Although you won't find a politician who will say so in public, the United States appears to be moving toward a "national curriculum," two experts said at a session on the topic.
Over the past several years, groups representing all the subject areas have begun to develop "national standards" laying out the key content and performance targets for students, noted Eva Baker, director of the Center for the Study of Evaluation at the University of California at Los Angeles. "The `standards' have become a code word for what we used to call curriculum," she said. "For political reasons, it's seen as inappropriate to call this entity `curriculum' in a national context." So those backing national standards have softpedaled the "national curriculum" connotation while insisting that adoption of the standards by local districts and states will be voluntary.
How far is the United States willing to take the idea of national standards—or national curriculum? Key evidence may emerge from the present effort to reauthorize Chapter 1, the huge federal program to help disadvantaged students. More than 70 percent of schools receive Chapter 1 funding, Baker noted, and some lawmakers are trying to ensure that Chapter 1 program evaluations include some measure of student performance relative to national standards. If such a measure is approved, "then a lot of rhetoric about the standards being voluntary disappears," Baker asserted.
William Moloney, superintendent of schools in Easton, Penn., agreed with Baker that the question is no longer if the United States will have a national curriculum, but when and what kind.
The major philosophical barrier to a national curriculum—concern over local control and flexibility in curriculum matters—has fallen by the wayside, Moloney suggested. Local educators, he said, are more interested in a clearer consensus on what students ought to be learning.
"The biggest transformation I've seen among rank-and-file teachers and principals is that no one is interested in that local option and that marvelous flexibility," said Moloney. Educators feel that "as long as we at the local level are allowed to do anything, we will be blamed for everything," he said. The way schools are presently operated, "the mission is never clarified, and anyone and everyone can add to that mission."
Both Baker and Moloney noted that the press for dramatically improving student learning has fueled the interest in a national curriculum. But is a national curriculum the answer?
Baker was doubtful. Research does not support the assumption that a mandated curriculum enforced by high-stakes testing will motivate students and teachers to improve, she said.
Still, some form of national curriculum seems inevitable, she said. A key task ahead is to debate what pieces of the curriculum might best be shared nationally and what parts ought to be left to local decision makers.