OFFICE OF THE SUPERINTENDENT OF SCHOOLS
ARCHDIOCESE OF NEW YORK
1011 First Avenue,
NewYork, NewYork 10022
Phone: (212) 371-1000 Fax: (2)2) 758-3018
December 2, 2013
Dear Catholic School Parents,
I would like to address the recent media attention that has been given to the issue of Common Core Learning Standards (CCLS). Unfortunately, this coverage has created a certain level of consternation for parents across the country. I appreciate that many of you may also be experiencing some confusion regarding the CCLS.
As a brief summary, the CCLS initiative began as a bipartisan effort by the governors of our country to collectively establish common curriculum guidelines for all schools in the nation. To date, 46 states have adopted CCLS and over 100 (Arch) d ioceses have also chosen to teach CCLS in Mathematics and English/Language Arts. During the 2012-13 academic year, New York State began the implementation of the CCLS and the realignment of their year-end state tests to reflect the CCLS.
The CCLS test scores of students in all school districts last spring were disappointingly low and this sparked considerable media attention. Opponents of this initiative have called into question the academic merits of the CCLS. Others have raised concern about the diminishment of our Catholic identity. Please allow me to articulate some relevant information to counter the concerns being voiced on television and in our newspapers. It is important that you are presented with the facts involving CCLS.
In his book, The Holy See 's Teachings on Catholic Schools (2006), Archbishop J. Michael Miller highlighted the main responsibility of Catholic schools is to integrate our faith into classroom instruction. Archbishop Miller also stated the need to recognize that our schools have an additional responsibility of preparing students for their professional life. The CCLS curriculum guidelines are designed specifically for that purpose. It should be noted, Catholic schools have been using state and national standards for decades. The claim of opponents that the CCLS are Jess rigorous is mistaken. Our classroom teachers will tell you, the CCLS are more rigorous and require more reading, writing, listening, higher order thinking, and a deeper understanding of mathematical concepts to support problem solving. To say this transition in our teaching methodologies and testing procedures is challenging is an understatement. It is hard work and it is
time-consuming work.
There is also the misperception CCLS will dictate what Catholic school teachers must teach. This claim confuses the significant difference between the 'standards' and the 'curriculum' a school district chooses to adopt. Standards descri be what students should know and be able to do at the end of a course. Standards are too broad to define what teachers will teach on a daily basis -that is the purpose of a local curriculum, and specifically our Archdiocesan curriculum.
As an example, one of the 4th grade CCLS for reading literature states, "Refer to details and examples in a text when explaining what the text says and when drawing inferences from the text." It does not however, specify which text or how the teacher will guide students to accomplish this instructional task. The concern that Archdiocesan schools will not have the freedom to select their own texts is a misread of the CCLS.
Regarding the allegation that the CCLS will undermine our ability to infuse Church teachings into classroom instruction, please know our teachers are not encumbered with this responsibility and they continue to have the ability to preserve our Catholic identity in their instruction. To that
point, we also subscribe to the Common Core Catholic Identity Initiative: a national collaborative formed by a partnership of Catholic universities and Pre K-12 Catholic educators that was created for the express purpose of modeling how Catholic identity elements can be captured in classroom instruction while still implementing CCLS. More information about the Common Core Catholic Identity Initiative can be found at: http://www.cccii-onli ne.org/about.
For parents who have q uestions based on what they hear from opponents of CCLS, I suggest they talk directly to our principals and teachers -the educators in Catholic schools who are actively engaged in the implementation of excellent and authentic Catholic curriculum. Such conversations will expose that the allegations offered by the opponents of the CCLS are factually incorrect.
While completely supportive of the CCLS initiative, I should note there have been concerns raised regarding the strategy used to implement CCLS -the timeline and the pace by which the standards are being delivered and assessed. On this issue, many of us are in agreement with that observation and are currently working with the State to address that complaint. That reality has
put noticeable pressure on our classroom teachers and certainly more support needs to be given to them. However, the need for those adjustments is not an excuse to forgo the benefits of an initiative that has challenged our educational institutions to strive for greater and continued excellence.
The Catholic schools in the Archdiocese of New York will continue to implement CCLS. In the near future it will be demonstrated that because of the work of our teachers, test scores will improve, our Catholic identity will remain as strong as ever, and our Archdiocesan school system will be completely transparent about our instructional methodologies to parents and all of our stakeholders .
Sincerely
Dr. Timothy McNiff
Superintendent of Schools
Cc: Cardinal Timothy Dolan
