Giving Compass' Take:

•  Jill Barshay, writing for The Hechinger Report, examines the reasons why after five years of teaching the Common Core, high school students in New York are still failing exams. 

• One policy consultant who studied these trends argues that it's a sign that the most low-achieving students did not get introduced to the Common Core standards early enough, and they need extra support because it is a harder transition. How can educators create reliable pathways for these students? 

• Read about how donors can advance education on the common core. 

Back in 2013, when New York was one of the first states in the nation to adopt Common Core standards and administer tougher tests, children’s test scores initially plummeted. Then, as teachers had time to develop lesson plans and adjust to new curricula, student performance began to improve.

But now, after five years of high schools teaching to the Common Core standards (now slightly revamped and called Next Generation Learning Standards in New York), there’s a sudden spike in the high-school failure rate.

More than 13,000 more students failed the algebra Regents exam in the most recent 2017-18 school year compared to the previous year, pushing the failure rate up from 25 percent to 30 percent, according to a December 2018 report by education policy consultant David Rubel.

“It’s odd that there would be a decline at this point,” said Morgan Polikoff, a professor at the University of Southern California’s school of education and an expert in assessments.  “Most often the trend is that a new exam is implemented, there’s a ‘dip’ in performance. I don’t like calling it a dip because it’s a different test so it’s not really comparable. And then scores gradually increase over time.”

Even if Common Core approaches are superior and teachers have mastered the new material, average scores could fall and the failure rate could rise when the share of low-performing students increases.

These test results are pointing out that some students are having greater trouble learning the material than they used to. One hypothesis suggested by USC’s Polikoff is that low-achieving kids who were introduced to Common Core standards midway through their educational life might have been harmed in the sometimes rocky transition

Rubel argues that low-achieving students may continue to need more support with Common Core, especially students with disabilities and English Language Learners.

Read the full article about the failure rate of high school students by Jill Barshay at The Hechinger Report