standards. As addressed below, these standards are currently being developed. Until the new content and performance standards are adopted by the State Board of Education, the law prohibits the development of a statewide assessment test in those curriculum areas.

 While on the one hand it is commendable to develop clear standards first, before creating a matching assessment, it is foolish not to have members of the assessment committee participating in the conversations and efforts of the standards committee. Since the law forces the standards commission and the test development group to work subsequently and separately, one can only hope that the standards and the measure used to assess them will align. The State Board of Education must approve both the new standards and the new test, so hopefully they will monitor their alignment carefully.

History and Future of California's State Standards and Assessments

Unlike the language in the Charter Schools Act that requires charter schools to administer the state pupil assessment, the phrase, "charter schools shall meet the statewide performance standards," is much more vague and open-ended. How exactly does a charter school meet state standards? What does this mean? Firstly, what are the state standards?

Between 1987-1992, special committees of content-area educators, sponsored by the California Department of Education, developed the California state "curriculum frameworks," which were generalized content-based standards for grades kindergarten through 12 in English-language arts, mathematics, history-social science, physical education, and the arts. While the curriculum frameworks were widely used and seemed to be highly regarded, Assembly Bill 265 (October 1995) created the Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards to develop statewide standards, kindergarten - grade 12, in the core curriculum areas of reading, writing, mathematics, history-social science, and science. According to Scott Hill, Director of the Commission, legislators decided to eliminate CLAS and to develop new standards because "CLAS was assessment-driven, a backdoor into what was taught." Instead, they wanted to reach agreement first about what ought to be taught, then develop a test that aligned.¹⁰ Interestingly, not everyone agrees with Hill's analysis; they point out that CLAS was designed to be aligned with the curriculum frameworks.

Rather than being composed largely of educators (as were the curriculum framework teams), the new state standards Commission was largely appointed by the Governor and consists of members of the education, business, and law communities. Furthermore, rather than being only content-based standards, these new state standards purport to contain both content and performance standards, with performance standards being a demonstration of the content standards. In the language of the bill:

"Content standards" means the specific academic knowledge, skills, and abilities that all public schools in this state are expected to teach and all pupils are expected to learn in each of the core curriculum areas at each grade level tested. "Performance standards" are standards that define various levels of competence at each grade level in each of the curriculum areas for which content standards are established. Performance standards gauge the degree to which a student has met the content standards and the degree to which a school or school district has met the content standards.

 Some of the language of AB 265 hints at the controversy caused by certain test items on the CLAS. For example, part of the bill specifically states that the new list of skills students will need to acquire "shall not include personal behavioral standards or skills, including, but not limited to, honesty, sociability, ethics, or self-esteem." Hill emphasizes that the primary focus of the new content and performance standards are rigorous, core academic skills, not personal skills or even school-to-career focused skills.¹¹ (Although the Commission did consider what students would need to know in the working world after finishing school.)

 With the development of new state academic standards, the role and fate of the existing state curriculum frameworks is unclear. Much of the confusion between the curriculum frameworks and new academic standards stems from differing views of their purposes. Some argue that the new academic standards are more specific descriptions of what students should know, while the existing frameworks provide only a general guideline. Others argue that the curriculum frameworks can potentially "flesh out" the academic standards, providing more specific curricular and instructional ideas of how to teach what students should know. Still others argue that the curriculum frameworks and academic standards serve the same purpose and that having both is redundant, or even that they are at odds with one another. At the October 1997 California State Board of Education meeting, State Superintendent Delaine Eastin argued that the curriculum frameworks and new content standards cannot be reconciled, especially in math. She claimed that the frameworks are "old school," based on isolated concepts in each grade level, whereas the new content standards (which she is helping to develop, as a member of the Commission) are more integrated along thematic "strands."

 The law dictates that the new statewide assessment should be developed in alignment with the new standards, not the existing curriculum frameworks. The bill also requires the State Board of Education to modify the curriculum frameworks to bring them into alignment with the new statewide standards. However, it does not specify what "bringing them into alignment " means.

 ...the curriculum frameworks and CLAS are "out;" the new standards and assessment are "in."

Whether the frameworks will be superseded by the new standards, or whether they will be somehow revised to work in concert with them remains to be determined. At any rate, officials at the state level are encouraging school practitioners to pay close attention to the new standards and assessment; they are not currently emphasizing the former curriculum frameworks. The way the winds seem to be blowing, the curriculum frameworks and CLAS are "out;" the new standards and assessment are "in."

New California State Standards and Assessment on the Horizon

 When can charter school developers and operators expect to see the new state content and performance standards and the new assessment test? At the October 1997 State Board of Education meeting, the language arts and mathematics content (not performance) standards were presented to the Board and were about to undergo public hearing.¹² On November 14, the Board unanimously voted to adopt the language arts content standards with minimal changes.

 At the October meeting, the Commission reported that they have yet to develop performance standards in math and language arts to go with the content standards and that they need to add technology standards to the math standards. (Apparently, they are viewing technology as a separate skill area, rather than as a tool that is used in all academic areas.)

Director Scott Hill remarked that the new math standards are much more rigorous and comprehensive "than any other standards in the nation," requiring high school graduates to master such topics as algebra 2, geometry, probability, and statistics by the end of 10th grade. He also noted that unlike in the past, there was no controversy when developing the language arts standards; the Commission learned from past debates about such topics as phonics and whole language and incorporated all of these skills into their new reading and writing standards.

The Board needs to adopt statewide standards in math and language arts no later than January 1, 1998. They will also adopt standards in the areas of history/social science and science (which are currently being developed by the Commission) no later than November 1, 1998. Once the state content and performance standards are adopted, the Board will contract with a group to develop an assessment that aligns with them. At that point, the state will presumably drop the Stanford Achievement Test.

Since the charter school legislation is unclear about how charter schools should "meet" state-level standards, and since the new state standards and assessment are still "under construction," should charter schools merely ignore state-level standards as they are developing their own student outcomes?

This is not a recommended strategy. The state standards and assessment test is the only mandated accountability mechanism governing charter schools (besides being accountable to the terms of their individual charters). Again, the purpose of having charter schools meet the state standards and administer the state test is to provide a means of assessing how charter school student are performing in comparison to students in other California public schools. Although there are no clear state guidelines or products at this point, charter school developers and operators should keep abreast of current standards and assessment activity on the state level.¹³

As they are developing and reviewing their own student performance standards, charter school developers and operators should look at drafts of the emergent state-level standards as they become available. Once the state standards are finalized and officially adopted, charter school operators and developers should include them in their pile of resources from which they are developing and revising their school-based standards. Some charter schools may choose to incorporate the state standards in their entirety into their school-level standards, whereas other charter schools may choose to let the state standards merely "inform" them as they develop their own home-grown student outcomes. Still other schools may choose a process somewhere in-between. 

 Although there are no clear state guidelines or products at this point, charter school developers and operators should keep abreast of current standards and assessment activity on the state level.

 No matter how a charter school chooses to address the issue of "meeting" state standards, it must keep in mind that its students are going to have to take a state assessment that is meant to be a close reflection of the state content and performance standards, and that its success as a school may be largely judged by how its students do on that test. Furthermore, some instructional materials that the charter school may want to purchase may likely be based upon the new academic standards. When the state standards "backwash" into their assessment and possibly their curriculum, charter schools will have no choice but to notice them.

Other California State Standards Initiatives

 The Commission's academic content and performance standards are not the only state-level standards initiative being developed in California. Four months before AB 265 was signed, the California Education Round Table formed two task forces to develop content standards in English and mathematics that they believe all high school graduates should be able to meet in order to succeed in a work career or in postsecondary education. The Education Round Table consists of the State Superintendent of Public Instruction, the President of the University of California, the Chancellor of the California State University, the Chancellor of the California Community Colleges, a representative of California Independent Colleges and Universities, and the Executive Director of the California Postsecondary Education Commission. The standards task forces were composed of high school teachers and administrators, college and university faculty, and community and business representatives.

 The impetus behind this group was their concern about the high need for remedial education in the California State University system, the need for an expanded, diverse pool of qualified applicants in the University of California system, and the goal of California community colleges of preparing students for employment in technical fields or transfer to four-year colleges. The Education Round Table believes that developing clear standards of what high school graduates should know and be able to do is essential in bridging the gap between students' K-12 education and their post-secondary education and/or career. Having developed the content standards in these areas, the Education Round Table is now working on developing an assessment to measure these standards, which they hope to have completed by spring 1998.¹⁴

 While the state standards Commission and Education Round Table are aware of each other's concurrent efforts and have looked at drafts of each other's work, each group developed its standards largely according to its own agenda. According to standards Commission Director Scott Hill and Dave Jolly, Project Coordinator for the Round Table, the Commission's standards set the bar higher for academic standards expected of students. However, Jolly believes that the Round Table's standards are more realistic for all students, whether they want to go to college or immediately begin a post-high school career.

 In comparing the content of the two sets of state standards, Jolly feels there is great overlap in the English standards developed by both groups, but that the math standards differ. He explains that the Commission's standards include some algebra 2 skills which their standards do not, and he feels that the Education Round Table's math standards focus more on problem-solving skills, as well as statistics and probability.¹⁵ According to Hill, the Commission incorporated the Round Table's math and English standards into theirs, then upped the ante: "We've done by 10th grade what CERT [California Education Round Table] has in their 12th grade standards."¹⁶ Jolly points out that more important than comparisons in content between the two sets of standards is the fact that neither group has tied their standards to student performance levels at this point. He would soon like to answer the questions, "How many of these standards must be achieved by students?" and "Must they be achieved by all or just some students?"¹⁷

 Both the Commission's and the Round Table's standards have been submitted to the State Board of Education for consideration and have undergone public hearing. Both Hill and Jolly agree that more communication needs to take place between the two standard-setting efforts before the Board adopts a final set of state-level standards. Developing and adopting state standards will be a priority item on the agenda of the next several Board meetings.

 Keeping a Close Watch on State Standards Activity

 Meanwhile, charter school operators and developers should add the California Education Round Table's standards to their pile of standards documents to consider when developing their own school-based student outcomes. As the Commission's and Round Table's proposals are being considered, it is wise to have an idea of where the state standards may be heading. "While the soup is being cooked, keep an eye on what ingredients are being thrown into the pot." Even if the Round Table's recommendations are largely ignored by the State Board as they adopt state-level standards, it is important for parents, students, and staff in charter schools to be aware of what the higher education and postsecondary career worlds feel today's students should know. While these groups' standards may not be given legislative backing, they are the voices affecting college admissions standards, and they represent important sectors of career fields which graduating students may want to enter.

 District-Level and Other Local Standards

 In addition to facing national- and state-level standards, charter school operators and developers may also be located in a district that has developed its own local list of expected student outcomes. While charter schools are not legally required to meet district-level standards, they may need to consider and perhaps incorporate them into their school-based standards as a matter of political reality. After all, it is the local school board that grants and renews charters, and there are often many personal and professional connections between district administrative staff and the local school board members. Furthermore, as mentioned previously, the district may have developed instructional materials that are aligned with their local standards, and they may also have a district-wide assessment for their students. When developing or reviewing their school-based standards, charter school developers and operators should "take the temperature" of the local school board regarding their attitude towards whether the charter school incorporates the district-level standards or not.

 Along with district-level standards, there may be other local standards affecting charter schools. Depending upon the way the charter was written, some charter schools may also have to follow standards that were mandated by their specific charter. In order not to box themselves in too early, charter developers should write the standards section of their charters in a way that provides enough information to be substantive, but not such specific language that the school has no flexibility in modifying its desired student outcomes in the future.

Reconciling Multi-Level Standards

 So, how do charter school operators and developers make sense of all of these multi-level standards being thrown their way, while at the same time developing effective student outcomes that best serve the needs of the students at their individual schools? Is there any way to combine and reconcile these different standards, or must charter schools attempt to shoot at multiple targets? Sometimes elements of these multi-level standards overlap, and sometimes they do not.

 ...charter developers should write the standards section of their charters in a way that provides enough information to be substantive, but not such specific language that the school has no flexibility...

  As previously mentioned, some states have consulted nationally-developed standards when developing their state-level ones, and others have not. On a state level, the two California groups currently developing state standards have drawn from each other's work, sometimes incorporating one another's standards, sometimes throwing the other's out and creating new ones of their own. At the October 10 State Board of Education meeting, the Commission announced its plan to consult district-level standards while developing the new state standards in history/social science and science. (The Commission did not use district-level standards to inform their math and language arts standards.)

 Just as state-level standards development groups may choose to consult district-level standards documents, California law states that the new state standards may be used as a model or guideline in developing district standards. However, since districts are not required to consult state standards when developing local student outcomes, school operators and developers must remain hopeful that the district integrates them in some way, or else they may be faced with conflicting recommendations about what students should understand and be able to do. It is likely that districts will try to align their standards with the state ones, especially since their schools will be required to take the state test (which will reflect the state standards). However, until the state finishes developing new standards and a new test, many districts may be developing their own standards and assessments, "not holding their breath."

 Many charter school operators and developers have literally stacks on their shelves of standards documents from the national, state, and district levels. While wading through these piles of standards and trying to make sense of them all, they should remember to stay focused on the charter school„s mission. As the charter schools standards team sorts through the different, multi-level standards, including some, merging some, and throwing some away, they may get many good ideas about how to refine their own list of student outcomes by looking at the fruits of other people's labor regarding the same questions.

 If charter schools must prioritize while picking and choosing among outside standards, the crucial ones to pay attention to will be the state-level ones, since those are the ones that they are legally accountable for meeting in some way. For political reasons, some charter schools may also need to consider incorporating the district standards. Indeed, some charter schools may find that what they believe students should understand and achieve is not that different from what people at the state and district levels espouse.

Preparing Standards for Charter Renewal

Many charter schools are currently undergoing a renewal process. For them, defining clear student outcomes is not only a good idea, but a necessity. It is at this point that the district board or other charter sponsor will evaluate how well the school is doing at articulating and meeting its "measurable pupil outcomes" as required by the Charter Schools Act and as stated in its charter. Some charter school operators facing renewal may have to define their standards for the first time, while others will be re-evaluating and perhaps rewriting existing ones. New charter school developers may find that as charter sponsors review existing charter schools for renewal, they will decide that all incoming applications must be more specific in their proposals of student outcomes. In the eyes of many, the charter school movement will rise or fall based upon how well its students do.

 In the eyes of many, the charter school movement will rise or fall based upon how well its students do.

Conclusion

 Thus, as charter school developers and operators face the overwhelming question of how to determine what their students should understand and be able to do, keeping their school's mission as the focus will help them to navigate through the maze of national, state, district, and school-level standards. In California, charter developers and operators should pay special attention to the state-level standards and assessments to which they will be held accountable under the charter school law. Whether a charter school is just getting off the ground or soon facing renewal, defining clear, measurable outcomes for their students is a key element in ensuring the school's ongoing effectiveness and survival.

¹ California Charter Schools Act of 1992 (revised 1996), Section 47605(b)(2). The Act in its entirety can be found on website www.cacharterschools.org/SB1448.html.

² The Harvard Project on Teaching for Understanding in Cambridge, Massachusetts chooses the word "understand," rather than "know," because they feel that "know" could imply a shallow memorization of facts, whereas "understand" connotes a deeper absorption of knowledge.

³ Greater Egleston Community High School Handbook, Boston, MA, June 1997.

⁴ "The O'Farrell Standards," O'Farrell Community School: Center for Advanced Academic Studies, San Diego.

⁵ Linda Diamond, "School Reform, Accountability, and Charter Schools," Making Charters Work: Strategies for Charter School Developers, Brief #2, spring 1994, p. 2.

⁶ Check the federal charter schools web site, wwwv.uscharterschools.org/tech_assist/ta_standards.

html, for links to on-line lists of standards and private groups which offer assistance in developing school-based standards.

⁷ Millicent Lawton, "Riley Delays National Tests' Development," Education Week, October 1, 1997, p. 27.

⁸ For details and updates regarding the national test, see website www.ed.gov/nationaltests.

⁹ California Charter Schools Act of 1992 (revised 1996), Section 47605(c).

¹⁰ Telephone interview with Scott Hill, October 3, 1997, Sacramento, CA.

¹¹ Telephone conversation with Scott Hill, September 30, 1997, Sacramento, CA.

¹² The Commission's content standards documents can be viewed and downloaded from website www.ca.gov/goldstandards.

¹³ To keep abreast of California state standards and assessment activity, check the following websites: www.cacharterschools.org/charter.html (Charter Schools Development Center), www.ca.gov/goldstandards (the Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards), and www.cde.ca.gov (CA Department of Education, including State Board of Education news).

¹⁴ The California Education Round Table's standards may be viewed and downloaded from website www.otan.dni.us/certicc.

¹⁵ Telephone conversation with Dave Jolly, October 31, 1997, Sacramento, CA.

¹⁶ Telephone conversation with Scott Hill, September 30, 1997, Sacramento, CA.

¹⁷ Conversation with Dave Jolly, October 2, 1997, Sacramento, CA.

The Charter Schools Development Center provides experienced technical support to charter school developers, operators, and charter-granting agencies in California and across the US. Center staff have a broad range of expertise in planning, developing, and implementing new education policies, structures, and practices to help create substantially improved schools and education systems.

 The Center is located at the California State University Institute for Education Reform, a policy center located on the CSU Sacramento campus. The Institute's goals are to link university and state policy makers with important developments within the K-12 education community and to provide assistance to K-12 schools which are undertaking or contemplating major reform activities.

 Several individuals provided thoughtful and helpful comments regarding drafts of this brief, including Eric Premack of the Charter Schools Development Center, Ting Sun of the Natomas Charter School, Jane McDonough of the Sonoma Charter School, Mark Kushner of Leadership High School, and Sue Burr of the CSU Institute for Education Reform. Any opinions, errors, or omissions are those of the author and not necessarily those of the reviewers.

This brief was written by Laurie Gardner.