Standards

New Hampshire Weighs Bill to Undo Common-Standards Adoption

By Catherine Gewertz — May 05, 2011 1 min read
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New Hampshire’s legislature is trying to unravel the state’s adoption of the common standards. A group of Republicans in the state’s House of Representatives sponsored the bill, HB164, and got it through the House. It’s currently before the state Senate’s education committee.

If approved, the measure would require the state legislature, called the “general court” in New Hampshire, to approve any changes the state board of education makes in academic standards. It specifies that the common standards, approved by the state board last July 8, “shall not be adopted” without the general court’s consent. Both chambers of the New Hampshire legislature are controlled by Republicans, but the state’s governor is a Democrat.

Just the other day, we were telling you that Texas was weighing a bill to fend off the adoption of the common standards by asserting the state’s sovereignty over standards and curriculum.

In most states, standards adoption is the sole province of state boards of education. But in some, the chief state school officer or legislature is involved. Do you know of other states that are moving, in one way or another, to unravel their adoption of the common standards?

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A version of this news article first appeared in the Curriculum Matters blog.