"Too few students are leaving the K-12 system ready for college and the global economy, yet the public appears to fear an overemphasis on test scores and a decrease in attention paid to the whole child." This problem is the subject of a new Education Commission of the States (ECS) briefing memo, one in a series titled "Setting the '08 Education Agenda for the Nation."

Benchmarking to International Standards While Protecting the Public's Traditional Commitment to a Comprehensive Education, points to policy issues of maintaining local control while voluntarily adopting national standards.

"What results do we want?" asks the briefing:

    * Fewer, deeper standards
    * A realistic picture of how all 15-year-olds perform on the PISA exam, even though this might cause outrage about how low scores might be. Complacencywill get us nowhere
    * A far greater number of students who gain and can apply knowledge and skills at a higher level
    * Graduates who are capable of producing new knowledge in a global society
    * Graduates who employ transferable skills in an economy where career paths are constantly changing
    * Teachers with a good grasp of clear, ambitious targets and who can inspire, motivate and help students meet those targets
    * Students who work hard and understand the big ideas behind the algorithms
    * Communities and individuals who have the knowledge, skills and dispositions to support a common good.

What components of quality policies could address these questions?

    * Voluntary state adoption of internationally benchmarked standards
    * Clear common denominators for teachers to teach
    * Support for ongoing, embedded, individualized professional development
    * Incentives to attract the top third of high school students to apply to teacher preparation programs
    * System-wide alignment (preschool, elementary, secondary, university)
    * Inclusion of 21st-century skills and civic education
    * Alignment of support systems for students
    * Understandable metrics for evaluation.

To read more about this topic, you can download the report ECS Briefing Memo.