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A history of the development of the California Science Content Standards: 1990--2005

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Content A HISTORY OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE CALIFORNIA
SCIENCE CONTENT STANDARDS: 1990-2005
by
Frederica Jost Stassi
A Dissertation Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE ROSSIER SCHOOL OF EDUCATION
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF EDUCATION
August 2006
Copyright 2006 Frederica Jost Stassi
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UMI Number: 3236553
Copyright 2006 by
Stassi, Frederica Jost
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DEDICATION
This whole undertaking for the past six years is dedicated to my husband, Ron
and our two adult daughters, Gina and Andrea. Ron has been my sounding board and has
also been so encouraging when I needed it Gina and Andrea have kept on me and said,
“Mom, are you working on your paper? Get busy and finish it!”
I love all three of you very much and thanks for all the support you all have given
me. You have put up with me for the last six years and you are the special stars in my
life!
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
There are two special people that I must thank for seeing me through all of this.
First of all, Dr. William McComas, the chairman of my committee has become a
wonderful friend. He and I talked about this dissertation topic several years back and
there is no one that could have been more excited about this topic than he. And after
discussing this and writing some papers around the topic I got just as excited if not more.
Bill, it has been a great honor and a pleasure to work with you these past six years and
thanks for inviting me into your program. I wish you all the best as you move on to a
new and exciting adventure. Thank you so much.
The second person I must acknowledge is my closest friend, Jo Ann McVeigh.
Jo Ann and I have been friends for so long that many times we know what the other is
thinking before anything is said. She has been a wonderful help to me because she is the
one that did all the transcriptions of my taped interviews. That included just about
everyone I interviewed. After listening to the tapes she was almost as interested in the
topic. She also went with me to the State Library in Sacramento to help sort out
information that I needed from the minutes of the Academic Standards Commission. Jo
Ann, I owe you many thanks for all the help and support and work you have done for me.
You are a wonderful friend, Jo Ann. Thanks!
Two other people I must thank are Dr. Joel Colbert, the second member of my
committee, who also shared my excitement in finding out just how the story of the
California Science Standards occurred. Thank you also to Dr. Sandra Kaplan who agreed
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to be on my committee on short notice even though she didn’t really know me. Thanks,
Dr. Colbert and Dr. Kaplan!
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V
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Dedication ii
Acknowledgements iii
Table of Contents v
List of Tables vi
List of Figures vii
Abstract xiii
Chapter 1: Introduction 1
Chapter 2: Literature Review 7
Chapter 3: Research Method 35
Chapter 4: Research Findings 42
Chapter 5: Discussion and Implications 184
Bibliography 209
Appendices
Appendix A 218
Appendix B 220
Appendix C 221
Appendix D 229
Appendix E 231
Appendix F 237
Appendix G 257
Appendix H 264
Appendix I 266
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vi
LIST OF TABLES
Table 1: Guide to Using the Standards 52
Table 2: Example of Challenge Standards & National Science 57
Education Standards
Table 3: Timeline for RFPs 83
Table 4: List of Focus Groups; Location and Date 98
Table 5: Big Issues for Science Standards 105
Table 6: What Students Should Know 106
Table 7: Roles of Brunkhorst and Metzenberg 124
Table 8: Roles of Science Committee 124
Table 9: Comments from Commissioners on Preliminary Draft 136
Table 10: Issues Heard from the Public 150
Table 11: Major Issues needing to be addressed by Consultants 154
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vii
LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1: Sequence of Function in Curriculum Development 21
Figure 2: Yin’s Convergence of Multiple Sources of Evidence 37
Figure 3: Sample of the Challenge Standards 56
Figure 4: RFP point criteria 81
Figure 5: Memo 115
Figure 6. Reorganization of Verb Forms in Standards 152
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ABSTRACT
Science Standards to guide curriculum design and student assessment in K-12
instruction exist in nearly all fifty states. However, little has been written about the
development of these Standards. Such histories are necessary not only to record the
debates and deliberations, but to guide the future work of those who will produce
effective and appropriate content guidelines. Moreover, a detailed examination of the
development of Science Standards in California may help others avoid debates that turn
into “wars” because of differing viewpoints in the way science should be taught.
In California there was much drama and intrigue with respect to development of
the Science Standards. Rumors flourished in the news media and by word of mouth.
This dissertation details the evolution of the Standards; the first-ever set of such specific
instructional goals produced in California and provides a comprehensive view of the
process, personalities and politics that resulted in the 1999 California Science Content
Standards.
Two main resources used in this study were interviews with many key
individuals involved in development of the Standards, and careful review of minutes and
other documents from the Academic Standards Commission meetings.
Many people involved in the process seem to have had personal agendas,
impacting the final product in less than desirable ways. The Standards Commission was
comprised of people with expertise in business, engineering, political science, education
and science itself, but drew poorly on the necessary expertise of science educators. As
work progressed, debates devolved into politicized, divisive and polarizing affairs, pitting
those favoring memorization against individuals supporting hands-on/inquiry instruction.
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In the final analysis the California Science Content Standards feature content
over process while recommending that some science content be taught at grade levels that
may not be scientifically accurate or age-appropriate. Moreover, heavy reliance on
scientists as advisors produced a set of Standards evoking older science instructional
methods, such as memorization focusing on training future scientists while neglecting
education for those whom science will be an avocation and/or foundation for citizenry.
Standards should be developed with shared input from a variety of individuals, including
science educators, science teachers, but not dominated by, scientists
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CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION
The function of the historian is neither to love the past nor to emancipate
himself from the past, but to master and understand it as the key to the
understanding of the present. Edward Hallet Carr, What is History? (p.
29)
The educational system of the 19th century began with perspectives of antecedent
from the Middle Ages. Those who were advocates for change recognized that the system
needed to be modified. Some of the critics of the classical system argued that the real
purpose of an education was to help students prepare for the world in which they would
be alive in and to prepare them to address socially relevant questions (DeBoer, 1991).
This answer is often given today to those who ask, “Why study science?”
Statement of the Problem
With the development of science standards in all 50 states, there has been very
little written about the development of the California Science Content Standards and how
they evolved. Although similar types of events occurred with the California math
standards, the standards for science reform have not been as well recorded and most all
that has been reported appears only in newspaper articles and other minor documents
including letters and opinion papers. Because of this, it is clear that more information
needs to be found and documented on this matter before its valuable history and
important lessons are lost.
Cohen and Neufeld wrote, “The schools are a great theater in which we play out
these conflicts in the culture; they are the stage for the long war over the character of
[American] adult life” (Cohen & Neufeld, 1981). Debates are easily observed and can
be very fiery when parents participate in discussions about the education of their children.
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The debates over content standards for every subject in school are not new to the
20th and 21st centuries. In the academic history of American schools there has been an
ongoing dispute about what subjects should be part of the standard curriculum. During
the 1980s and 1990s there were many attempts to write education standards. The
language of war was seemingly present all of the time. There have been culture wars in
the writing of the history standards, as well as reading wars and math wars. These wars
were created because of different viewpoints on the way a subject should be taught.
The debate about reading pitted phonics versus “whole language” as being the
best methodology for teaching children in California. In writing of the California
History-Social Science Standards there was also debate. Lynne Cheney, Chairperson of
the National Endowment for the Humanities, said they focused too much on the negative
aspects of past history and did not concentrate enough on the great historic, heroic figures
(Ross, 1997). Before there was the “new math,” that “encouraged divergent thinking and
understanding big ideas about math,” (Tyack & Cuban, 1995) versus memorization, drill
and computation.
Suzanne Wilson (2003) studied the development of the mathematics curriculum
in California, and as she puts it, “wars” may sound a bit strong to outsiders. However, for
insiders there is much drama and intrigue. Rumors flourished through word of mouth
and the media - newspapers, radio and TV talk shows.
One of the major arguments has focused on which subjects should be included in
a curriculum. This is a frequent lament among educators, and with the same proposals
seemingly recycled it is like a “distracting merry-go-round” (Tyack & Cuban, 1995).
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The Industrial revolution provided the need for students to be in the classroom so that the
population could be educated (Olson, 1973). Educational goals come into need for a
time, then priorities shift and they fall to the background and something else reemerges.
This type of pendulum swing is what has given education its episodic qualities (Labaree,
1997).
Purpose of the Study
With the National Science Standards (1995) already in place, there was already
an effort to use a unique set of Science Standards for California. The researcher seeks to
discover why the State of California mandated a new set of science standards. How did
the committee writing the standards come together? There were many newspaper articles
being written during the time of the writing of the standards and the researcher wanted to
find out if the accounts from these articles are in fact true. It sounded as though there
were many arguments going on during the time of the whole process. The purpose of the
researcher will be to sort these things out to understand what it was that really happened.
The researcher wants to know where the ideas came from and how the decision
was made that lead to California acquiring new science standards, as well as how the
Committee decided it was an opportune time to present the new Standards to California
science teachers.
Significance of the Study
There is much to be learned from studying the history of any process. The
lessons that we learn can tell us what things went right and are worth repeating, and what
things went wrong and need to be avoided. The history of the California Science Content
Standards needs to be revealed and the whole story told of how developments evolved
into what they are today.
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Research Questions
1) What events led to the writing of the current California Science Content
Standards?
2) What people, laws, policies, and procedures were involved in the
development of the Standards?
3) What insights, impressions and suggestions for the enhancement of the
process may be gleaned from a review of the development of the California
Science Content Standards?
Overview of the Proposed Method
Most of this study will be done by conducting personal interviews with the
people involved in writing the California Science Content Standards. Additionally,
investigations will review government documents and newspaper accounts containing
information about conversations and meetings that took place with respect to the
Standards.
The process will include reviewing government documents that may be from a
committee meeting; a bill or amendment that was passed; reviewing senate or assembly
bills that are already in place; and consulting newspaper articles that have been written in
California. The most important part of the study will be getting information from people
that the researcher seeks out to question. Some of them were present at the time the
writing of the Standards was taking place. There is a second tier of persons that may have
done research for committee members or might have been in the State Education
Department that had an interest in what was happening at that time. The information
from research and taped interviews will be arranged to create the history of how the
California Science Content Standards became what they are.
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Assumptions
It is assumed that questions asked of those being interviewed, will be responded
to forthrightly so that the data will reveal an accurate picture of what was being studied.
Limitations
In studying the California Science Content Standards, the researcher will attempt
to talk with all of the key players that had a role in writing the California Science
Standards, however, it is likely that some may be unwilling or unable to participate. The
first account will be limited in accuracy should key respondents be unable or unwilling to
respond.
Delimitations
The limitations of any generalizations are endless in learning about the historical
analysis of events occurring in the creation of the California Science Content Standards.
A reader would be cautioned not to make parallels with the development of other
standards in California or in other states.
Definitions of Standards and Frameworks
The United States Department of Education’s definition of national standards is
"all states and schools will have challenging and clear standards of achievement and
accountability for all children, and effective strategies for reaching those standards"
(http://www.educationworld.eom/standards/l.
The National Science Education Standards are an outline of:
What students need to know, understand, and be able to do to be scientifically
literate at different grade levels. They describe an educational system in which
all students demonstrate high levels of performance, teachers are empowered to
make the decisions essential for effective learning, interlocking communities of
teachers and students are focused on learning science, and supportive educational
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programs and systems nurture achievement.
(http://www.nap.edU/readingroom/books/nses/overview.html#contentt
The California Department of Science Education defines content standards as
“designed to encourage the highest achievement of every student, by defining the
knowledge, concepts, and skills that students should acquire at each grade level”
(http://www.cde.ca.gov/be/st/ss/index.asp)
The definition of the Science Framework for California Public Schools says,
The Science Framework incorporates and builds on the Science Content
Standards adopted by the State Board of Education in 1998. It is the blueprint for
reform of the science curriculum, instruction, professional preparation and
development, and instructional materials in California.
(http://www.cde.ca.gov/re/pn/fd/sci-frame-dwnld.asp. 5 v)
The Standards told what was to be studied. The Framework spelled out the
process of who, what and why of teaching science. When comparing the National
Science Education Standards (NSES) with the California Science Content Standards and
the Framework the NSES contains both; what to be studied, as well as who, what and
why of teaching science in the same text.
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CHAPTER II
LITERATURE REVIEW
This literature review tells how the education of science became important in the
late 19th centuiy. The scientists at this time were interested in using the “hands-on”
approach with science experiments. Educators were at that time debating which subjects
should be taught in the schools. There were recommendations that science be one of the
essential subjects to be included. As the schools in the United States and particularly in
California evolved, it became important that there be science frameworks for the teachers
to follow. This review takes the reader up to the point of when the California Science
Contents Standards were to be written.
Diane Ravitch (1995), Research Professor of Education at New York University,
defines educational standards as “both a goal (what should be done) and a measure of
progress toward that goal (how well it was done).” Ravitch goes on to say that in every
part of life, standards are needed or life would be chaotic. Standards are expected in the
construction of buildings and highways, the manufacturing of cars, and in the production
of food we purchase at a store. “Standards are created and perfected because they
improve the quality of life,” she explains (p. 9).
Late Nineteenth Science Education
It was not until the end of the nineteenth century that there was a debate about
whether science should be included in the schools. Scientists from the late nineteenth
century promoted the idea of teaching science in the schools of Europe and the United
States. Three men, two of whom were scientists and one a science textbook writer and
lecturer, especially stand out. In order they are Thomas Huxley, Herbert Spencer and
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Edward Livingston Youmans. Together they agreed that science was an essential subject
to add to the curriculum (DeBoer, 1991).
Herbert Spencer (1820-1903) was an English philosopher and a leading Social
Darwinist. He was an agnostic and believed the “only way to gain knowledge was
through a scientific approach.” It was through this knowledge “that people learned how
to live in society.” He also stressed learning science in the schools. He said, “learning
should be a sensory experience where a student interacts within his/her environment; a
slow, gradual, and inductive process. Children should be encouraged to explore and
discover that which would allow them to acquire knowledge naturally.” Rote
memorization was strongly opposed and he said education should be a pleasant
experience. The student should engage in activities that would be useful for survival in
society (http://www.nd.edu/~rbarger/www7/spenser.htmlV
Spencer’s book, What Knowledge is of Most Worth? answered the question by
stating that this question needed to be answered before curriculum was to be planned and
the curriculum should assist in survival and progress in society. His “main goal was to
teach subjects that would contribute to successful living”
(http://www.nd.edu/~rbarger/www7/spenser.htmlV
Huxley (1893) recommended that science be taught in the schools as early as
possible. Huxley thought that at ages 9 or 10 children would be able to grasp scientific
concepts.
If a child is not snubbed and stunted by being told not to ask foolish questions,
there is not a limit to the intellectual craving of a young child To all such
questions, answers which are necessarily incomplete, though true as far as
they go, may be given by any teacher whose ideas represent real knowledge and
not mere book learning, (p. 124)
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The only way for science to be taught well was to let the children learn through direct
observation and be in direct contact with the objects that were studied, rather than
learning from verbal, abstract instruction (Huxley, 1893).
In the nineteenth century the academies were the first educational facilities that
used a new curriculum, rather than the classical curriculum of the Latin grammar schools.
As part of this new program, science was included even though it was more book
learning than direct observation that had been recommended. The academies were
considered the institutions that were first to push the study of science even though the
quality was not very good and it was only taught for a short portion of the year (DeBoer,
1991).
In Europe, the Swiss educator, Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi, was the first to use
object lessons in science. Because of this a German, Johann Friedrich Herbart, gave
support to the idea of direct experience and the idea soon moved to the United States.
Herbart also agreed that pupils’ interests came from social interaction. Hands-on and
direct experiences in science provided this interaction. His idea was to prepare a child
for real life.
Not the esoteric life of the recluse or the dreamy idealist, but the life of a man
of affairs, who takes an active part in all that pertains to human welfare and
advancement. Such a man is not merely subjectively but also objectively moral;
he is a good parent, a good citizen, an efficient man of business, who is able to
advance his own interests through honest promotion of the interests of others.
(De Garmo, 1896 p. 241)
What De Garmo said is also true today. The teaching of science and the use of the
science standards is to help instill in a child the same characteristics, a knowledgeable
and good citizen and taught to be objective when making decisions pertaining to the good
of all.
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Charles W. Eliot, the president of Harvard from 1869-1895, became another
contributor to science education in the United States. He not only influenced the
colleges, but also the high schools and elementary schools. He pushed for use of the
laboratoiy method to help children in preparation for development in their mental
abilities and for their future (DeBoer, 1991). Science is indispensable, must be taught
with instruments in hand, and cannot be taught with just a good textbook or by sitting at
the foot of the most highly regarded lecturer (Eliot, 1909). At the end of the nineteenth
century, science became less important in the schools and the teaching that was left was
done with poor instruction technique (DeBoer, 1991).
In Eliot’s speech about the method in which education should function in a
democratic society, he said that school should begin teaching the sciences in first grade
with the study of nature, elements of physical geography, meteorology, botany, and
zoology. It should leave one harmonious sketch in the child’s mind of the complex
environment. Later, in the child’s maturity, the “great sciences” of chemistry and physics
should be taught, but this learning should all be enjoyable; delightful but not painful
(Eliot, 1909).
Kirst and Bird (1997) said,
From 1900 to 1970 there were four broad bases to evaluate elements in
curriculum that emerged as most prominent: tradition, community, science, and
individual judgment. These are the values that hold together peoples’
preferences. The conflicting nature creates political stress and changes in
curricular demand. These things are exclusive or exhaustive but do represent
foremost ideas of thought and feeling, (p. 2)
This is an answer to Spencer’s question, “What knowledge is of most worth?” (Kirst &
Bird, 1997, p. 2)
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Formation of the National Education Association
In 1892, the Committee of Ten was formed at the annual meeting of the National
Education Association (NEA). The group was made up of college and scholastic leaders.
When the committee was formed, Eliot, as head, divided the members up so that smaller
groups could meet in separate science conferences. Three groups were formed: natural
history; physics, chemistry, and astronomy; and geography. After a meeting of the
Committee of Ten, it was decided that high schools should use 25 percent of their time
studying science. A report from the Conference on Physics, Chemistry, and Astronomy
found that carrying out experiments in school with children was the best way to learn. In
addition, they recommended that science be started as early as possible in the elementary
grade schools (DeBoer, 1991).
Two of the subcommittee chairmen, Alexander Smith and Edwin H. Hall,
worked together in 1902 on the book, The Teaching of Chemistry and Physics in the
Secondary School. They believed that without elementary math and science education, a
person may remain a total stranger in the world where he lives. Whatever he encounters
in nature, or the industrial world will be totally unintelligible to him, as if in another
language (Smith & Hall, 1908).
Smith’s idea for teaching chemistry integrated two main ideas. The first was to
acquire knowledge and be able to understand what was being done. The second was to
develop the capacity to think, be discriminating and reason inductively. Inferences
should then be derived from the student’s own observing. Edwin Hall believed that the
laboratory should be the central part of science. He suggested that “inquiry” was the
proper method in which to use the lab. Using inquiry as the method was designed to keep
the student “just enough in the dark as to the probable outcome of his experiment, just
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enough in the attitude of discovery, to leave him unprejudiced in his observations” (Smith
& Hall, 1908, p. 278).
Between 1893 and 1920, the reasoning for teaching of science changed greatly.
It was first proposed because science had the capability to develop a student’s intellectual
skills. The reasoning in 1920 was to create a good and intelligent citizen in the society
because science was part of the everyday world around them (DeBoer, 1991).
The Progressive Era (1917-1957)
In American education the years between 1917 and 1957 were considered the
“progressive era” (Cremin, 1961). One of the greatest accomplishments of this era was to
establish a series of science courses that were to be taken during the four years of high
school. The first year always began with a general science class. This was in case a
student had to drop out before graduating, he or she would still have some experience
with science. There was considerable pressure for requiring students to take this course
and for teachers to make it significant to a student’s life. In 1940, Thomas Smyth found
that it was important for school science to be child-centered. He said, “We must teach
our science for the sake of the student and not for the sake of the subject. We must teach
to arouse a greater genuine interest in science...” (Smyth, 1940, p. 259, as cited in
DeBoer, 1991).
In 1945, there was a committee commissioned by the President of Harvard,
James B. Conant, which created the Harvard Committee on General Education. This
group published the report, General Education in a Free Society. President Conant
acknowledged the exclusiveness of higher education but he charged the committee to be
“concerned with a general education - a liberal education - not for the relatively few, but
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for a multitude” (Conant, 1945, p. ix). The resolve was educating all students to be well-
informed, responsible citizens (Muir, 2001).
In 1946, President Harry S. Truman issued an order to create the President’s
Scientific Research Board. This Board was to study the research and development of the
science programs in the country. The Board found that they had to make college science
more attractive to teachers through better salaries and quality programs, this also meant
having better facilities and equipment. In addition they realized that the students in K-12
needed better science education. They understood that if interests were not stimulated in
the early grades there would be no need for the bettering of college science programs
(DeBoer, 1991).
During the progressive era there were several events that earned a reputation as
an advancement Publishing the Cardinal Principles, which justified having science in
the core curriculum, was the first item. The Association for the Advancement of
Progressive Education and its journal, Progressive Education, which affirmed educator’s
ideas of the social importance of knowledge and helping a child relate real-world
applications in school. Learning was to be made fun and enjoyable. Probably the
biggest achievement was the institution of a series of science courses in the high schools,
beginning with general science, and including biology, chemistry and physics over the
next three years (DeBoer, 1991).
World War II had a direct effect on education in the United States in several
ways. College science students were not given special deferments, so many had to go
into the military. At that point there was a huge depletion of science students in the
colleges. When the war was over there were 600,000 GIs wanting to major in science,
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but only 50,000 science faculty. Many faculty members had left the field of science
during the war (DeBoer, 1991).
After the war ended, the President’s Scientific Research Board showed that there
was a need for universal improvement in the education system. A major shortcoming
was the observation that the best students were not in the technical fields even though it
was understood just how important science, math and technology were to military efforts.
Before 1950, science education had progressed, but now it was being turned away by
more traditional educational values. This was a great debate between the progressives
and the traditionalists (Bybee, 1997b).
F. James Rutherford, Director and Chief Education Officer Project
2061/American Association for the Advancement of Science (1997) noted that there were
some important differences that were worth looking at in science education at this time
following the post-Sputnik and the post-war/pre-Sputnik education concerns. Colleges
were worried about how they would be able to deal with all the veterans who were
returning from World War II. (Later, the same thing would happen with the baby-
boomers.) The focus was on how and what was taught, instead of who was taught
(Rutherford, 1997). Before Sputnik launched, it is interesting to note that in the U.S.
there was educational reform in progress in the 1950s and 1960s. Jerrold Zacharias was
setting the stage for science reform in 1956 when he began the Physical Science Study
Committee (PSSC). He was instrumental in having this committee make successful
recommendations that also occurred in producing some new textbooks and movies. This
occurred a year before the Russians had launched Sputnik (Bybee, 1997a).
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An event in August 1955 stimulated a renewed interest in science when President
Dwight D. Eisenhower announced that a series of satellites would be sent up into space
during the International Geophysical Year (IGY). Beginning on July 1,1957, the IGY
was declared ( 'http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/Historv/sputnik/. 1997). On August 26,
1957, the Russians landed Sputnik, the first artificial satellite to orbit the earth. On
December 6,1957, all American eyes were turned to Cape Canaveral, where on national
television many saw the Vanguard explode and collapse. The Vanguard was the first
United States rocket that was not tied to any type of weapons system. It had been
designed to launch satellites and even though it failed, it was the beginning of the space
program in the United States
( http://www.spaceline.org/rocketsum/vanguard.html. 200T ). This was a huge
embarrassment to the United States and “took on disastrous proportions” (Swenson,
Grimwood, & Alexander, 1989,5 7). After this event occurred, the United States was
alarmed that the Russians might win in the space race, including the possibility of space
vehicles carrying nuclear weapons (http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/Historv/sputnik/.
1997). For the public, Sputnik symbolized a huge threat to the United States and the
superiority of its progress in technology and political freedom.
After the Sputnik mediated reforms, was anything learned by the country?
Rutherford (1997) believes there were lessons learned, but would they last? Having some
of the world’s most prestigious scientists around at the right time helped to make science
education reform legitimate. Another lesson learned was to have teachers and scientists
work together to get more accomplished, more than if either group were working alone.
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The Golden Age (late 1950s - 1970)
Because of Sputnik, a new debate about American education was created, which
resulted in the public demanding a change in the math and science education. This was a
turning point and, in 1958, the response from the federal government resulted in
Congress passing the National Defense Education Act. Previously, the American public
had not wanted financial support from the federal government for schools because it was
afraid it would lead to control by the federal government (Bybee, 1997a).
Congress created the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA),
which led to the formation of the “Space Act” that was passed on October 1,1958
(http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/Historv/sputnik/. 1997). Bybee (1997b) sees this as
the result of the Soviet Union providing “Sputnik as a symbol for the problem, President
Kennedy provided manned flight to the moon as America’s solution to the problem” (p.
3).
Beginning in the 1950s, teachers had the help of the professional organizations to
investigate some new and different ways to teach science. For math and science this
period came to be known as the “Golden Age” because there were so many new
programs being developed (Bybee, 1997a). A teachers’ institute supported by the
National Science Foundation (NSF) was being set up as one of several science and math
projects underway at the time (Rutherford, 1997). The summer of 1957, before Sputnik,
the NSF had institutes in all of the states, except for five. For the next 20 years, there was
financial help from the United States government to assist scientists. After the
occurrence of Sputnik, the number of summer institutes expanded rapidly and it was not
until after the early 1970s that the members of institutes started to trail off (Rutherford,
1997).
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After American education had been criticized in the mid-1950s, and with the help
of the National Science Foundation, there were groups of scientists that began trying to
renew science education in the schools. There were philanthropic foundations that
provided support for funding of science curriculum projects. The Carnegie Corporation
of New York and the Rockefeller Brothers Fund were two foundations that were very
supportive and provided ample support for the expansion of new programs for science
curricula (Bybee, 1997b). “Never before had scientists from the highest echelons of the
academic community had such a controlling influence on elementary and secondary
school curriculum” (Atkin, 1997 p. 1). Many of these educators were very committed to
making a change in the schools and they believed that an educated populace was a very
important part of keeping world peace.
Rutherford (1997) believes that one of the successes of Sputnik was the “grand
alphabet” soup, as it was known, with new mathematics and science programs. In the
schools they were best identified by their acronyms. The high school science programs
included Biological Sciences Curriculum Study, known as BSCS; Earth Sciences
Curriculum Project, ESCP; and Physical Science Study Committee, PSSC. The
elementary programs were Elementary Science Study, ESS; Science - A Process
Approach, S-APA; and Science Curriculum Improvement Study, SCIS (Bybee, 1997a).
The curriculum reform that took place as a result of the Sputnik era with the
“Alphabet Soup” programs did not fail. Every reform has mistakes and weaknesses, but
overall these programs were a success and they exhibited a broad impact, and lasting
influence. In addition, these programs were widely used in commercial textbooks.
Bybee’s (1997b) thinking was that the Sputnik period lasted into the mid-1970s and
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reformers of that era kept pace. These were all programs where children learned by
direct experience, by doing, and also by reading and listening to a teacher. Dewey
recommends an activity curriculum because “verbal knowledge is of limited usefulness”
(Dewey, 1938).
David Olson (1973) wrote an article entitled “What is Worth Knowing and What
Can Be Taught.” He says “Dewey, like Comenius, Rousseau, and Pestalozzi before him
and Piaget after him, emphasize that there was a necessary link between the structure of
direct experience and the processes of education.” Dewey could see the contrast between
the way children learn with just tests and listening in class and “learning through
experience.” There has been psychological research that has proven this correct (Olson,
1973).
The obvious way to obtain a type of skill and also knowledge is to try doing it
and achieve “the goal in a variety of performatory domains.” Other ways to learn are
modeling and observing what is being done. Each different form of experience generates
more skills. “The amount of knowledge obtained from any experience increases as you
move from reinforcement, to modeling, to symbolic systems (Olson, 1973).
History of Standards
Standards are part of the foundation on which state accountability systems are
built. The critical ingredients are decided and designed by each state. Each state can
determine its own content standards and design. States have the ability to name the
achievement level they want to see in their students (e.g., exceeding, meeting or not
meeting standards; or advanced, proficient, or basic)
( http://www.ed.gOv/news/pressreleases/2004/01/01142004.html#standardsl.
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There was support for national standards in 1989 at the National Governors
Association and immediately after that President George Herbert Walker Bush endorsed
them along with President William Clinton who followed after President Bush. It was in
1991 that the President of the National Science Teachers Association wrote a letter to the
National Academy of Sciences and the National Research Council (NRC) to coordinate
the development of national science standards. The NRC was encouraged to take the
lead in developing some national standards and the major funding for this came from the
National Science Foundation (NSF) and the Department of Education.
The term “standards” has many meanings. In science, they are the “criteria to
judge quality:. . . what students know and are able to do; the quality of the program. ..
for students to leam; the quality of science teaching; the quality of the system that
supports science teachers and programs.” The hallmark of education in America is local
control. The teachers, administration and boards of education can make the decision
about what they want their students to leam
(http://www.nap.edU/readingroom/books/nses/html/l.html#whyt.
“The Standards help to chart the course into the future. By building on the best
of current practice, they aim to take us beyond the constraints of present structures of
schooling toward a shared vision of excellence
(http://www.nap.edU/readingroom/books/nses/html/l.html#whvl.
There are some goals for science that lie beneath the National Science Education
Standards to educate students so that they might:
• “experience the richness and excitement of knowing about and
understanding the natural world;
• use appropriate scientific processes and principles in making personal
decisions;
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• engage intelligently in public discourse and debate about matters of
scientific and technological concern; and
• increase their economic productivity through the use of the knowledge,
understanding, and skills of the scientifically literate person in their
careers”
(http://www.nap.edU/readingroom/books/nses/html/l.html#whyl.
These are goals that identify a society that is scientifically literate. The Standards
define what a student should know, be able to do and understand after 13 years of science
in the schools.
Science Frameworks
The history of the basic standards for science in California began with the 1970,
Science Framework for California Public Schools. The State Board of Education asked
an advisory board to put this book together. The Superintendent at this time was Max
Rafferty and he felt that no one in society could avoid the influence of science on our
culture. All persons needed to have some understanding of the subject in a realistic and
functional way. This is so important that it needs to be taught beginning in kindergarten.
It must be noted that the book is called a “science framework” and not “science
standards.” Rafferty said the framework provided a model for the teachers and
administrators to use it as a pattern to improve the teaching of science in the California
schools. Before this document was printed many hundreds of representatives from
different school districts and offices all over the State had read and approved it.
The learning of science meant something different than it used to and it gave
science a new interpretation. ‘The development of inquiry processes was identified as a
major purpose of science instruction” (California State Advisory Commission on Science
Education, 1970, p. 1). Much of the report described and illustrated new components of
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the curriculum and a new science program. It was left up to each school to fit it to their
own educational thoughts.
The 1970 Science Framework was based on Figure 1. Each chapter explained
one of the five parts of the sequence. Because this framework was written for classical
Evaluate
Revise and
implement
curriculum.
Perform
needs
assessm ent.
Determine
philosophical
position.
Derive
goals and
objectives.
Determine
optimum
conditions
for learning.
■%
Fig. 1. Sequence of Functions in Curriculum Development
Figure 1. Sequence of Functioning in Curriculum Development. Note: From Science
Framework for California Public Schools, by California State Advisory Committee on
Science Education, adopted by California State Department of Education, 1970.
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and historical purposes, the next framework would be for social values and ways to
resolve social problems. In conclusion, the years from 1970 to 2000 would be the time
when cultural implications and contributions to science could make “intellectual use of
leisure” (California State Advisory Commission on Science Education, 1970).
In 1974, there was an addendum to the 1970 Framework that included some
curriculum planning. It took into account the connection between science and society, an
interdisciplinary approach, major social forces that affect science learning, adapting
science learning to individual learners and knowing that science and technology were not
the only answers to society’s problems (California State Advisory Commission on
Science Education, 1974).
A Nation At Risk
The National Commission on Excellence in Education was created in 1981, with
a purpose of putting a report together about the quality of education in the United States.
The Chairman of the committee that prepared the report was David Gardner. When it
came out in April of 1983, it was titled “ A Nation At Risk: The Imperative for
Educational Reform. ”
The purpose of this report was to point out some of the problems that were
affecting the education in America in a negative way and to seek to provide some
solutions. The Commission made some specific charges for the group to address and
used five main sources for information to improve education (National Commission on
Excellence in Education, 1983). The document, A Nation at Risk, focused on content,
standards and expectations, time, teaching and leadership, and fiscal support (Collins,
1998).
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At this time, America was fearful of other countries developing industrial
knowledge at a greater rate than it was. The quality of the education in the United States
was starting to fall behind. Children had too many classes to choose from, the
expectations in some subject areas were low, much less time was spent studying, teachers
were not well prepared, there were limited amounts of supplies, and teacher pay was very
poor.
Project 2061
In 1985, the American Association for the Advancement of Science founded
Project 2061. This action was to help Americans become literate in math, science and
technology. The major question then was: How will science education in the schools
prepare children for the future? The title was also to be a reminder that the education
children received would shape the quality of their lives as adults in the 21s t century.
Project 2061 was to begin making bold changes in the way science was to be
taught. Children needed to know how the world worked, and needed to leam to think
critically and independently, so they would be able to lead productive lives. For Project
2061, a panel of experts, some being scientists, wanted to identify what would be most
important for children to know and be able to do in the areas of math, science and
technology. Project 2061 was designed to help future generations of Americans become
literate in these three areas. There was a need to engage children more in the process of
working actively together in investigations and to collect the evidence to provide an
explanation (Moreno, 2004). The change also required covering a topic more in depth,
changing the role of the teachers, and altering the way a child was to be assessed.
The Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) called
Project 2061 the “single most visible attempt at science education reform in American
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24
history” fhttp://www.project2061.org/about/default.htrn). Journalist, Julia Steiny (2001)
called it “the ultimate science project.” She said Project 2061 has done a huge favor to
education and has put together what looked like “a bazillion seemingly disparate learning
goals . . . in related ideas that develop sophistication over the course of grade levels” (p.
1H).
The first publication of Project 2061 was Science for All Americans (SFAA) in
1989. It was in answer to the question of what constitutes science literacy for adults
(AAAS, 1985). It was to lay out for American students what they should leam and what
they should know by the time they completed high school. These were to become know
as “science standards.” This was not a how-to book but a book of standards in science
education with ideas that are ever evolving conceptual structures (Collins, 1998). This
was the beginning of laying the groundwork for the National Science Education
Standards that would come later in the 1990s.
In 1989, there was a political event that took place to influence the process of
completing the National Science Education Standards. The National Governors’
Association had an education summit with President George H.W. Bush. The Governors
felt that something more needed to be done to improve the quality of education in their
states. They approved six national goals for education in grades K-12. National goals
seemed to be a very bold choice in the United States where the focus of local control was
regarded as a fundamental right. Elmore and Fuhrman (1994) called local control the
“most durable myth” and said that public education has always been a combination of
national, state and local control (Collins, 1998).
Elmore (1983) says that the people at the top (i.e., state superintendent, board of
education) want to be the ones to initiate the process, but if it does not work at the
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“delivery level,” that includes classroom teachers and their students, it does not make
much sense to introduce a policy from the top. Elmore has a term called “backward
mapping,” in which things begin at the local level. This is where people meet the
problem and develop a plan of how to attack it. They then “move it on up” to the policy
level. The process goes upward from bottom to top, rather than downward from the top
to the bottom.
There is a 1990 Framework that was also written by the California State Board of
Education and in the preface there is a reference to two earlier frameworks from 1978
and 1984. At the time the 1990 Framework was in place Bill Honig was the State
Superintendent of Public Instruction. In his introduction to the Framework he said
science is to be actively engaged in, meaning hands-on science. Students are to be taught
in a way so they will enjoy science learning. All five senses are to be applied in learning
science. Children should be able to come up with new ideas from the continuation of
other things they have learned earlier. Students need to see the meaning and utility of
science ideas and issues and it is at this point where testing and accountability become
important.
In the foreword of the framework Superintendent Honig summarized the science
programs into three age levels. High school science programs need to be as good as
science is in other first world countries. In the middle schools science should be able to
meet and reflect the different needs of students going through adolescence. At the
elementary level sound science education needs to be presented at every grade level
beginning in kindergarten. This framework is intended to help science teachers at all
levels appreciate and understand the reforms that have been made. Honig called this a
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“complex and challenging manuscript” (California State Advisory Commission on
Science Education, p. vii).
The 1990 Framework is about connections and each subsequent section uses
information from the section preceding and connects it to the following chapter. It also
shows students how science relates to other disciplines. The content of the book is
divided up into three major parts. The first is asking, “What is science?” and talks about
the themes and nature of science. The second concerns the content in three areas: 1)
physical, 2) earth, and 3) life sciences. The last section is concerning the way for
teachers to attain the desirable curriculum (California State Board Education, 1990).
The implementation of the information is ultimately left up to the teachers of
California, to model “the spirit and practice of science” to their students. It was hoped
that science literacy would be reached by the year 2000 (California State Board
Education, 1990).
Benchmarks for Science Literacy
The next publication after Project 2061 was Benchmarks for Science Literacy. It
was published in 1993, and was to be a companion account to SFAA, explaining the steps
showing how students were to progress on the road to science literacy. Many states used
Benchmarks for Science Literacy as an outline for their science standards and pulled
some of the content for teaching from Benchmarks. Together, these two reports were to
guide science reform in education (AAAS, 1993).
Benchmarks for Science Literacy also laid out what children should know by the
end of grades 2,5, 8, and 12. The reason for the grade separation was to have
checkpoints to see how children were progressing. The concern for science literacy was
to enable children to begin thinking independently and critically for themselves. To have
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this be a long lasting and comprehensive improvement, the program needed to include all
children, all subjects and every grade (AAAS, 1993).
National Science Education Standards
Bruce Alberts, President of the National Academy of Sciences called the
National Science Education Standards (NSES), a radical document and revolutionary.
He stated, “This is science for everybody. This is to make the country vital and
competitive . . . It’s science as inquiry based learning. And that’s a major revolution”
(Alberts, 1996, p. 1). The National Academy’s intent for the NSES was that “these
Standards are for all children” (Cromer, 1998). It exemplifies both equity and
excellence.
The goal of the nation at this time was for all children to achieve science literacy
and that is why the National Science Education Standards were written. They were to
provide the roadmap to reach that objective. The premise of the Standards was for
science to be an active process and the activities were to be “hands-on” as well as
“minds-on.” Inquiry was also central to the science learning for students, which meant
describing, questioning, testing and communicating with others (National Science
Education Standards, 1995).
Ravitch (1995) says the National Science Education Standards offer the most
valuable function by coordinating all state curriculums. Everyone, students and teachers,
colleges and universities, textbook writers and software designers, can all know exactly
what is expected because it is possible to coordinate the various parts with the NSES.
Rutherford said with National Science Education Standards, there were enough
challenges to keep focused for the next few decades.
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“There is no reason to have different standards in different states, especially in
mathematics and science, when well-developed international standards have already
been developed for these fields” (Ravitch, 1995, p. 27). Her belief is that there should
not be any departure from the international standards. In addition, America is so mobile
that when children move from one state to another, the international standards make it
easy for those children to adjust and know what is going to be expected of them.
In 1993, there was a National Survey of Science and Mathematics Education
conducted from a sample of 1,250 schools and roughly 6,000 teachers from grades 1-12
throughout the United States. One of the questions for the teachers was, ‘To what extent
do teachers support reform notions embodied in the . .. National Science Education
Standards?” Teachers said they felt like they could tty out new ideas found in the
Standards and be supported by their colleagues. The problem was, however, that they do
not have time during the week to work on the curriculum with their colleagues, much less
observe each other teaching (Weiss, 1994, p. ii).
Science Content Standards for California Public Schools
In 1995, the California Legislature commissioned a group called the “Academic
Standards Commission” (ASC) to create new, “world class” science standards, both in
performance and in content just for California. The ASC was to have 12 members
appointed by the Governor. This group did not write the standards, but appointed a
committee to do so. A Request for Proposal (RFP), which is the traditional manner in
which to start, was available for anyone who wished to apply. There were two responses
to the RFP, one from the Science Coalition at California State University, San Bernardino
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(CSU-SB), and the other from the Associated Scientists, headed by a professor at
California State University, Northridge (CSU-N) (Burdman, 1997).
Dr. Bonnie Brunkhorst, Professor of Geology and Science Education, headed the
group from CSU-SB. Their proposal included some renowned scientists with K-12
science education, other nationally known science leaders in education; a Nobel Laureate,
and Dr. Burton Richter from Stanford and Dr. Bruce Alberts who was President of the
National Academy of Sciences, both as advisors to the Commission. The institution in
charge of the finances would be CSU-SB (Schultz, 1998). The second RFP came from
the Associated Scientists, with Dr. Stan Metzenberg, Associate Professor of Biology at
California State University at Northridge. This plan had no budget, no affiliation with any
institution and no work plan.
It was not a surprise when the group from CSU-SB was awarded the contract.
There were some very essential differences in the two approaches of each group that sent
in an RFP. One major difference was whether there would be rote memorization of
science facts, or an understanding and learning process. There was much protest from the
Associated Scientists before the Commission and there was information given to the
press. Supposedly, the three Nobel Laureates were going to offer their services for free.
From the national press on down, the theme was “$178,000 for a bunch of Cal State San
Bernardino educrats or $0 for three Nobel Laureates?” (Schultz, 1998, p. 3)
Dr. Stan Metzenberg, from California State University at Northridge, had put the
“Nobel-studded team together” in order to stop the “dumbing-down” of the schools’
science curriculum in California. Metzenberg believed that since they were some of the
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top scientists in the world, they should be able to write the Standards for California. He
thought that they were the people that really understood science (Petit, 1997).
There was such a “brouhaha” over the rebuffed Nobel-studded team’s offer that
the state panel rescinded its selection and decided to start from scratch. Officials
acknowledged that they had violated some of the rules that had been set up and
unanimously voted to start over again (Burdman, 1997). There was another furor before
there was a vote to start over because of the type of groups that had applied. The public
was swayed by the fact that if three Nobel Laureates wanted to do it for free, what could
be better? (Saunders, 1997)
The panel had opted for CSU-SB because it was a more diverse group with
scientists, educators, and one Nobel Laureate; while the other group had been quite vague
about how they would put their work together. The Nobel Laureates were enraged with
the first dismissal and filed a formal appeal of the process (Colvin, 1997). They had
wanted to be provided with a written scorecard explaining why they had lost. Their pleas
produced nothing. The Executive Director of the State Standards Commission, Scott
Hill, said that with the decision being formally appealed, he could not make any kind of a
statement to the public (Petit, 1997). Dr. Glenn Seaborg, a Nobel laureate in chemistry,
had written a note along with the first proposal saying that science content continues to
be watered-down. The reason this is being done is to produce obvious bits of information
continually for less skilled students. Seaborg said there is a moral obligation to stop the
tide of mediocrity and to teach our children to understand the scientific principles
(Colvin, 1997).
At this time Delaine Eastin was State Superintendent of Public Instruction in
California. She said the Commission staff wanted to avoid a lawsuit so they decided to
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start the process over. Although Eastin did go along with the original decision, she
stated, “You get what you pay for. I don’t think getting something for free is necessarily
all it’s cracked up to be. You don’t have control over the product, and you can’t hold
anybody really accountable” (Burdman, 1997, p. A17).
All the input and feedback that had been received by the Commission from
public hearings was never put into any methodical data analysis. Therefore, when it was
presented to the Commissioners, it did not seem to have much credence and appeared as
though it was grossly disorganized. Most of the other public reviews and meetings were
never analyzed and some were only open to the public for a short time or not at all
(Schultz, 1998). The public hearings of this draft before the State Board of Education was
done with a two-week notice and planned for the last two weeks in August when most
people were away on vacation.
After responses to the second set of RFP’s were handed in on January 27,1998,
Governor Pete Wilson appointed both Dr. Brunkhorst and Dr. Metzenberg to be
consultants to the Academic Standards Commission. The next day the Governor asked
Dr. Glenn Seaborg from the Associated Scientists to be part of the Commission because
there was a vacancy. The Chairman then asked Seaborg to be head of the Science
Committee, and he in turn asked Dr. Rollie Otto to “facilitate” the teams. This meant that
the balance was gone because Seaborg (from the team of Nobel Laureates) had the
dominating role (Schultz, 1998). Roland Otto had been recruited by Dr. Glenn Seaborg
24 years earlier to work at the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory as a nuclear physicist. Dr.
Otto was on the winning team, but said that he did not think the two groups were that far
apart in philosophy. There was just a difference in ideas as to how to teach science (Petit,
1997).
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Months before that there were several Nobel Laureates who joined with other
well-known names in science opposing the science standards. Charles Townes, one of
the Nobel Laureates, wrote to a physicist friend, Andrew Sessler, saying he saw a huge
emphasis on memorization of facts about science instead of having fun exploring and
experimenting (Asimov, 1998). The California Science Content Standards are a long list
of facts for students to leam. The National Standards give eight content categories and
the California Standards give only four. There was major criticism from key scientific
organizations, such as the American Association for the Advancement of Science
(AAAS) and the National Academy of Sciences (NAS). These groups saw California’s
Standards as opposing the vision NSES had in its plan for science education (Sessler,
1998).
In sharp contrast to the time spent on drafting the Benchmarks for Science
Literacy and the National Science Education Standards, the initial draft of the California
Science Content Standards was written basically in three days with approximately 30
people, in a hotel suite at the Los Angeles International Airport. Writing the National
Science Education Standards took an extensive amount of time and much compromising
compared with the writing of the California Science Content Standards that were done
very hurriedly and with much controversy. After submitting the draft to several public
hearings and revising it a couple of times, the final draft was approved and given to the
Committee and the Commission without any additional public hearings, with the hope
that it would be adopted. Some of the content was much different from the NSES, but the
writers never gave any reason why it diverged (Bianchini & Kelly, 2002).
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On Saturday, October 10,1998, Asimov reported in the San Francisco Chronicle
that on the day before the California Board of Education adopted the California Science
Content Standards. The vote was unanimous and completed a major piece of a
comprehensive plan for the state to improve the public education. Standards were
defined as “specific lists of concepts and facts in a given subject” (Asimov, 1998). The
Board of Education President, Yvonne Larsen, said they were pleased and the Standards
would elevate our kids to a higher level of science education. The State Superintendent
Delaine Eastin said this was a good turning point for a system that had been under attack.
She also said it was an exhilarating time for California education.
Conclusions
Science seems to have been an important subject in the schools for over 100
years. Soon after World War II, the Russians launched Sputnik and this was when the
people of the United States realized that the Russians seemingly were getting ahead of the
Americans in the space race, science, math and technology. Project 2061 then began and
this was the beginning of change in the United States education system. It has taken a
very long time for the State of California to put the Standards and Framework together.
The story behind how it all evolved is very unclear.
Implications
History is the “aggregate of past events, the discipline that records and interprets
past events involving human beings, possibly a record or narrative description of past
events” (WordNet, 2005). Earl J. McGrath was the U.S. Commissioner of Education
from 1949-1953, during the Truman Administration. McGrath described general
education as “the thread that ought to weave a pattern of meaning into the total learning
experience” (McGrath, 1974, p. 282).
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There is no real record or narrative of the past events or the actual occurrences
regarding what the committees did while they were in session and how the information
was gathered for the California Science Standards. The history should be the complete
story of all events and the order in which things occurred.
Reviewing newspaper articles and conference papers that have been written
about the California Science Content Standards does not seem to weave together a story
that provides all of the information that is required. Some of the newspaper articles the
researcher found only attacked the writing of the Standards rather than providing correct
information (Burdman, 1997; Colvin, 1997: Petit, 1997; & Saunders, 1997).
It is because of these reasons that the researcher proposed to go out and
interview the people that were the closest to the circumstances surrounding the
development of the California Science Content Standards. Speaking to the people
suggested by Dr. Bonnie Brunkhorst (Appendix A) and others that may be suggested,
should give the researcher an opportunity to piece together the events, to discover what
occurred, and to determine how the California Science Content Standards came to be
written.
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CHAPTER III
RESEARCH METHOD
Introduction
The focus of this study was to find and talk with people involved in writing the
California Science Content Standards and those who assisted in any other way with the
Standards. After interviewing these people there was a story that unfolded about what
happened before, during and after the Standards were written.
This was a qualitative study and as such the researcher used multiple sources of
information. The sources came from interviews, archival government documents,
newspapers and journal articles. Yin (1993) calls on the use of different sources to focus
on an accurate description, triangulation. Triangulation gives strength to a study and ‘Tar
exceeds. . . other research strategies, such as experiments, surveys, or histories” (Yin,
1993, p. 91). When different sources are combined and analyzed, a convergence of
information seems to take place. The use of these “multiple sources of evidence. . .
allows an investigator to address a broader range of... issues” (p. 92).
Research Questions
1) What events led to the writing of new California Science Standards and
Frameworks?
2) What people, deliberations and processes were involved in the
development of the Standards?
3) What insights, impressions and suggestions for the enhancement of the process
may be gleaned for a review of the development of the California Science
Content Standards?
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Nature of the Study
The researcher developed a list of people who were involved in some way with
the development of the California Science Content Standards. The interviews were
added to a review of newspaper reports and any other official documents that related to
the focus of the study.
Subjects
After interviewing some of the key informants, the researcher used what Patton
(1987) calls the “snowball or chain sampling” process. The people being interviewed
were asked if they knew of others that might be good informants to interview. Patton
(1987) reminds us that in most situations some names continue to occur and those are the
other key names to interview.
Triangulation is the best way to construct checks and balances and have the best
data collection (Patton, 1987). Denzin’s (1978) premise is that there is no single method
that solves the problem adequately and triangulation should be used in all investigations.
Robert Yin (1994) shows in Figure 2 how triangulation can get a researcher to the facts.
Collecting information from several different sources all aiming toward the same
fact substantiated what it was the researcher was looking for. This showed real
triangulation, rather than just taking one source and reporting the findings from one area.
Evidence from these sorts of multiple measures lowers the possibility of problems and
having confidence in the authenticity. This rates a study much higher in the terms of
overall quality.
There are great benefits when using all six types of evidence and Yin (1994) says
they can be maximized if three principles are followed. All the evidence can establish
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reliability and construct validity in a case study. Yin defines construct validity as
“establishing correct operation measures for the concepts being studied” (p. 33). There
are three tactics used to increase the validity: 1) using multiple sources of evidence, 2)
have a chain of evidence, and 3) having key informants review the case study reports
(Yin, 1994).
Using the open-ended interview sometimes can lead to other names of people not
on the list of interviewees. After talking to many people there was very little conflicting
information found. Two ways to analyze the information is by “making a matrix of
CONVERGENCE OF
MULTIPLE SOURCES OF EVIDENCE
(single study)
Documents
Observations
(direct and
participant)
Archival
records
FACT
Structured
interviews and
surveys
Open-ended
interviews
Focused
interviews
Figure 2. Real Triangulation. Note: From Case Study Research Design and Methods, (p.
93), by R. K. Yin, 1994, Thousand Oaks, CA; Sage Publications. Copyright 1994 by
Sage Publications, Inc. Reprinted with permission.
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categories and placing the evidence within... categories,” or “putting information in
chronological order. . (Yin, 1994, p. 103)
The researcher found documents on the Internet and in the library. There were
archival records and assembly bills to read in the California library in Sacramento.
Interviews started out to be structured but when an informant began to talk they often had
a story to tell and the researcher just listened. These were open-ended interviews where
names of other good informants sometimes surfaced. When multiple sources are
combined, Yin (1994) calls this “the development of converging lines of inquiry’ ' ’ (Yin,
1994, p. 92). When all of this information is gathered together, this is the process of
triangulation.
Research Procedure
The research was done in Sacramento at the Stanley Mosk Library and
information was looked for in the archives. Government documents were be reviewed
for any bills that might have been passed in addition to the collection of minutes and
other documents that were printed during that time. Newspaper articles related to the
process of the Standards were also a source of information. The people who were direct
participants were the primary sources of information. After talking to them, some
suggested other names of people that might be helpful (Booth, Colomb & Williams,
2003).
It only took a few questions to get the interviewee to start telling the story as they
remembered it. Several time one contact led to another, so it was not know at the
beginning of the research how many people might be interviewed. The assumption had
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been that once the discussion got started the snowball effect would take place, the
researcher would come up with some spontaneous questions, and die interviewee would
provide information the researcher had not thought to ask about If the interviewees
permitted, the interviews were tape-recorded.
Government documents, magazine and newspaper articles were researched for
any type of information found about die California Science Content Standards being
written. Along with this information, the group of people listed in Appendix A were
contacted and interviewed. There were several others who were contacted, but they
declined to be interviewed. One person said they were afraid that they might be
misrepresented, another gave an interview and called a week later and said nothing that
had been said could be used. A third said after looking over the IRB materials (USC
UPIRB #05-08-209) they chose not to participate but gave no other reason. Some never
responded to the request at all.
Case Studies
Much can be learned from case studies, especially when a case involves people
and a situation needs to be studied in great depth. Interviewing a number of people can
result in some very rich information. Many angles of the story can be heard which are
unique to each person. When all the pieces of information from each person are gathered
together a true story begins to unfold.
Case studies are a large part of this research and Patton (1987) says that when
data overlaps in collection and analysis, this improves the quality of data for a case study.
This is the logic of triangulation. More than one method must be used. ‘Triangulation is
a powerful solution to the problem of relying too much on any single data source or
method and thereby undermining the validity and credibility of findings because of the
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weaknesses of any single method. Triangulation is the recognition that the evaluator
needs to be open to more than one way of looking at a program” (p. 61).
Yin’s ideas of open-ended case studies have a higher rating of overall quality. It
is most important to corroborate documents and supplement evidence using other
sources. Using archival records were produced for a certain purpose and the audience
must be aware of this when interpreting materials. The open-ended interviews are a very
important source and are considered as “verbal reports.” To tie all of this together the
reliability of a study needs to have a chain of evidence (Yin, 1994).
Timeline
The interviewees were contacted by telephone to set up appointments for either
face-to-face interviews or phone interviews. The first interviews began up in Berkeley at
the end of September 2005. The last interview took place in the early spring of 2006.
Data Reduction
Rather than forming conclusions, this story was imparted step-by-step. Since it is
the histoiy of the California Science Content Standards, hopefully all the information
that was received is true or as close to the truth as possible. To test for the truthfulness of
the informants, information from others was compared. Only one or two people needed
to be called again to verify what was said. After receiving all the information it was put
together with the minutes and laid out chronologically to tell the story of how the Science
Content Standards for California unfolded.
A book has been written about the evolution of the math standards in California.
The information about the California Science Content Standards could possibly be as
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interesting or more so than the math standards and may be written up as a book to be
published.
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CHAPTER IV
RESEARCH FINDINGS
The history of how the California Science Content Standards (CSCS) resulted
from interviewing twenty-six people working in different areas of the project. The two
main consultants that sent in a Request for Proposals to write the Standards were
interviewed, one was by email only and the other was a face-to-face interview. Others
that were interviewed were Commissioners, State Board Members, outside reviewers,
State Education Department employees and some well-known outside scientists and
science educators. The other main source of information was from findings in the
archives of the State Library in Sacramento. Looking for minutes from meetings held by
the Academic Standards Commission and the State Board of Education. There were also
four other key players asked to participate but they were not willing to talk. None of the
four gave any reason why they did not want to participate.
The Present
Diane Ravitch, former Assistant Secretary of Education, “is commonly
recognized as one of the chief architects of the modem standards movement” (Marzano
& Kendall, 1996). In her book, National Standards in American Education: A Citizen’ s
Guide, she says, “Standards are created because they improve the activity of life”
(Ravitch, 1995, p. 9). Standards define just what is to be taught and expected of the
student’s performance (Ravitch, 1995).
The term “standard” has multiple meanings. Criteria for science education
standards are to judge quality: what students know, what they are able to do, the quality
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of science programs, quality of teaching, quality of the system that is supporting teachers,
their programs and the quality of assessments
(http://www.nap.edU/readingroom/books/nses/html/l.html#why~).
Standards offer a way to develop criteria for assessing growth and effectiveness
of instructional practices. They can help identify clear targets for student outcomes. But
care must be taken to avoid narrowly defined instructional objectives without first
identifying broader education purposes and goals (Bemauer, 1999).
Darling-Hammond and Wise (1985) said standards are directed at students and
are “intended to influence the actions of teachers.” Setting standards is a:
. . . means for rationalizing teaching by defining goals, methods for reaching the
goals, and/or means for evaluating whether the goals have been achieved.
Broadly speaking, standards are intended to improve the quality of education by
focusing the attention of teachers and students on particular types of learning.
(Darling-Hammond & Wise, 1985 p. 317)
The way teachers view standards:
. . . depend on the degree to which the policies impose constraints on their ability
to meet what they perceive to be the needs of their students. . . teachers’ views of
standards often depend on how multidimensional or flexible they perceive the
standards to be. (Darling-Hammond & Wise, 1985 p. 317)
The California “Science Framework incorporates and builds on the science
content standards . . . It is the blueprint for reform of the science curriculum, instruction,
professional preparation and development, and instructional materials in California.”
The Framework provides a guide for educators to achieve the goals that have been set
It is directed to several different audiences including—“teachers, administrators,
instructional materials developers, professional development providers, parents,
guardians, and students. It makes the important point that science education must take
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place in conjunction with other core subjects, not in isolation from them” (CDE,
2004, p. v).
The Framework out-lines [sic] the implementation of the Science Content
Standards for California Public Schools and connects the learning of science
with the fundamental skills of reading, writing, and mathematics. The Science
Standards contain a concise description of what to teach at specific grade levels;
this framework extends those guidelines by providing the scientific background
and the classroom context designed to provide valuable insights to both novice
and expert science teachers. (CDE, 2004, p. 2)
This framework is intended to (1) organize the body of knowledge that
students need to learn during their elementary and secondary school years; and
(2) illuminate the methods of science that will be used to extend that
knowledge during the students’ life-times. (CDE, 2004, p. 2)
The main audience for the Frameworks is teachers, because they are the ones
that are to implement the Standards. They are “designed to provide valuable insights to
both novice and expert science teachers” (CDE, 2004, p. 2). It also serves as a guide to
the type of scholarly teaching of science that is expected. The publishers must adhere to
the rigorous criteria in the Frameworks. Parents should also find the Framework useful
for helping their child with homework. Finally, “the Science Framework communicates
to the science faculty at all California institutions of higher education what they may
expect of entering students” (CDE, 2004, p. 3).
In 1998, the California Science Content Standards (CSCS) were adopted, and a
message from the State Board of Education and State Superintendent of Public
Instruction introduced the Standards as academically rigorous in science. The Standards
in each core subject marked a turning point in the reform movement that began in 1983.
“Standards are a bold initiative... the knowledge and skills” a student needs to acquire
are explicitly stated for each grade. “Standards describe what to teach, not how to teach
it.” California has a tradition of local control of schools with the support of families and
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other community partners. “Standards are here to stay.” Since the adoption of the
Standards everything has been aligned to the curriculum: instruction, teacher preparation,
assessment and professional development. “Standards are a continuing commitment to
excellence.” These Standards have put California on the path to success in science
education. Reed Hastings, then President of the State Board of Education (BOE), and
Jack O’Connell, State Superintendent of the Public Instruction made these comments at
the beginning of the finished California Science Content Standards (CSCS, 1998, p. vi).
The introduction to the California Science Content Standards (NSES) says that
California has given grades kindergarten through twelve the essential skills and
knowledge that students will need to be scientifically literate in the twenty-first century.
The BOE has affirmed that they have developed “worid-class” Standards for California
students. Students will be able to learn in different ways: reading, solving Standards-
based problems and doing laboratory investigations and experiments.
There is the question of why California thought that the State needed it’s own
standards when the National Science Education Standards were already in place. Dr.
Lawrence Woolf, a research physicist from San Diego’s General Atomics had been active
in science education outreach in the State for over 10 years and he said:
California’s Science Standards differ from the National Science Standards in
fundamental ways. While the National Science Education Standards include
science content as well as discussing the role science plays in society, the
California Standards are almost exclusively based on science content. (Garrett,
2005, p. 3)
The major point of the National Standards was learning science by doing, science as
inquiry. Most of that disappeared from the California Standards and Framework.
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The National Science Education Standards took three years to write and the
California Science Content Standards were done in approximately a year’s time. In an
interview with Phil LaFontaine, science consultant for the California Department of
Education, he said the NSES had more wide-open statements (LaFontaine, personal
communication, 2005). The NSES were grouped together by grades: K-4,5-8 and 9-12.
There is strong support for not setting grade-by-grade standards for 6-8 and 9-12. In
addition, Dr. Bruce Alberts, then President of the National Academies of Science:
. . . argued for more flexibility in the K-5 years, so as to allow school districts to
choose more effectively from among the large menu of excellent elementary
science modules developed by the Lawrence Hall of Science, the National
Science Resources Center, and others. thttp://www. sci-ed-
ga.org/standards/Albertstestimony.htmlV
But California still decided they needed their own “world-class” standards that were more
rigorous. The California Standards had a set of four strands: physical, earth, life science,
and investigation and experimentation, in each grade.
The Academic Standards Commission (ASC) looked at other science programs
from around the world, listened to hundreds of hours of testimony, read pages of written
recommendations and hosted nine community meetings up and down the State of
California. The State BOE also held five public hearings up and down the State. “The
goal remains clear, and these Standards are the foundation for increasing the scientific
literacy of all students” (CSCS, 1998).
In 2006, people are still angry, frustrated and even outraged at the California
Science Content Standards written in 1998. Dr. Andrew Sessler from the Lawrence
Berkeley National Laboratory summed it up quite well when he said:
There is considerable concern within the scientific community about the
Proposed California Science Standards. Many individual scientists . . . and 10
scientific societies have voiced concern . . . These scientists strongly support the
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commitment to raising educational standards in California. But they are
dismayed that these Science Standards. . . utterly disregard common sense in
what they require children to learn at various grade levels. Their point, and mine,
is that these standards would be impossible to implement. A group of
California scientists . . . has offered to help correct the Proposed Standards by
bringing them into line with the National Standards and developing hands-on
and exploratory activities, which we are convinced are required so as to keep and
develop children’s interest in science. (Sessler, personal communication, 1998)
This obviously did not happen the way Dr. Sessler wished it to be as the history
unfolds. Some people still do not want to talk about it, while others do not have enough
time to say all the things they would like to about their displeasure over the resulting
California Science Content Standards.
When Dr. Ted Schultz, who was head of the American Physical Society’ s (APS)
Education and Outreach in 1998, was asked about his perspective on the formulation of
the California Science Content Standards, he stated that the events surrounding the
writing of the Standards is an important story to tell. “The conflicting goals of the
different approaches to science education, the evidence for each, the supporters of each,
and the intensely political maneuvering behind the scenes have all been missed.”
Newspapers have totally misrepresented the issues. “Attempts to correct the wrong
impressions . . . were rejected . . . by the State’s leading newspapers” fhttp: //w w w.sci-ed-
ga.org/standards/history.html).
Dr. Larry Woolf, a physicist at General Atomics, when asked about his
perspective, responded that the stories that had never been told before should be made
public. Dr. Woolf did not participate in the writing of the Standards, but he did know
about many of the activities surrounding the writing of the CSCS. He said that he was
surprised when he was not invited to be at the three-day meeting when the science
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committee worked at the nearby Los Angeles Airport (Woolf, personal communication,
2005).
It is curious to note that in other states such as Delaware, the Department of
Education lists all of the people who were involved in writing their Science Standards
taking almost four pages at the beginning of the book. North Dakota does the same sort
of thing in its introduction with two full pages of people who helped to write the
Standards. Massachusetts also is proud to list all who advised or contributed with two
pages of names. However, looking in the front of the California Science Content
Standards there is one page, where someone might look for the year the book was
published and above that in fine print are the members of the California State Board of
Education, the Academic Content Standards Commission with a few other
acknowledgments (CSES, 1998). The list is in such small type that one might totally
miss the names. Why is it that California downplayed its list of some of the contributors
and Commissions that helped to create these “rigorous, world class Standards?”
(Appendix B)
Science Frameworks
Before writing the California Science Content Standards other documents
addressed science education in California. These included four sets of Science
Frameworks: 1970,1978,1984,1989, for the State of California, along with American
Association for the Advancement of Science Benchmarks for Science Literacy and the
National Science Education Standards.
The Science Framework for California Public Schools: Kindergarten - Grades
One Through Twelve was prepared by the California State Advisory Committee on
Science Education and adopted by the California State Board of Education in 1970, when
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Max Rafferty was the Superintendent of Public Instruction (California State Department
of Education, 1970). In March of 1974, there was a short addendum to the Framework of
1970, which said it “is as viable today as it was when published in 1970” (California
State Board of Education, 1974, p. 1).
In the Framework of 1970 “the essential ingredients and structure of a science
education program” were defined. It “first states it philosophical position and describes
the unique nature of science as it relates to science education. Emphasis is then placed on
a system of curriculum development based on goals, operational objectives and
instructional strategies and techniques” (CDE, 1970, Introduction).
In 1978, another edition of this framework, funded by the National Foundation of
Science (NSF) under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, Title V, would be
written. These were for Kindergarten and Grades One Through Twelve (California State
Department of Education, 1978). Science Framework Addendum was developed by the
Science Curriculum Framework and Criteria Committee and adopted in December 1983,
by the California State Board of Education (California State Department of Education,
1984). This Addendum augments the original Framework from 1978:
With specificity and certitude that set a standard for the forthcoming textbook
adoption in science . . . articulates what students should learn by specifying the
concepts to be learned at various grade-level spans and, with intentional overlap
between adjacent spans, shows the spiraling development of conceptual
understanding. (Honig, 1984, Forward, 5 6)
It is specific but not overly prescriptive. There is flexibility allowed for different student
needs.
The State Department of Education (SDE) in 1987 developed the Science: Model
Curriculum Guide for Kindergarten Through Grade Eight. The California State
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Department of Education worked with an advisory committee to write this curriculum
guide (CDE, 1987).
On November 9,1989, the California State Board of Education adopted the last
set of Science Frameworks for California Public Schools. It was developed by the
Science Curriculum Framework and Criteria Committee and recommended to the State
Board for adoption (California State Department of Education, 1990). This is part of the
history of events that led to the writing of the current California Science Content
Standards. The 1990 Science Framework was adopted when Bill Honig was the
Superintendent of Schools.
In the 1990 Framework “thematic teaching, coupled with active learning” is what
was provided. In 1990 the Framework was interested in active learning, meaning:
Instructional activities where students take charge of learning the major ideas in
science. There are many ways in which students can be active learners.. ..
active learning includes active reading, listening, discourse, and using new
learning technologies. (CDE, 1990, Forward)
This new Science Framework arrives at a time when educators . . . are
grasping for a way to help all students achieve scientific literacy. Two previous
frameworks, issued in 1978 and 1984, attempted to address the definition and
development of scientific literacy. (CDE, 1990, Forward)
This framework is designed to help science educators at all levels understand and
appreciate the needed reforms. This framework is about connections.
The 1990 Framework has a discussion of the nature of science, a need for science
educators to give examples of scientific investigations: objectivity, consistency and
testability. There also needs to be connections across science disciplines to other subjects
to show how science relates to other subjects. The content of science is addressed and
connects the three branches of science. “Ultimately, the implementation of the ideas in
this framework rests with California’s classroom teachers” (CDE, 1990, Forward).
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In the last section of the 1990 Frameworks it discussed assessment programs
being aligned with the instruction national, both in format and content. Performance of
the students and investigation are part of the role of the assessments (CDE, 1990).
Science For All Americans (SFAA) (1989) was next and answered the question
about what constitutes science literacy, recommended what students should know and be
able to do when they are out of school. Project 2061: Benchmarks for Science Literacy
(1993) is a companion book to go along with SFAA.
Project 2061 promoted science literacy and “addresses the particular needs and
interest of individual students” (AAAS, 1993, p. XI). Benchmarks is for teachers to
design curriculum that makes sense to them. The chapter order is not related to the
importance of topics. It “specifies thresholds rather than average or advanced
performance” (AAAS, 1993, p. XIII). This means it gives the level all students should be
expected to reach. Technical language is avoided in benchmarks. It “sheds only partial
light on how to achieve the goals it recommends” (AAAS, 1993, p. XIII). Teachers must
clarify it for themselves and their students. Benchmarks is only one tool and is a
companion for SFAA.
The National Science Education Standards (NSES) were published in 1996
(National Academy of Sciences, 1995). In the NSES the standards and frameworks were
combined. In Table 1 the NSES were summed up well as to which parts were standards
for the students and frameworks for teachers and educators. Each of these books and all
of the publications of Frameworks had acknowledged all the contributors that helped to
write these publications.
Chronologically, the different activities began with: Scope, Sequence and
Coordination, which took place approximately from 1990-1993; the California State
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Table 1
Guide to Using the Standards_________________
PURPOSE
Defining scientific literacy
Principles and Definitions (Chapter 2)
Content Standards (Chapter 6)
Providing guidance for teachers and other
Science educators
Teaching Standards (Chapter 3)
Assessment Standards (Chapter 5)
Professional Development Standards
(Chapter 4)
Clarifying the responsibility of policy makers
And the community
Program Standards (Chapter 7)
System Standards (Chapter 8)_________________
(National Research Council, 1995)
University, National Science Foundation (CSU-NSF) project from 1993-1995; the
Challenge Standards from 1995-1997; and the California Science Content Standards that
were approved in 1998.
1990 -1995
The Scope, Sequence, and Coordination (SS&C) was started by the National
Science Teachers Association (NSTA) as a major reform effort to restructure secondary
science teaching. It was a national curriculum project for high school science education
fhttp://scied.gsu.edu/Hassard/mos/3.3d.htmlf. SS&C was the first reform effort to prepare
students in high school “to achieve the vision of the national science education
Standards”
(http://www.accessexcellence.org/LC/SER/page3.html.
Later, a California State University - National Science Foundation (CCSU-NSF)
Project got its start sometime around 1993, when Dr. Herb Brunkhorst from California
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State University at San Bernardino, (CSUSB), brought the California State University
campuses together through the California Science Teachers Association (CSTA). This
group of interested scientists and science educators on each of the CSU campuses formed
a fairly cohesive group (H. Brunkhorst, personal communication, 2005).
Talking about the project, Dr. Herb Brunkhorst stated, “It basically was the first
attempt to get scientists, K-12 science teachers and science educators talking to each
other. Every campus had a team with a scientist, a science educator and a K-12 science
person.” This NSF project was a science teaching development grant. What this group
put together was not a set of Standards but it was “to improve the preparation of science
teachers It wasn’t like we planned the grant to feed into the Standards. It just
happened to be that the grant preceded the Standards.” As a result, the participants had a
chance to think about what they wanted to contribute when it became time for the
Standards to be written. The whole thing was basically an “unplanned involvement” (H.
Brunkhorst, personal communication, 2005).
Dr. Herb Brunkhorst said that with the SS&C preceding the California State
University - National Science Foundation (CSU-NSF) project, one group of people sort
of ‘Ted into the next group so that by the time the Standards came around, there had
developed a fairly close network of science educators and interested scientists” (H.
Brunkhorst, personal communication, 2005).
Dean Gilbert, then the Long Beach District Science Consultant, was politically
active in the Long Beach Unified School District, the third largest school district in the
state. The district of Long Beach began developing Standards before the State Standards.
Since Gilbert was science consultant for Long Beach he was in the political mainstream
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and many people were asking for direct input from Long Beach at that time. Gilbert was
involved later in the review process of the California Science Content Standards, the
input process and he also testified at some of the public hearings (Gilbert, personal
communication, 2005). However, he was not on the Commission.
Challenge Standards -1995
In 1995, the California Alliance for Mathematics and Science (CAMS) wrote a
position paper on the reform of California’s science education to give to the new
Superintendent of Public Instruction, Delaine Eastin. A major outcome of that meeting
was the formation of the California Science Education Advisory Committee (CSEAC).
This was the “establishment of an ‘official’ science education advisory committee.” The
group was to share information and work together to improve science education in the
schools (http://www.wested.org/werc/cseac.htmll.
CSEAC has a membership of 35+ organizations from statewide professional
development groups, county offices, districts, CDE, national labs, institutions of
higher education, business and industry, and parents. Its meetings are convened
jointly by CAMS and the WestEd Eisenhower Regional Consortium every 6-8
weeks, are held at various locations around the state and are open to
organizational representatives as well as interested individuals.
((http://www.wested.org/were/cseac.htmB
Jo Topps from WestEd, said the groups, CSEAC and some from WestEd, took it
upon themselves to put together this first set of Standards because they “knew the other
ones were coming, so we wanted to be ready.” The Challenge Standards were written in
1997 in preparation for the California Science Content Standards (CSCS) that were to be
developed later. Some of those involved in writing these Challenge Standards were Dr.
Art Sussman, Director of WestEd; Kathy DiRanna of WestEd, Dr. Rollie Otto from the
University of California at Berkeley, Dr. Bonnie Brunkhorst from the University of
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California at San Bernardino, and Dr. Helen Quinn from Stanford University. The main
group divided into four smaller groups: physical science, earth science, biology, and
investigation and experimentation (I&E). Jo Topps, Dr. Art Sussman, Kathy DiRanna
and Dr. Helen Quinn were on the physical science team. Dr. Bonnie Brunkhorst was
involved in writing the earth science section. The physical science group also wrote the
Investigation & Experimentation section, which they didn’t expect would be a part of the
CSCS. Kathy DeRanna was one that helped also in writing the biology section. Dr.
Rollie Otto wrote the Standards for the high school section (Topps, personal
communication, 2005).
The WestEd group became involved and took the development of the Challenge
Standards upon themselves. They put together the Challenge Standards in 1997, so that
they would have their “ducks in a row” when it came time for the call for the California
State Science Standards (CSCS). When the time came “the State Department didn’t want
any part of the Board and the Board didn’t want to hear about the Challenge Standards so
they just kind of went by the wayside” (Topps, personal communication, 2005).
Karen Cerwin, also of WestEd, said they had put the Challenge Standards
together with the idea:
Let’s help the student have some direction, let’s make the suggestion to the State
Board of Education and the Commissioners that they at least begin with this
document. In many ways the Challenge Standards are a much more organized,
much more coherent document because of that. (Cerwin, personal
communication, 2005)
Cerwin thought “it was really proactive to try to do a strategic move of putting up a
quality document before it was even asked for” (Cerwin, personal communication,
2005).
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The group that put it together thought it was a good document. They knew that
there was going to be a call for new Standards and the group based the Challenge
Standards on a more detailed set of Standards than the National Science Education
Standards (NSES). They told a more conceptual story with a header standard depicting a
big concept or idea followed by three or four other supporting ideas. (Figure 3) In the
Challenge Standards (Table 2) each section such as A-l has several paragraphs of
information for the teachers for K-3, 3-6,6-9 and 9-12. In the National Science
Education Standards, there is information for each section, K-4,5-8, and 9-12, but only
Earth and Space Science
Big Idea 1
Earth materials and structures are organized in systems; earth itself is part of a larger system.
K-12 Concept IB
rianets are organized in
, and chemical composition.
K-2 Standard:
materials can be distinguished by many properties,'such
as all materials are made of smaller parts, materials may
sink or float, and materials may be found in different
states.
3-5 Standard:
Every student demonstrates an understanding that solids, liquids, and
gases have different properties and can be found at different places on
earth. Students are able to determine those properties.
6-$ Standard: ^
Every student demonstrates an ability to measure the relative density of
earth materials and to explain layering on, in, and above Earth and
other planets based on density and states of matter.
9-12 Standard:
Every student demonstrates an understanding that layers on earth and in
its atmosphere may be compared to those on other planets and moons.
Students use direct and indirect evidence to make these comparisons.
Figure 3. Sample of the Challenge Standards. From Challenge Standards for Student
Success - Science, (p. 8), by California Department of Education, Prepublication Copy,
1997.
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Table 2
Example of
Challenge Standards_______________
LIFE SCIENCE
K-3, 3-6,6-9 & 9-12
Section A - Living Things
A-l What are the characteristics of
living things?
A-2 How do the structures of living
things perform their functions,
interact with each other, and
contribute to the maintenance
and growth of the organism?
A-3 What are the relationships of
living organisms, and how are
living things classified?
A-4 How do humans interact with
other living things?
Section B - Cells, Genetics, and
Evolution
B-l What are cells? What are their
component structures and their
functions? How do they grow?
What is the biochemical basis
of life and of metabolism?
B-2 How are the characteristics of
living things passed on through
generations? How does heredity
determine the development of
individual organisms?
B-3 How has life changed and
diversified through time? What
processes and patterns
characterize the evolution of life?
Section C - Ecosystems
C-l What are ecosystems, and how do
organisms interact in ecosystems?
C-2 How does energy flow within an
ecosystem?
C-3 How do ecosystems change?
C-4 What are the responsibilities of
humans toward ecosystems?
(Challenge Standards, 1997)
National Science Education Standards
LIFE SCIENCE
K-4 develop understanding of:
- The characteristics of organisms
- Life cycles of organisms
- Organisms and environments
5-8 develop understanding of:
- Structure and function in living
systems
- Reproduction and heredity
- Regulation and behavior
- Populations and ecosystems
- Diversity and adaptations of
organisms
9-12 develop understanding of:
- The cell
- Molecular basis of heredity
- Biological evolution
- Interdependence of organisms
- Matter, energy, and organization in
living systems
- Behavior of organisms
(NSES, 1995)
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certain information is given in each section. After 4th grade, for example, the 5-8 group
learns about a different area of the life science. Each topic does not go through K-12 like
the Challenge Standards. (Table 2)
Delaine Eastin, who was the Superintendent of the California Schools, was also
part of the group of volunteers who helped write the Challenge Standards. Eastin told
the interviewer that Diane Ravitch had written an editorial in the New York Times in
October 2005:
She talked about how under George Herbert Walker Bush, they had proposed
national standards, national assessments and the Democrats hadn’t supported it.
And then when Clinton proposed them, the Republicans when nuts. And the fact
is that Pete Wilson, probably if you asked him today, would proudly tell you he
signed the bill to create Standards in California. However, he was never
supportive of it because the Republican caucus in both the Assembly and the
Senate had taken an opposed position. He did sign the Bill but he signed it under
pressure from the corporate Republicans, not from the right-wing Republicans.
But he also signed a Bill that said the Standards would always be voluntary to get
the right-wingers off of his back. (Eastin, personal communication, 2005)
Phil LaFontaine, the science consultant for the California Department of
Education, thought that the Challenge Standards were “very much progressive, they were
moving towards what he thought was quality science education.” LaFontaine said he
thought, “students learn best in an integrated approach, rather than a discipline-specific
approach. He was working on the integrated science Challenge Standards.” The hope
was that when these Challenge Standards were done, the State Standards group would
delay developing a new set of State Standards, and the Challenge Standards might easily
be accepted (LaFontaine, personal communication, 2005).
These Challenge Standards were being written when Delaine Eastin was the
State Superintendent and at this time LaFontaine said:
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There was kind of this big push to reform schools and... she put out kind of a
call for districts to kind of think about how they could improve student
achievement and if they took the challenge, they were to meet these things called
Challenge Standards. [They] were really developed as much more global
statements, much like the National Standards and then there were exemplars
underneath and what I was working on were the exemplars and how you would
demonstrate that the student understood this, which is where we really need
to all go. It’s nice to have Standards, but if you don’t know how the student’s
going to meet them or what it’s going to look like, then we’ve got kind of
empty sentences. (LaFontaine, personal communication, 2005)
Kathy DiRanna of WestEd is Director for the K-12 Alliance, which combines
three professional development programs - California Science Implementation Network
(CSIN), Science Partnership for Articulation and Networking (SPAN), and Scope,
Sequence, and Coordination (SC&C). She recalled how all of these science curriculum
activities started while Bill Honig was California Superintendent of Schools in the late
1980s and early 1990s. Her recollection was confirmed by Delaine Eastin, former State
Superintendent of Schools, who stated, “Bill Honig set frameworks, but they weren’t
based on Standards” (Eastin, personal communication, 2005).
DiRanna was the head of a project called Process and Concepts in Elementary
Science (PACES), that was trying to help teachers and kids improve their science in the
classroom. Thomas Sasche was hired to be the State Science Supervisor and had been an
advisor to the American Association for the Advancement of Science on its Science for All
Americans (Project 2061,1989) document. He saw the work being done at PACES
evolve into a state science professional development network called California Science
Implementation Network (CSIN). This Center, CSIN, turned into one of the strongest
networks this state ever had in terms of professional development (DiRanna, personal
communication, 2005).
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In the 1990, “Science Framework for California Public Schools, Kindergarten
Through Grade Twelve,” DiRanna noted, “you’ll see almost everything we (CSIN)
believe in is in the 1990 Framework. CSIN is cited in the Implementation chapter.” At
that point there were no Standards but they talked about content in the Framework. The
idea that there should be bigger ideas, a more inquiry based approach, hands-on science,
and active learning was an important part of what the 1990 Framework was all about
(DiRanna, personal communication, 2005).
DiRanna continued:
In 1992, California was awarded a State Systemic Initiative1 (SSI) from the
National Science Foundation (NSF) when the assessments got started. The
trouble began first with language arts and math before it hit science, but because
science is California’s “stepchild,” the same thing happened to it also. The
assessment testing got pulled from the science area also. Parents were coming to
meetings trying to build community support for the fact that hands-on science
was a good thing. (DiRanna, personal communication, 2005)
DiRanna said that Elizabeth Stage, an educator and leader with a reputation in teacher
development, student assessment, and educational equity,
(http://www.lhs.herkelev.edu/news/stage.html) had the guts to go talk to legislators about
needing to have hands-on science.
DiRanna said:
Literally, hands-on science assessment in this State began at Frank Fat’s
Restaurant in Sacramento. Elizabeth, Tom Sasche, who at die time was the
Administrator of Mathematics, Science, and Environmental Education Unit in the
Department of Education in California, and myself were sitting there with a
napkin drawing what would it look like and wondering could we really make
this work? (DiRanna, personal communication, 2005)
1 California Science Education Advisory Committee (CSEAC) initiated a California Systemic Initiatives
Assessment Collaborative that provided a 1996 spring science assessment for all schools involved in NSF
systemic reform efforts (http://www.wested.org/werc/cseac.htmll.
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When they started to implement their ideas, they had a huge network including hundreds
of teachers in the state with whom they could work, but Governor Wilson derailed it.
Before this happened though, they had gone out and field-tested the hands-on science
performance tasks. They were ‘really quite good and people were very, very excited to
do it’ and DiRanna said it had a good mix of, ‘What do you know?’ and ‘What do you
know about how science works?’ And then she said, ‘That’s what the subject’s about’”
(DiRanna, personal communication, 2005).
The Golden State Exam
There have been many “wars” over the writing of various California State
Content Standards. In language arts it was whether or not to use phonics or whole
language, in math it was use of real-world problems vs. skills, in history/social science it
was whether everyone was getting equal time. And so it should not be surprising that the
same happened again with the development of the California Science Content Standards.
The question, do children sit and read about facts or do they get to apply the facts they
are learning with experiments and inquiry learning? This became the principal issue of
contention during the development of Science Standards in the late 1900s.
In 1998, California was about 40th out of the 50 states in spending per student. In
the area of math, California ranked 40® out of the 40 states that had done the testing.
California used to be the leader in education but everyone now agrees that K-12
education in California is not what it used to be (Schultz, 1998, p.l).
The California math “wars” began in the 1980s and to an outsider the word “war”
may seem a bit extreme, “but to insiders in such debates, there is drama, intrigue, fierce
disappointment. Rumors abound” (Wilson, 2003, p 2). There were rumors of bribes, of
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literal fistfights, inflamed discussions with the media and those who felt disrespected,
dismissed, wronged and misunderstood. The “math wars” even made the Wall Street
Journal, and in January of 1998, Secretary of Education Richard Riley was addressing a
group of mathematicians and asked for a “cease-fire” (Wilson, 2003). There were fierce
debates over the new fuzzy math and the old way of memorization and recall. The wars
did not stop with just math; there were also reading wars, social science wars and the
science wars.
After the math wars started, in the mid-1990s the people who had written the
Challenge Standards decided they had better pay attention because there had already
been the language-arts war before the math war. It seemed that science’s turn was coming
and that is when the group got together to start writing some science standards before
they were asked for any standards.
LaFontaine said, “We were trying to avert the wars [but they] continue today.
They haven’t stopped. In some places they’ve gone underground and in some places the
war is still on and it’s huge” (LaFontaine, personal communication, 2005).
They made a decision not to put together standards grade-by-grade because it
really did not matter which subject one started with, unlike having building blocks that
you must start with in language arts and math.
Some parts that make more sense to put them in some kind of sequence, but
there’s a lot that can just be, you can just dive in and go for it So, doing grade-
by-grade standards for science made no sense at all. There isn’t any ...
pedagogical reason, there’s no cognitive reason; there’s no research that says by
putting these standards at a certain grade level they’re appropriate. (DiRanna
personal communication, 2005)
The National Science Education Standards were similar in structure. DiRanna
said there is not any pedagogical reason, no cognitive reason and no research that says
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putting standards at certain grade levels makes them appropriate. She thinks that this is
partly what got us into trouble with the other standards and has gotten a little crazy as
well as making it more complicated for the kids. One needs to look at how viable is the
standard for the grade in which they are putting it, and in science their argument was, “Is
it developmentally appropriate?” (DiRanna, personnel communication, 2005)
According to Dr. Bonnie Brunkhorst, the group called “Mathematically Correct”
had “gotten their claws into the political system at the time Pete Wilson was Governor,
and their tentacles into a guy at the Los Angeles Times” (B. Brunkhorst, personal
communication, 2005). “Mathematically Correct” is a reform movement that is devoted
to the concerns raised by parents and scientists about the invasion of our schools by the
New-New Math and the need to restore basic skills to math education.2 Members of the
Science Coalition knew that the Mathematics Standards had met with some “severe
assaults from conservative activists” that were found to be based in the group
“Mathematically Correct” (Brunkhorst, personal communication, 2005). It is assumed
some of these same people from the “Mathematically Correct” group were beginning to
look into the writing of the Science Standards, because of the so-called “fuzzy math”
versus the memorization wars that happened earlier between the Commission members.
Beginning the Process of the California Science Content Standards
When it was about time to begin writing the new Science Standards, even though
the whole group worked on the Challenge Standards, “the State Department did not want
any part of the Board and the Board did not want any part of the Challenge Standards”
(Topps, personal communication, 2005).
2 http://www.mathematicallycorrect.com/
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California has an adoption cycle for instructional materials, that’s . . . a seven-
year cycle, and each cycle in the past began with a Framework Committee
writing a framework for each of the subjects areas. So it was time to do a new
Science Framework. It was right on schedule and on cycle. But it was clear
from the State Board of Education that when they adopted the Standards in each
of the subject areas, they wanted Frameworks now that they were written aligned
to the Standards.. . Standards and testing were the new dimensions that were
being introduced, and so the Standards were written in this way by the Academic
Standards Commission to precede the writing of the new Framework. The
Framework is the guide to the publishers and all of the money that goes out in
terms of eventually textbooks and materials for schools, so its,... high stakes.
(Otto, personal communication, 2005)
Assembly Bill (AB) Number 265, referred to as the Alpert Bill, is the California
Assessment Academic Achievement Act It requires that the State Board of Education
adopt statewide, academically rigorous, content standards and performance standards no
later than January 1,1998. Governor Pete Wilson and California State Superintendent,
Delaine Eastin, put the Commission for Academic Standards together.
The make-up of the Academic Standards Commission begins with the Governor
and the Board of Education (BOE). The Governor appoints the eleven members of the
BOE. The State Superintendent is an elected position on a non-partisan ballot for a four-
year term. For the Academic Standards Commission the Governor chooses eleven
members, the Superintendent chooses six members, the Senate Committee Rules appoints
one member, the Speaker of the Assembly appoints another, and the last member is
jointly chosen by the governor and the Superintendent and this person is the chair of the
commission.
In addition to the Academic Standards Commission there are some staff people
involved with the process. There is the Executive Director of the State Board of
Education. The Superintendent has an Executive Director, a Deputy Executive Director
and a Senior Consultant. There were also three science consultants to the Academic
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Standards Commission, appointed after sending in proposals to write the standards.
These consultants also had other scientists and educators that helped to write and review
what the consultants were working on.
In 1995, the legislature authorized a Commission for the Establishment of
Academic Performance and Content Standards (the “Academic Standards
Commission” ), a 21-member body charged with creating new “world class”
standards for both content (i.e. what should be taught) and performance (i.e. how
it should be assessed) - standards which school districts would not be required to
adopt, but with which state approved textbooks and statewide tests would be
“aligned.” (Schultz, 1998, p. 1)
Development of a Business Plan to Produce Science Standards
A business plan was drafted in October 1997, for the development of the work
for the Academic Standards Commission from November 1997 to August 1998. It
defined the Commission’s work for developing the standards for science and
history/social-science. Scott Hill, the Executive Director of the Academic Standards
Commission, developed the plan. (Appendix C)
The plan was drafted with three core questions in mind:
1. What is the commission’s work and ‘product?’
2. What calendar and timeline will the commission follow to ensure that its
product is completed?
3. How will the commission ensure that it maintains a strong understanding of
how the commission is going to proceed?”
The business plan included three distinct elements:
1. There was to be an overview of the work done by the Commission, such as
background, goals, mission, project status, evaluation and development.
2. The calendar for all key dates of meetings, public meetings, evaluation, and
completion. (Appendix D)
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3. A budget was projected with a breakdown of the major expenditures by
month, special project categories, and overhead (Commission for the
Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
When Governor Wilson signed AB 265, all parties agreed that there were some
crucial elements missing from the previous state assessment system. There was a great
need for anchoring the curriculum and assessments to the statements of what children
“should know and be able to do.” This was the reason for creation of the Academic
Standards Commission. This Commission was given one charge and that was to produce
academically rigorous content Standards and performance Standards for grades
kindergarten through twelve (Business Plan, 1997).
With AB 265 there was established criteria that had to comply with the following
academically rigorous content and it was to be:
Measurable and objective;
Reflect the knowledge and skills necessary for California’s work force in the
twenty-first century;
Comparable to Standards used in school systems of America’s global
economic competitors; and
Providing the basis for assessment in all grades.
The Mission Statement included having grounded and solid research for
producing the best content Standards. The Commission was to communicate with all
who had any
type of stake in the improvement in education. And lastly the Commission was to give
insights to the State Board of Education (Business Plan, 1997).
The Goal was basically to present academically rigorous content and
performance Standards in science to the State Board of Education by August 1,1998.
The definition of the two types of Standards were:
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1. Content Standards - skills, academic knowledge and abilities that all
school children in California are expected to know.
2. Performance Standards - define different levels of competence and the
degree to which a child has met the content Standards (Business Plan, 1997).
The National Association of State Boards of Education, an information analyses
publication, said this is the definition:
Content standard is a statement of the knowledge or understanding we would
expect students to have. On the other hand, a performance task describes a
specific use of knowledge and skills: it is not a description of knowledge, but a
description of some application of it. (Kendall & Marzano, 1996 p. 14)
The National Education Standards and Improvement Council (NESIC) notes:
Performance Standards indicate ‘both the nature of the evidence (such as an
essay, mathematical proof, scientific experiment, project exam, or combination
of these) required to demonstrate that Content Standards have been met and the
quality of student performance that will be deemed acceptable. (NESIC, 1993, p.
22)
In Section 4 of Chapter 975, in the Statutes of 1995, is the amendment:
It is the intent of the legislature that the membership of the commission include,
but not necessarily be limited to parents, classroom teachers, representatives of
the business community and individuals with expertise in pupil assessment or
expertise in the subject matter areas included in statewide pupil assessment.
(California Assessment Academic Achievement Act, 1995)
The bill created the Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and
Performance Standards that would consist of 21 members. The members are listed in
Appendix E.
In addition to this original group of people picked to be on the Academic
Standards Commission, the name Mark Ortiz was found on a “DRAFT” paper that had
no date but seemed to be the original list of people. There was no biography written up
about him. Throughout the process a few people left and others replaced them. At two
different times in the minutes it was reported that a Commissioner had resigned. First
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Larry Stupski resigned from the Commission. At another meeting where Jerilyn Harris,
who was new to the Commission and was Acting Chair, reported that Andrew Galef had
resigned. He had been the first Chair of the Commission. Both times there was no reason
given for the resignations.
The list of people that were on the committee at the end was: Chair Wright,
Commissioners Aiello, Calfee, Carrabino, Codding, Condron, Davis, Eastin, Evers,
Fisher, Harris, Lee, Ortiz, Panton, Paredes, Petrossian, Seaborg, Simpson, Siskind,
Treadway, and L. Wright. Those that left the beginning group at some time were: John
D’Ameliio, Cornell Maier, Andrew Galef, Larry Stupski and Frank Uiy. Those that were
new by the time the Standards were drafted were: Michael Aiello, Tony Fisher, Jerilyn
Harris, and Glenn Seaborg. No where in the minutes was it ever found when the other
three Commissioners left and it was not listed when the three new Commissioners were
added.
Ruth McKenna was Chief Deputy Superintendent for the California Department
of Education at this time and in her interview she said:
There was a full range of ideologies on the Commission. One end was very strict
. . . kind of back to basics for science, more subject area; and the other end was
integrated science, where it was more hands-on approach than integrating the
various disciplines. (McKenna, personal communication, 2005)
The philosophical belief systems of most of the people who were on this developmental
team for the Standards believed that the more you memorize and regurgitate, the more
scientifically literate you are. It is the whole idea of direct instruction (Gilbert, personal
communication, 2005).
The California Science Content Standards were dedicated to the late Dr. Glenn
Seaborg, who was the Chairman of the Academic Standards Commission’ s Science
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Committee. One other consultant to the science committee was Dr. Rollie Otto who was
a protege of Dr. Seaborg. He is the head of the Center for Science and Engineering
Education, at the E. O. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory ( < California Science
Content Standards, p. ii).
There is one other group of important players in the writing of the Standards.
The group that had the last say on the Standards and adopted them was the State Board of
Education: Yvonne Larsen, President; Robert Trigg, Vice-President; Marian Bergeson,
Timothy C. Draper, Kathryn Dronenburg, Marion Joseph, Marion McDowell, Janet
Nicholas, Geni Thomas, Mariana Tse, and Richard Weston.
The Role of Consultants
Neither the Commission nor its appropriate Science Committee writes standards
by themselves. Rather, they hire consultants; they provide them with guidelines;
they meet and discuss with them, often giving them very specific directions; they
receive, modify, and publicize the several drafts the consultants help prepare; and
they receive input from experts and the public at oral presentations and public
hearings and Commission meetings and in written submissions. Although the
Science Committee and the Commission have enormous influence and are
ultimately responsible for the standards that are produced, the nature and quality
of the standards also depend to an important degree on the nature and quality of
the consultants. (Schultz, 1998 p. 1)
Along with Dr. Otto were two other consultants, Dr. Bonnie Brunkhorst from
California State University at San Bernardino, and Dr. Stan Metzenberg from California
State University at Northridge. In the request for proposal (RFP) the consultants were
actually called contractors. They were to be “the most qualified standards specialists to
perform the work.” The work would be “divided into three components: facilitation,
consultation, and drafting.” They were to facilitate the work sessions, ‘Yocus the
Commissioners in thinking about how standards meet the commission’s criteria. The
contractor will take policy guidance from the Commission and Committee and write the
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standards, and include them in a regular report” before each meeting. (Commission for
the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997)
The Alpert bill also required that the meetings be open and public. Closed
session meetings were only to review the actual contents of any approved or adopted
assessment. The Brown Act also speaks to public meetings as open and public. There
are to be no secret meetings and no actions to be taken in secret.
( 'http://www.thefirstamendment.org/brownact.htmll. The State Board of Education was
required to hold regional public hearings up and down the State for public hearing with
the purpose of determining degree of rigorous, academic focus within each curriculum
area.
As President of the State Board of Education, Yvonne Larsen said that she was
not intimately involved in the writing of the Standards. The Standards Commission was
in charge of the drafting but she had no input. She did observe some of the hearings but
was never an active part of them. She said that even though it was required by the Board
to have hearings, they (the Board) were not interested in the hearings (Larsen, personal
communication, 2005).
Because of the Brown Act, Larsen admonished people not to meet with any of
the publishers. She did not think that the Board members met with any of the publishers
and believed that they were extremely cautious of this. When asked about the
Commission members, she said she did not know whether they met with anyone (Larsen,
personal communication, 2005).
Governor Wilson and his staff approached Alice Petrossian to be on the
Academic Standards Commission. Wilson told her, “We really need a voice that
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understands policy at the same time is out there in the trenches working” (Petrossian,
personal communication, 2005). Mrs. Petrossian said:
The power of the majority lay with the Governor for appointments, so it was also
perceived that the conservative right-wing group would control the Commission,
except there was Ellen Wright and Alice Petrossian, who were the moderate wing
of the party. But the Governor knew that when he appointed us. He knew just
exactly where we stood. (Petrossian, personal communication, 2005)
Commissioner Alice Petrossian chaired the English Language Arts Standards.
The Chair had someone in mind to chair the Math Standards group, however Bill [Evers]
wanted to chair the Math Committee and used every political ploy he could to try to do
so. According to Ellen Wright, he, [Evers] was appointed to chair the Math Committee
but it was so contentious that she had to add a co-chair and it got to a point where she
asked him to step down and someone else was to be appointed the chair of the Math
Standards Committee (Wright, personal communication, 2006). Yvonne Larsen
indicated that Evers was much more involved in the math wars. She thought he had lots
of good resources and gave her a lot of different people to talk with. He had a good
oversight of what was going on. She also said that he was one of the “groupies” that
followed the Board (Larsen, personal communication, 2005).
Mrs. Petrossian said they chose to begin writing the English and Math Standards
“because they were the most controversial Standards and then moved on to science and
social science which would not be controversial. . . We selected staff, which also became
very political” (Petrossian, personal communication, 2005).
Scott Hill said Ruth McKenna was one of the last teaching deputies in Delaine
Eastin’s first term. She was also Scott Hill’s successor as Chief Deputy Superintendent
in the Department of Education. Hill was “involved in the legislation that led up to the
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development of the State Standards that called for the Commission. That was AB 265.”
Mr. Hill was asked what he saw going on that led to the call for new State Standards? He
said, ‘The business community was calling for the development of Standards in the wake
of the 1989 President’s Summit of all the Governors” (Hill, personal communication,
2005). Dr. Calfee, who was the Vice-Chair of the Commission Standards, said that in the
legislation it called for:
. . . standards for every grade. And that really chaffed almost all of us. We
discussed the balancing of the Content and Performance Standards. And the
decision was made by the group to focus on Content Standards first and then
move on to Performance Standards. (Calfee, personal communication, 2006).
Hill said:
Ruth was the person that was pushing aggressive reform under Delaine [Eastin]
in her first term more than anybody. Ruth has a very, very open, forward
personality. I consider her to be a good friend of mine, and there are lots of
people who think that Ruth is one of the greatest educators in the nation. Ruth
was aggressive in pushing for State Standards. (Hill, personal communication,
2005)
Hill’s position was a Constitutional appointment, which meant that they could
appoint an executive officer. He was the second Executive Director of the Commission.
The Wilson folks had originally appointed another woman but it did not work out. There
was way too much politics and it turned out that the dynamics between her and the
Chairman of the Commission, Ellen Wright, were not going well. They decided that
Ellen Wright should stay, and Hill replaced the first Executive Director. He “was asked
to join up in May of 1997, as the Director and I was approved by the Commissioners to
do that ” (Hill, personal communication, 2005). Ms. Eastin said that Scott Hill had
worked for her and “Scott’s somebody who has been on both sides of the issue and I can
tell you he’s an honest, fair man” (Eastin, personal communication, 2005).
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Hill arrived just when the battle over the math Standards was heating up. The
battle over math was instructive because of what we ended up doing. It led to a lot of
constraints and different ways of treating the discussion around science. Yvonne Larsen
thought, “The Academic area was a battleground.” She felt that “it was a tragedy
because the children were the ones that were being short-changed” (Larsen, personal
communication, 2005).
The Commission made the decision to divide up the four content domains -
math, language arts and reading, science, and social science and history - into two
sections, rather that trying to take on all four at the same time. The committees started
with math, and language arts and reading. When those standards were finished they
wrote the science, and social science and history standards.
We decided to move ahead with the easier, that is the more familiar ones of
literacy and of mathematics, and then we would turn later to science and social
studies, which couldn’t be called social studies, it had to be called history.
(Calfee, personal communication, 2005)
The Standards Commission asked Dean Gilbert, who worked for Long Beach
Unified School District in the late 1990s, to be involved with the field reviews, the input,
and the feedback that was asked for from public hearings. Gilbert commented:
During the 1997-98 development of the Standards, there was a significant rift of
two communities that evolved out of the discussion. You had people, not a lot,
but those that thought it was the scientists versus the teachers. It really wasn’t.
There are a lot of scientists and there are a lot of business leaders that bought into
our philosophy that if the amount of science information doubles every four
years, you cannot base scientific literacy on the quantity of regurgitation of
information, but you’ve got to look at the bigger conceptual ideas and teach
critical thinking and problem-solving and use the tools of the scientist to apply it
to decision making and problem solving. The group from California State
University San Bernardino however, “also believed in a hands-on/minds-on
inquiry-based approach to teaching science” (Gilbert, personal communication,
2005).
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The other camp . .. was . . . led by Glenn Seaborg . . . [and] he was the
Chair. They came from the old school and their heart, soul, and strong
convictions believed that you had the four sciences; biology, chemistry, physics,
earth and space science. You had this body of knowledge that needed to be put
to memory and your level of scientific literacy was based on the quantity of
knowledge you could recite. It was not just, how do I solve today’s problems
using the body of knowledge and skills that we learn in science? I think that a lot
of people making the decisions were in the driver’s seat politically and had the
ear of the State Board and California Department of Education that concurred
with them. It’s not that we didn’t have a voice in our camp; die people in our
philosophical circle didn’t have the voice with the right people. (Gilbert,
personal communication, 2005)
I think that at that time, the people that were on the State Board felt so
strongly about direct instruction and were so opposed to hands-on science
because their view of hands-on science was kids tinkering with no instruction,
no direct facilitation and that it was a waste of time. Obviously they got that
impression because they must have seen programs that mimic that. (Gilbert,
personal communication, 2005)
You had a lot of people that were not in K-12 education, that did not
understand learning theory or learning cycles, did not understand kids, but
yet were saying, “Well, in my day we learned it this way,” and they felt that
what they learned 40 or 50 years ago was appropriate for today’s child, and it’s
not. There’s nothing about the educational system today that is similar to that
back 40 years ago. And, yet, they wanted to take a model that worked for them,
that worked well for them, and plug it into today’s child. And that was the
disconnect. That was the war. That’s what created the wars. (Gilbert, personal
communication, 2005)
And you had these two camps and two schools of thought, and the camp that
was for “the more you memorize, the more you regurgitate,” said don’t worry
about hands-on science, we need to have that body of knowledge drummed into
them— they had a better strategic plan to get to the ear of the State Board that
was going to vote on it. They had a more choreographed strategy to fight than
we did. So, it was a stacked deck. Now, twice we’ve tried to submit legislation
to revisit the Standards on a cyclic basis and yet they believe the Standards are
perfect. No alterations are needed. (Gilbert, personal communication, 2005)
“There was a political progression on the Commission and those who were
relatively more progressive moved toward the area of literacy” (Calfee, personal
communication, 2005). Larsen said that the emphasis was on reading first. She said that
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the Standards were prepared at the time when the reading was abysmal (Larsen,
personal communication, 2005). “And those who were more conservative moved in the
direction of mathematics.” Dr. Calfee said:
It surprised me. I think it came about because Bill Evers, who was one of the
strongest of the more conservative voices from the Hoover Institute at Stanford,
had spent some time talking with mathematicians at Stanford about the
mathematics curriculum. He got very upset about it, and so, I think viewed
himself as being rather knowledgeable about mathematics and he and a group
that, kind of was close to him, just moved into that arena. (Calfee, personal
communication, 2005)
Alice Petrossian was the leader of the literacy group, and she’s both very
knowledgeable and very politic. Literacy you might think, would get caught up
in the reading wars and all of that, [but] it went just as smooth as silk. (Calfee,
personal communication, 2005)
The reason that that was important was that when we got then to history and
science there are two almost cabals, that had formed on the Commission. And
you might have thought that they just kind of unformed themselves and then
reformed, but that isn’t what happened. The one group went with science, the
more conservative group, and the relatively more progressive wound up doing
history and social studies. (Calfee, personal communication, 2005)
We did not want to see a replay of what happened in math, where the State Board
and the Standards Commission had a very public squabble. We wanted to have a chance
for success. We knew that the conversation was not likely to be about the real apparent
debates that most people considered science. All the discussions heard now about
intelligent design and evolution were only a minor part of the conversation in terms of
science discussion. I think it was one day’s worth of conversation and we were done
with that subject.
What was far more critical was what was getting played out as science reform
and more progressive science education. It was all based around inquiry and
hands-on science, as opposed to what most people would talk about as explicit
instruction or drill and skill or fact-based science. (Hill, personal communication,
2005)
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One Anonymous Commissioner had said that after being in the group that wrote
the Math Standards:
It was very clear to me that the Commission was going to have little impact on
what the Standards would be. There were a few . . . on the Standards
Commission who did not like those Standards and they would be classified as
“Mathematically Correct” people and even though the Commission voted
whatever it was, 17-1-1, one abstention, in favor of the Standards that we
had come up with,. . . and we had had all these public hearings and
everything, a group of people went into a back room and wrote their own
Standards, submitted them to the State Board, and that’s what was approved. So,
. . . I think all the business people resigned from the Commission. (Anonymous
Commissioner, 2006)
This commissioner felt they resigned, and this was just an opinion but:
. . . they did not feel that giving their time and then having it, and going through
the democratic process, following the law that stipulated what the
Commissioners were supposed to do, they felt like the process was corrupt and a
waste of their time. (Anonymous Commissioner, 2006)
Several others, including this Commissioner:
. . . considered resigning and we were begged. . . by Delaine Eastin to please not,
try to stay with it and make a difference. But it was really clear that if this veiy
small group of people didn’t like what was happening, they were going to change
it. (Anonymous Commissioner, 2006)
Sheila Byrd was the Deputy Executive Director to Scott Hill and during her
interview said that she has helped develop Standards all over the country and the
developing of:
. . . standards is always a nasty process; it’s an emotional and a political process
dealing with other people. What we learned here in California was no different
really than what others go through in many other states, but because it’s
California, there was more visibility maybe and there was a lot at stake, or maybe
because of the timing and the fact that California’s huge, an influential state,
(Byrd, personal communication, 2006)
and the textbooks for sale all over the country are based on what California has and
therefore drives a lot of sales.
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Some of the State Board of Education members were asked to be interviewed,
but they declined without giving any reasons. So they might tell a different story than
some of the others that were consulted on the topic. Mrs. Larsen said “she thought that
was absurd that they were not willing to talk. Marion Joseph is a real fire brand and
should be a good resource.” Mrs. Larsen wondered if “she was trying to protect
somebody that might cast some pall on her. She was fabulous and a wonderful resource.”
Larsen said, “she has great respect for her and she should have been very helpful. “ Janet
Nicholas also was “very much involved in the science.” Mrs. Larsen said when she was
told who would not agree to be interviewed that they were the very conservative ones on
both the Board and the Commission that did not want to talk (Larsen, personal
communication, 2005).
On October 24,1997, Chair Ellen Wright gave out the science committee
assignments. There was one Commissioner vacancy but Andrew Galef was assigned
chair of the science subcommittee. The other members were Joseph Carrabino, Dan
Condron, Linda Davis, Delaine Eastin, Williamson Evers, Jerilyn Harris, Dorothy Jue
Lee, Mark Ortiz, Jerry Treadway and Ellen Wright as Ex-Officio. On that same date the
memo went out to the Commissioners that Larry Stupski resigned that week and a
replacement was to be assigned at the November 7,1997 meeting. Michael Aiello was
assigned to fill the Commissioner vacancy. Also there is no record anywhere that tells
when Jerilyn Harris joined the group of Commissioners. She filled in as acting chair for
the Science Subcommittee after Galef left and before Dr. Seaborg was assigned. Ms.
Harris is one the persons that declined to be interviewed. Without anything in the
minutes and no interview the researcher has no idea who picked her to be on the
committee.
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A memorandum to the Members of the Science Committee on October 24, from
Andy Galef gave the members a copy of the agenda for the November 6,1997, Science
Committee meeting. Everyone was also given a copy of the California Science
Framework. ‘The Framework has been the basis for science instruction in the state since
1990, so it is important that we have all read it carefully” before the next meeting
(Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards,
1997).
The development of the Standards was to start with reading/language arts and
math and then with history/social studies and science. The Commission had to make
available information from the hearing and provide opportunities for comment on the
information. During this period of time it was up to the Commission to hold at least six
public hearings throughout the State for public comment and for public input. Deputy
Director Scott Hill said that the Commissioners took the public hearings quite seriously
and it was a big part of the project (Hill, personal communication, 2005). Submission of
the Content and Performance Standards was August 1,1998, and extends the sunset date
of the Commission to June 30,1999. This was in the Governor’s budget proposal for
1997-1998.
The goals were to be established by November 1,1997. Commission and
committee calendars for the science committee were to be set. There was to be the
development and distribution of the RFP, selection of contractors to develop the
Standards, the communication of the work of the commission to the public and the last
goal was for the Staff to provide quality support to the Commission (Commission for the
Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
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On the copy of the Request for Proposals (RFP) the changes shown with strike
throughs and underlines in sections III through VI were based on the recent deliberations
of the evaluation team.3 The evaluation team members were Commissioners Wright,
Galef, Codding and Deputy Executive Director Sheila Byrd. There were some edits also
to Sections I and II (Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and
Performance Standards, 1997). (Appendix F)
Eastin noted, “Developing world-class Standards is the cornerstone of our efforts
to improve our schools. The work of this Commission is crucial as we define what
students need to know to be successful in the twenty-first century” (Commission for the
Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
Alice Petrossian believed children needed to have higher, more rigorous
Standards. One of the things she and Delaine Eastin wanted was to take this project out
of the political domain. “All of education should not be politicized and it should be
something that’s about the children, about the future of this nation, about the economic
well-being of this nation” (Petrossian, personal communication, 2005)
Academic Standards Commission
Chairperson Ellen Wright sent a memorandum to all Commissioners telling them
that before any RFP was to be issued, the commission would need to approve it. It was
also noted, “that decisions made about the scope of work for Performance Standards
would affect the RFPs” {Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and
Performance Standards, 1997).
3
The evaluation teams members were named in the minutes, but there was no explanation as to exactly what
their role was or how they were picked to be on the team.
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In a meeting of the full Commission for the Academic Content and Performance
Standards on September 16,1997, Item 7: Discussion/Action was a review and approval
of the final RFP draft for History/Social Science and the Science Consulting Services.
In the minutes, Chair Wright told the Commission that if there was not a consensus
reached for the Performance Standards portion on the RFP at this meeting, they would
only go out for Content Standards. For the Performance Standards, samples of student
work needed to be included to illustrate “how good is good enough” (Commission for the
Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997). Commissioner
Codding was reported to have said she supported the development, but undertaking this
task would require people with specific knowledge and skills that deeply know specified
content and discipline.
Commissioner Evers reportedly said that Commissioner Calfee had been quite
conscientious about keeping the Performance Standards before the Commission but in
reality it would require too much work. Commissioner Evers said the only practical way ,
to go was to vote down Commissioner Calfee’s motion. The debate voted to remain open
and after more discussion of how it could be done, the motion passed by a vote of 9 for
and 8 against.
There were some changes made in the RFP that meant that the Commission did
not necessarily have to award the contract to the lowest bidder. This occurred because
Commissioner Codding proposed changes used in the scoring method. There were two
sets of criteria evaluation points. One set was for the proposal with a total of 90 points
and an oral interview for 10 points. Adding this together totals 100 points. (Figure 4) No
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other list of points was found but in the set of minutes of December 1, it talked about a
total of 115 points. Therefore, it is unclear which was the final “official” version.
The staff would have to consider the point evaluations but they would have to
consider the detailed financial expectations. They would have to decide how much
weight to put on the financial part.
On October 24,1997, a memo was sent from Ellen Wright to all the
Commissioners informing them that Larry Stupski resigned. Superintendent Eastin
would appoint a new Commissioner for the November 6 meeting. One Anonymous
Commissioner, who did stick it out wanting to try to do what was right, said that many of
the business people resigned close to the beginning of the project because they could see
that it was not going to go in the direction that it should (Anonymous Commissioner,
2006).
1. Proposer’s ability to integrate its ideas into the commissions’ overall
objectives - 4 points.
2. Quality and completeness of answers to question regarding the proposed
project tasks. Professionalism of personnel assigned to the account - 3
points
3. Quality of proposed strategies and work plan - 3 points
This amounts to a total of 10 points (archival materials, B. Brunkhorst).
The other points are for how everything is covered in the RFP:
RFP Criteria Evaluation
Content area expertise 30 points
Standards analysis and writing 30 points
Constituent relations 10 points
Consensus facilitation 5 points
Staffing plan 15 points
TOTAL 90 points
Figure 4. Request for Proposal point criteria. (Commission for the Establishment of
Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997)
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Hill said that “it was brutal, it was not fun” going through the process. “It was
unpleasant work.” Day by day I had to dog these guys to work for the Commission on
behalf of the state. It was hard work. We didn’t have these folks end up as friends
afterwards. We did end up with Standards that went to the State Board without a
significant amount of revision and were adopted by the State Board without a lot of
revision by the Board (Hill personal communication, 2005).
On this same day, Chair Ellen Wright sent out committee assignments for the
Science Committee. Andrew Galef was named chair of the committee, which included
Joseph Carrabino, Dan Condron, Linda Davis, Delaine Eastin, Williamson Evers, Jerilyn
Harris, Dorothy Jue Lee, Mark Ortiz, Jerry Treadway, and Ex-Officio, Ellen Wright.
After the Commission was picked Mrs. Petrossian said that they:
. . . started bringing people in from other states. Those people started to share
with us what they had done. We brought in national experts who told us what
they had done with the whole Content Standards concept California’s
legislation was very clear in saying that California should have the most
rigorous Standards in the nation and the world. The nation’s was going to
be easy. The world was a whole other issue. Once we started to realize it
was more the Asian world, we started looking into it a bit deeper. It was difficult
for English language arts and social science; however, it was not as difficult
in science or math. Those were more international languages. (Petrossian,
personal communication, 2005)
Dr. Otto was asked why the Frameworks differed from the Standards and why
they had to change them. He said that it was because “they were going to introduce
testing. They were committed to testing every student in California. They were going to
have testing based on specific Standards of what kids should know and be able to do”
(Otto, personal communication, 2005).
The purpose for the next meeting was to establish procedures, a work plan and
time line. (Table 3) All were to “become aware of what is the current state of science
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instruction in California, and make some preliminary decisions on format and content of
the Standards in order to be prepared to give policy guidance to the contractors when they
begin work in December” (Commission for the Establishment o f Academic Content and
Performance Standards, 1997).
Table 3
Timeline for the RFPs
September 15,1997 RFP notice posted in California Contracts Register
October 1 Notices of Intent to Bid and questions about the
RFP are due
October 12 Responses to bidders questions go out
October 31 Proposals due
November 15 Interview date
November Commission meeting. Expected vote on contractor
Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards,
1997.
At the full Commission meeting on November 6,1997, the evaluation team was
to present its recommendation for a contractor to provide the consulting services to
develop the Science Content Standards. The full commission would then vote to accept
or reject the evaluation team’s recommendation. The evaluation team members were
Commissioners Wright, Galef, Codding and Deputy Executive Director Sheila Byrd.
On November 6,1997, all commissioners were to meet and “the evaluation team
would present its recommendation for contractors for history/social science and science,
based on their evaluation of proposals received. The full commission would have to
approve that recommendation” {Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content
and Performance Standards, 1997). Committee meetings were to be held in the
afternoon from 2-6 p.m. At this meeting they were told to be “apprised of current
California law and practice in the area of science and history-social science instruction,
and start to frame your policy recommendations for the contractors, who will be on board
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by our December meeting” (Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and
Performance Standards, 1997). Vice-Chair Calfee asked for a discussion of the RFP that
had been issued. Mr. Hill gave the background. He told the commissioners that the RFP
had been sent out nationally and internationally. Staff had sent out news releases to over
300 media representatives. The RFP was also posted on the website and there were
requests received via phone and fax. By the deadline well over 100 RFPs had been sent
out to individuals or groups {Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and
Performance Standards, 1997).
“The selection of consultants started in the traditional manner,” as Dr. Ted
Schultz said, “but it ended in a complex political game, abetted by a press campaign
that characterized the choice as one between scientists, who were for high Standards, and
‘educrats,’ who were for ‘dumbing down’ the curriculum” (Schultz, 1998)
The RFP Process - September 15 to October 1,1997
The question was “Why did there have to be another set of standards when there
were already the National Science Education Standards? In a personal communication
with Dean Gilbert, from the Los Angeles County of Education he replied:
It is my understanding that since the National Standards and AAAS Benchmarks
were “grade span” standards, states wanted to have “grade specific” standards,
especially California. That was the impetus for our state standards. (Gilbert,
personal communication, 2006)
Deputy Director Byrd in the interview thought that it was generally
“irresponsible to characterize the process as black and white. Were there strong
diverging points of view? Yes. Is that always part of the Standards-setting process?
Yes. I think that those characterizations are way too simplistic” and she could not think
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of a process that she had been through that there was not disagreement about the
emphasis in a group of Standards (Byrd, personal communication, 2006).
When the Request for Proposals (RFP) came out, the responding proposals had to
be put together in a very short time. It seemed as though there was a political move to
take away the writing of these Standards from the science community. Dr. Bonnie
Bmnkhorst was involved with the writing of the National Science Education Standards
and she was suspicious of why another set of Standards was needed for California.
Dr. Andrew Sessler was the President of the American Physical Society (APS) in
1998. At the Physical Society they had:
. . . been working on education development in science throughout the country in
a number of different locations. They realized it was an... opportunity to have
some impact on what was being done in California, and that was quite consistent
with the American Physical Society’s view. Dr. Sessler got the support and
assistance of the people in the educational section of the APS and that was really
the mechanism that allowed us to get involved. (Sessler, personal
communication, 2006)
The involvement was “sort of peripheral and never came to anything, but they did try”
(Sessler, personal communication, 2006).
Dr. Sessler involved prominent scientists with the project: Dr. Bruce Alberts,
President of the National Academy of Sciences; Dr. Don Kennedy, President of Stanford
University and previous Director of the Food and Drug Administration; and Dr. Sally
Ride, first woman astronaut and head of the California Space Institute, University of
California at San Diego. Dr. Sessler had put together a presentation for the Commission
but he said, “They made a presentation for an hour or so and it was never taken seriously,
but was just dismissed. That was the end of it. We (Sessler, Alberts, Kennedy, & Ride)
were never asked to do anything” (Sessler, personal communication, 2006). Their goal
was to really get into some areas deeper and take others out so that “a significant fraction
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of time was spent on hands-on science and getting them to appreciate what science is”
rather than “just memorizing thousands of facts, like pieces of a flower, and so on”
(Sessler, personal communication, 2006).
California Science Teachers Association (CSTA) and Dr. Art Sussman, along
with WestEd had already put together the proposal for the consultants to the California
Academic Standards Commission (CASC). At a meeting of the CASC, WestEd found
that they could not do a proposal because Dr. Sussman did not want to jeopardize the
chance of WestEd’s chance for doing the assessments.
Since WestEd could not be the Principal Investigator for the RFP and there was a
short time frame in which to get the proposal in, Dr. Brunkhorst said that they could run
the RFP through California State University - San Bernardino (CSUSB) (Brunkhorst,
personal communication, 2005). Dr. Bonnie Brunkhorst was the principal investigator
and the group was called the Academic Science Coalition. The Coalition felt they had a
“strong leadership team.” There were biologists, physicists, geologists and chemists.
They all held advanced degrees in each of the areas of science, along with extensive K-12
experience in science education reform. Each division had nationally known scientists
and there were Nobel Laureates that had agreed to work with the Coalition. At this point
in time Dr. Rollie Otto was a key member of this group (Colvin, 1997).
Dr. Otto worked at the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory and was on the Science
Coalition. He was a protege of Dr. Glenn Seaborg at the University of California,
Berkeley. At the 1999 Conference on Standards-Based K-12 Education at California
State University Northridge, he was talking about the professional development of
science and he said, ‘The nature of science requires investigation and experimentation
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activities in science teaching. Having content rich, specific grade-by-grade Standards
allows for the proper use of inquiry based instruction” (Otto, 1999 p. 4).
Dr. Otto also talked about Dr. Seaborg at this Conference and he told them that
for Dr. Seaborg, the focus of science is on the “organized body of knowledge.” During
the hearings of the California Science Content Standards some thought there were
already too many things to memorize.
Dr. Glenn Seaborg was the co-founder and chairman of the Lawrence Hall of
Science (LHS) “recognized for its expertise in instructional materials development for the
K-12 audience.” In addition,
LHS was a pioneer in the inquiry-driven, direct experience approach to pre
college science instruction, and has successfully conducted numerous federal,
state and privately funded projects, including the Full Option Science System
(FOSS), the Science Education for Public Understanding Program (SEPUP),
and Great Explorations in Math and Science (GEMS)
(http://www.lhs. berkeley.edu/generalinfo/aboutmore.html~>.
In 1995 on the 27* anniversary the Lawrence Hall of Science (LHS), Dr. Seaborg
was Chairman of LHS, Dr. Larry Woolf noted that he talked about “how great hands-on
science is. Kids need to learn by doing.” That is exactly what the Hall of Science is all
about, it is for kids to come and try hands on experiments (Woolf, personal
communication, 2006). Dr. Art Sussman found it ironic too, that Seaborg was with the
Lawrence Hall of Science and during the time of the writing of the Standards he was one
that was trying to make it hard for the Full Option Science System (FOSS) group. The
Associated Scientists were disparaging their (Academic Science Coalition) way of
thinking by saying that, ’’ What we were pushing was kids having fun doing things,
hands-on, but no real science there” (Sussman, personal communication, 2006). FOSS is
a research-based science program for grades K-8 developed at Lawrence Hall of Science
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with support from the National Science Foundation and published by Delta Education
(http://www.lhs.berkeley.edu/foss/'). Part of the Mission Statement of the LHS is “for
children, parents, educators, and policymakers seeking to improve the understanding and
increase the enjoyment of science and mathematics
(http://www.lhs.berkelev.edu/generalinfoA.
Dr. Sussman said:
When you get down to it, the kind of experiments the Associated Scientists want
kids to do is to repeat things and to show that they can do the procedures and get
the desired results, not to mess around and get dirty, make mistakes, figure out
things, and really understand the science and investigation. (Sussman, personal
communication, 2006)
Dr. Sussman was part of the consulting team. And did a lot of the behind-the-scenes
negotiating and communicating (Sussman, personal communication, 2006).
After talking to Dr. Woolf and finding information on the Website for the
Lawrence Hall of Science about how interested Dr. Seaborg had been about hands-on
learning at the time the Hall opened, information was taken from the site, put together
and sent to Dr. Metzenberg and Dr. Evers. They were questioned as to why they thought
Dr. Seaborg had made such a 180-degree turn-around, but neither man ever responded.
Dr. Metzenberg said that “Only the perspectives gained from many years as a
scientist, and from having children in California public schools was what guided him
when he was writing the Standards.” Dr. Woolf was asked what he thought about the
importance of knowing about educational philosophies when writing Science Standards
for children. He was given the information that when Dr. Metzenberg had emailed his
answer in about that question, he said he was “blissfully unaware that there were any
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educational philosophies.” Dr. Woolf in turn replied:
He [Dr. Metzenberg] doesn’t believe, he doesn’t really believe in education
research. I think he’s blissfully unaware of the entire science education literature
and basically because he’s found certain things that he really strongly disagrees
with or thinks are silly. He sort of dismisses everything. (Woolf, personal
communication, 2005)
Delaine Eastin said about Metzenberg’s comment:
He is an ideologue, and so what he’s really saying to you is he doesn’t, he wasn’t
aware of anybody else’s point and he doesn’t want to learn about it. You know,
[he feels] “I’ve made up my mind; don’t confuse me with the facts.” (Eastin,
personal communication, 2005)
The second RFP came in from the Associated Scientists. This group was made
up of three Nobel Laureates; Glenn T. Seaborg, Dudley R. Herschback and Henry Taube.
Seaborg was a Nobel Prize winner who co-discovered more than 10 chemical elements,
with one named after him. Herschback was a Harvard professor who studied the
behavior of molecules and Taube was lauded “as one of the most creative research
workers of our age” in the field of chemistry. He was a Stanford professor and at the
time when the RFP was sent in he was Professor Emeritus in Chemistry. It was these
three men that joined with thirty other scientists and teachers to volunteer to write the
Standards for free. The Associated Scientists wanted to write what they thought students
should know about science in the Standards for California (Colvin, 1997).
One of the science educators for the Associated Scientists was Dr. Stan
Metzenberg. He said that the “commission established an RFP and he assembled a group
to bid for the contract” (Metzenberg, personal communication, 2005).
Scott Hill, the Executive Deputy Director said that once the RFPs were sent, they
“found [themselves] in the middle of an incredible debate.” In his opinion he said, with
this State Commission:
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You would think that nobody really is . . . involved in the development of
Science Standards,. . . so you can imagine the shock we have when we send
out fo r. . . proposals. And the proposals we get. . . back are reasonably well
qualified. |There were only two proposals sent back to the Commission.] There’s
this incredible roster of Nobel laureates and all these folks and they have a plan
to go forward and all these kinds of things. They have no experience writing.
There’re all highly read folks. But they’re not science educators. But they
have this incredible list of folks who are able to do this work and the cost
they submit is zero. There were probably forty people on that team. . . who
were listed as either the core people or the advisors on that team. (Hill,
personal communication, 2005)
The other team from California State University at San Bernardino:
They had been the folks who had been involved with the California Science
Teachers Association, the National Science Teachers Association, and the
National Science Content Standards, and in terms of science educators, they had
. . . a very, very impressive list of folks. (Hill, personal communication, 2005)
The Standards Commissioners ended up believing the people on this committee, the San
Bernardino group was going to serve the Commission best (Hill, personal
communication, 2005).
The proposals had been evaluated on the basis of the following criteria: “an
introduction, a minimum of 2 years in standards analysis and writing experience, content
area expertise, facilitation of group decision making, a work plan, a staff plan, and a
budget” {Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance
Standards, 1997). The Academic Science Coalition received 82 out of 115 total points
and the Associated Scientists received 43.5 out of 115 points.
According to the minutes in a meeting of the Science Committee on November 6,
1997, CSUSB was awarded the contract. “A motion was made by Commissioner Wright
to accept the RFP from the Science Coalition. Commissioner Petrossian seconded the
motion” {Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance
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Standards, 1997). The vote was unanimous however Commissioners Evers and Treadway
were absent.
The Academic Standards Commission picked the CSUSB group because they
felt they had more experience writing Standards for K-12. The Associated Scientists had
good resumes but were not clear about how they were going to go about doing the work.
The ASC felt that even though the Scientists had impressive resumes, they did not have a
game plan and did not have experience writing classroom Standards (Colvin, 1997).
Even though the Associated Scientists group were all three Nobel Laureate
winners, Commissioner Wright “noted that the proposal revealed no collective
experience among the scientists in writing Standards, and it appeared that the group had
come together just for the purpose of making a proposal.” According to another
Commissioner, the group with the rejected proposal “was made up of truly outstanding
scientists with a great set of resumes but had no work plan. . . it had maybe five or six
lines on a proposed work plan” (Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content
and Performance Standards, 1997).
The State Commission turned down the proposal from the Associated Scientists
and accepted the proposal from CSUSB for $178,000. According to Colvin of the Los
Angeles Times, most of the CSUSB group’s main members were educators and not
scientists. ‘The Standards they had written earlier were viewed by the scientists as
‘dumbed-down’” (Colvin, 1997).
Commissioner Judy Codding, who was on the ASC, said it was not hard to
decide which group to pick. Codding, who was formerly a Pasadena High School
Principal said, “They wouldn’t know a classroom if you put it in front of them” (Colvin,
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1997, Jf 7). Commissioner Carrabino also mentioned that it would be much easier to
contract with a university than with a group of individuals.
Commissioner Wright indicated according to the minutes that “the Science
Coalition . . . had written a veiy responsive proposal, and they had outlined a very
thorough plan for completing the work. They had listed a management team, a drafting
team and a review panel.”
After the contract had been awarded Chair Galef then told the committee they
would not be using Robert’s Rules of Order, but “rather would operate by cooperative
effort.” “According to Robert’s Rules of Order, parliamentary procedure is based on the
consideration of the rights: of the majority, of the minority (especially a large minority
greater than one-third), of individual members, of absentee members, of all of these
groups taken together.
The application of parliamentary law is the best method yet devised to enable
assemblies of any size, with due regard for every member’s opinion, to arrive at
the general will on the maximum number of questions of varying complexity in a
minimum amount of time and under all kinds of internal climate ranging from
total harmony to hardened or impassioned division of opinion.
http://www.rulesonline.com/
At the same meeting Galef asked the committee how it anticipated what the
format of the document would look like. The themes were posted on a board. They
agreed that it needed to use the terms in the same way:
Format: Committee agreed that the format is secondary to the content of the
document; it would be preferable to have the document that looks like the
Language Arts and Mathematics Standards,
Themes: Committee felt that the consultants should review the organization of
other sets of Standards and provide some guidance in this area.
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At the end of the meeting the science consultants gave the Commission the plans
for a management team to facilitate at meetings, a drafting team to write, and review
team to assure quality and rigor.
A week later the Academic Science Coalition was given notice that there was an
official protest of the award. A phone call [Brunkhorst made the assumption it came
from the Governor’s office] (Brunkhorst, personal communication, 2005) was made to
Dr. Brunkhorst saying there was an objection to their RFP and was told that the official
protest award was from the opposing group calling themselves the Associated Scientists
(Hill, personal communication, 2005).
We went through the process and ultimately were going to award it to the
Academic Science Coalition and in doing some of our checking, the attorney
from the Attorney General’s Office advised us that, “I think you guys have
made a fundamental mistake in your process. You said you wanted to award this
but the way you added up your points, neither of the bids made it over the . . .
threshold that you said was minimally necessary to award the bid.” So we ended
up . . . having to go and publicly renounce that, . . say, “You know what? We
have to start this whole thing all over.” (Hill, personal communication, 2005)
The dismissal had enraged the scientists and they filed a formal appeal of the
process. Dr. Stan Metzenberg asked the Department of General Services to reverse the
decision because the commission did not evaluate the scientist’s proposal fairly. This is
the first time that Dr. Stan Mezenberg’s name is mentioned in the minutes. Dr Seaborg
was the head of the group of Associated Scientists, so when and where did Dr.
Metzenberg come into the picture? At the time, he was a new Assistant Professor of
Biology at California State University Northridge. Metzenberg said his team included
some scientists who had overseen the writing of the Virginia Science Standards and those
Standards are very highly thought of. In the group there were also some master teachers
that had won some national awards.
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Metzenberg said Virginia should be used as a model for California. He was
asked why and what was different about their Standards. He said:
For my own part, I search for standards on the Web, and used the American
Federation of Teachers, which contained many examples of good standards.
Why Virginia? They are clear, concise, and grounded in the content of the
subject area. (Metzenberg, personal communication, 2005)
Dr. Herb Brunkhorst said:
There were definite attempts of intimidation toward the academic community. I
remember we were on the Washington peninsula and Bonnie got a call from our
University President saying ‘They’re pressuring me to tell you to step down.”
You know, that’s interesting in itself. . . you had people like Jim Bowers at
Caltech, who’s a neural biologist, excellent, got very involved with
Pasadena schools in . .. the work that Jerry Pine was doing on kid-based science,
and Jim got so frustrated, he left the state and went to Baylor. And. .. even
tried to contact a friend of his who worked for a newspaper in Boston, an
investigative reporter. The investigative reporter did a little checking around and
said,‘These people are threatening people. I won’t touch it” He never wrote a
thing. So, I mean, there’s some real issues that went on. They tried to discredit
Bonnie’s record as a scientist and science educator. It was [Dr. Holmes A.]
Semken who was one of the vertebrate paleontologists and came to her defense.
The Associated Scientists called Iowa University and he happened to be in his
office and said, “What in the world are you guys talking about?” So . . . it’s real.
There were some real power plays going on and what troubled me the most in
watching it sort of from the sidelines was the people who were being put into the
positions didn’t know a thing about what they were talking about. You had
Metzenberg, who was an assistant professor who ... tries to take on the President
of the National Academy of Sciences, [Dr. Bruce Alberts], who could run circles
around this guy and Metzenberg is talking like he really knows. (H. Brunkhorst,
personal communication, 2005)
Dr. Bonnie Brunkhorst had an investigative reporter tell her that she [the
reporter] needed to stop because her family was in jeopardy and she knew too much and
she was going to leave the state. It was clear that in spite of trying to avoid a new
standards war, this one was heating up anyway (B. Brunkhorst, personal communication,
2005).
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Now that a second round of proposals was issued and because the award had first
gone to the Academic Science Coalition, that proposal was public record and available to
anyone that wanted to read it.
With a formal protest the process sometimes will take 45-60 days to finish.
Attorney General Dan Lungren’s office approved the protest.
Later events demonstrated that the opposing group had obtained the governor’s
advocacy, but a legal intervention to stop the award was necessary. The
Commission claimed that there was a technical error on their part. There were
points assigned for each category of the proposal and the evaluation points they
were given were questionable. (B. Brunkhorst, 1999, p. 3)
There were also disparaging and misconstrued reports about the Academic
Science Coalition group the next week. It turned into a national media blitz of unfair,
misconstrued, and disparaging stories about how some individuals that had never taken
any upper division science classes in college were the ones picked to decide what the
curriculum would be for the public schools. On the front page of the Los Angeles Times,
a lead article talked about their work and scientific training. The writer said, “It’s truly
regrettable, but individuals who have never taken an upper division college science
course are often involved in defining the content for our public schools, and that leads to
mediocre and ‘dumbed down’ curricula” (Colvin, 1997). There were conversations
between Dr. Brunkhorst and the reporter but it did not result in any corrections in the
paper. This was the attempt to begin the perception of scientists versus educators
(Brunkhorst, 1999, p. 3).
At this meeting it was noted in the minutes that there were several textbook and
assessment representatives, scientists and science educators. Commission Harris said,
If we can’t do it right with the people who are here, it can’t be done. There was a
discussion of whether the committee should look at international or just U.S.
Standards. Commissioner Davis warned the committee that they should not look
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at where teachers and students are today but where we want them to be in the
future - at a world-class level. (Commission for the Establishment of Academic
Content and Performance Standards, 1997)
Aiello agreed and said, “we expect students to rise to meet the Standards, we
should expect teachers to rise to meet them too” (Commission for the Establishment of
Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
“Commissioner Evers said he would be seriously troubled with an integrated
approach to science in the secondary school, and he stated that he would fight such an
approach in the science Standards” (Commission for the Establishment of Academic
Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
Hands-on seemed to be the basic theme of the 1990 Science Framework. So
listening to how Galef responded to Evers by saying that the schools are to decide just
what and how to teach the children science is a good response. But it also shows that
some of the Commissioners want to go back in time to only textbook learning when
already in 1990, they were ready for hands-on and inquiry learning (Commission for the
Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
Chair Galef responded by saying that the committee is supposed to set the
Standards and let the schools decide how to get there; the committee isn’t going to
recommend integrated anything, just what students should know and be able to do.
Commissioner Harris concurred. No matter what grade, people who know science want
to see that there is knowledge in the three disciplines, it doesn’t matter how a student gets
there. ‘The word integrated need not be brought up again’” (Commission for the
Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
There were other plans made at this meeting for the science consultants. They
came up with a list of possible sources to use as guidelines. This is an interesting list
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because among the list of resources was The National Science Education Standards,
which had been spumed earlier as a set of Standards that were too general. The
consultants could look at other resources such as curriculum and Standards from Japan,
the Czech Republic, Singapore, and Germany. The list of the American Federation
Teacher’s “exemplary” states included: Delaware, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, and
Virginia and the Texas and the California Department of Educations’ Challenge
Initiative, Project 2061. According to the minutes of November 6, “Commissioner Evers
cautioned that the criteria have to be interpreted and judgment is an important factor.
Look at the merits of the documents” (Commission for the Establishment of Academic
Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
According to the minutes of the science committee, the Commissioners decided
that students should be included in this process to give a balanced perspective. Students
could be involved in the review panels or focus groups.
On November 20,1997, Communications Director, Marci McFadden sent a
memo to the commissioners about dates for Focus Groups. According to the minutes the
locations were “based on two criteria: 1) areas of the state we did not visit during our first
phase; and 2) those areas which have expressed interest in hosting a meeting.” The intent
was to hold two meetings at the same time, one with a majority of teachers and they other
with business and community leaders along with parents. Only 12 people were to be in a
focus group for maximum results. After the focus groups are over the results would be
presented to the Commission at the February meeting. The intent is to have follow-up
focus groups again with the same people in May. But this meeting depends on whether
there is a second round of meetings in May or June. If there is not a focus group the
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participants will be sent a survey. After looking at the list in Table 4 it does seem that the
Commission tried to spread meetings out across the State. But what were the results?
On November 21,1997, after the RFP had been awarded and protested, a special
meeting was called by Scott Hill. He knew it was last minute so he allowed some that
could not get to Sacramento to join via a conference call. According to the minutes of the
meeting on December 1,1997, nine commissioners were present and eight participated
via conference call. Four other members were absent. Commissioner Evers tried to
question
the legality of the meeting but Chair Wright had already cleared it with the Attorney
General’s office.
Table 4
List of Focus Groups; Location and Date . _________________ ____
Santa Ana, Santa Ana USD, Jan. 20,1998
Glendale, Glendale USD, Jan. 20,1998
Stockton, Stockton USD, Jan 21,1998
Santa Rosa, City of Santa Rosa Elementary School District, Jan 21,1998
Vallejo, Valejo City USD, Jan. 22,1998
Placercville, El Dorado County Office of Ed., Jan 22,1998
Yuba City, Sutter City office of Ed., Jan 23,1998
Redding, Shasta and Tehama County Offices of Ed., Jan 23,1998
Moreno Valley, Moreno Valley USD, Jan 26,1998
Palm Springs, PS USD, Jan 26,1998
(Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance
Standards, 1997).
According to the minutes on December 1, legal council found a two-fold
problem. The first was that the point system, that was shown earlier in this paper, gave
the Academic Science Coalition 82 out of 115 points. (The Associated Scientists had
received 43.5 out of 115.) In the RFP it stated that bidders would advance to the next
level of the interview phase with 81 percent of the total points, which meant that bidders
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needed 93 points out of 115. There was one list discussed earlier which had a total of
only 100 points. Where did this list come up with 115 points, because at the December
meeting, the minutes only discussed a total of 100 points. Where the other fifteen points
came from was never found in any other documents {Commission for the Establishment
of Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
We didn’t follow the evaluation process the way we were supposed to. And that
was up to the Executive Director, which was a thing that was my screw-up in
terms of leading the process. So, we ended up having to do a quick turnaround
and send the RFP back out and low and behold we had the two same responses.
(Hill, personal communication, 2005)
The second problem was the amount of points given for the bidders budget. The
Associated Scientists should have gotten 20 points and the Academic Science Coalition
should have gotten 0 points. But this was not the case. In the list from the minutes no one
mentioned any points for a bidders budget. If that would have been what was needed to
add to the 100 points it would have come to 120 instead of the 115 points they talk about,
so somewhere it is clear that information is missing.
Therefore the Commission had to rescind the action of the November 6,1997,
acceptance of the Academic Science Coalition and they had to reject all bids. The third
thing was to reissue a request for proposal with a substitute timeline and according to the
minutes of December 1,1997; December 3 would be the time when the new RFP would
be posted and January 14,1998, was the date for the commission to vote on the
contractor {Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance
Standards, 1997).
In December 1997 just a few days before the deadline of the second request for
proposals, Dr. Brunkhorst’s university president:
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Dr. Albert Kamig, called to report that he had received a call from the state
level telling him that should he allow my [Brunkhorst} proposal to be submitted
through the [sic] our university, the university could be in danger of a state
budget reduction. The governor actually “blue lined,” cut budget items,
supporting projects that had not fallen into political agreement with his agenda.
So the threat had warrant. . . It was too late to submit our second proposal
through a private university. Had we complied with the threat, the national
scientific community perspective would not have been at the table (Brunkhorst,
personal communication, 2005; Brunkhorst, 1999, p. 5).
President Kamig, acknowledging our representation of the perspectives of the
national scientific community documents, and those who had agreed to work
with us, including Nobel Laureates and the President of the National Academy of
Sciences, supported our submission, a brave act in defense of academic freedom
for a state university president new to California by a [sic] only few months.
(Brunkhorst, 1999, p. 5)
Alice Petrossian reported that:
. . . some days at the Commission meeting Bill Evers would go sit in the comer
of the room on the floor or hold up the proceedings in other ways by calling
points of order using Robert’s Rules of Order,. . . instead of focusing on the
issues. Bill was one of those people that is a pretty bright man, but somehow
turned off 99% of the Commission. (Petrossian, personal communication, 2005)
Bill’s whole thing was “if it can’t be tested then it shouldn’t be in the Standards.” And
ours was “the Standards weren’t based on the fact that they could be tested or not.” The
Standards were focused on, “What is it we expect every child to know and be able to
do?” not, “What is it we expect every child to get tested on?” (Petrossian, personal
communication, 2005)
Scott Hill said the publishing companies were at every meeting but were not
active participants; they just sat back and listened. They were there simply to learn and
to observe the process (Hill personal communication, 2005).
In 1989, the Board of Education adopted a policy statement about teaching
natural sciences that superseded the Antidogmatism Policy of the Board from 1972,
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which had been distributed statewide in 1981, and also in the Science Framework
Addendum in 1984.
The statement written in bold was:
Nothing in science or in any other field of knowledge shall be taught
dogmatically. (A dogma is a system of beliefs that is not subject to scientific test
and refutation.) Compelling belief is inconsistent with the goal of education; the
goal is to encourage understanding. (State Board of Education Policy on the
Teaching of Natural Sciences, p. xi).
At the end of the Policy statement were some definitions of scientific terms
emphasizing their meaning in a scientific context.
Theory, hypothesis as terms in science mean a generalization reached by
inference from observed particulars and proposed as an explanation of their
cause, relations, or the like. Theory implies a larger body of tested evidence and
a greater degree of probability:. . . Hypothesis designates a merely tentative
explanation of the data, advanced or adopted provisionally, often as the basis of
a theory or as a guide to further observation or experiment. (State Board of
Education Policy on the Teaching of Natural Sciences, p. xii).
In January of 1989, the California State Board of Education adopted a policy
statement on the teaching of natural sciences. One of the points defined three terms:
A scientific fact as an understanding based on confirmable observations and
subject to test and rejection, a scientific hypothesis as an attempt to frame a
question as a testable proposition, and a scientific theory as a logical construct
based on acts and hypotheses that organizes and explains a range of natural
phenomena. Scientific theories are constantly subject to testing, modification,
and refutation as new evidence and new ideas emerge. Because scientific
theories have predictive capabilities, they essentially guide further investigations.
(State Board of Education Policy on the Teaching of Natural Sciences, p. xi)
To achieve scientific literacy for all of our students we hold the following
expectations - which reflect the main ideas in the framework - for science
programs:. . . 5) Science is presented in connection with students’ own
experiences and interests, frequently using hands-on experiences that are integral
to the instructional sequence. 6) Students are given opportunities to construct the
important ideas of science, which are then developed in depth, through inquiry
and investigation. 9) Textbooks are not the sole source of the curriculum;
everyday materials and laboratory equipment, videotapes and software, and other
printed materials such as reference books provide a substantial part of student
experience. (CDE, 1990, Introduction)
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The 1990 Science Framework was built on previous work and just as science changes,
the frameworks need revision.
In Chapter 6 of the 1990 Science Frameworkthere is a section about science
learning by direct experience. There are many reasons why children need to conduct
their own hand-on investigations in order to learn science. The reasons fall into three
major categories:
1) many children do not always understand when everything they are to learn is
verbal;
2) children can learn techniques and processes when they repeat an experiment;
and
3) children can retain things longer from a science lab experiment and also enjoy
it much more rather than learning it from a textbook (CDE, 1990 p. 135).
According to Dr. Ted Schultz (1998), in the proposal Dr. Metzenberg sent in,
there was no work plan, it was not involved with any institutional affiliation, and
Metzenberg listed himself as the ‘authority to bind the vendor.” It was also determined
that Dr. Seaborg would actively write the Standards while Drs. Taube and Herschback
would help review the Standards when written, and they had agreed to this.
Taube said that even though the schools were facing increasing social changes,
there was no reason to “water-down” the Science Standards. Herschbach had also been
involved with K-12 science and had helped to develop science Standards for the National
Academy of Sciences (Colvin, 1997).
There was an emerging opposition to the involvement of the Science Coalition.
‘The Commission faced open threats of a legal suit that would hold up any progress if
they again proposed to contract with the Science Coalition.” The Commission then
decided they would take the leaders from both groups. “It was an ‘arranged marriage’
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without asking the ‘bride’, who had been publicly disparaged by the potential ’groom’”
(Brunkhorst, 1999a, Introduction to rough politics).
Most of the minutes were found at the Stanley Mosk State Library, one of the
many libraries by the Capitol in Sacramento. It is interesting to note that throughout all of
the binders of materials of the Science Commission, the minutes were all stamped with
“DRAFT.” A search was done by calling several people, up in Sacramento, at the
libraries to find out if there were “real” copies of the minutes anywhere. But there were
not any others found except those with the “DRAFT” stamp.
Sheila Byrd made a guess as to why the minutes had all been stamped “DRAFT.”
Any of the minutes that were circulated to Commissioners were always stamped
“DRAFT” because they would vote to approve them, so you would see in the
next set of meeting minutes, I would have assumed, motions that minutes of the
meeting were approved. I can’t remember any time when the minutes of the
meetings were not approved. Maybe those are the only ones. There was
probably no reason ever to go back and print up a new version of minutes. She
did not remember a whole lot of changes ever in minutes because we sort of did
summaries of minutes, we didn’t do painstaking “blow-by-blow.” (Byrd,
personal communication, 2006)
According to the Minutes of the Academic Standards Commission on December
11,1997, besides the commissioners there were about 30 members from the public in
attendance. Acting Chair Harris announced that Andrew Galef had resigned from the
commission. There was no reason given in the minutes for the resignation.
After an interview with Ellen Wright, the new Chairperson of the Commission,
she said, of course they used Robert’s Rules of Order at every meeting (Wright, personal
communication, 2006). From the minutes of the meetings it is not clear exactly when
Chair Wright took over, but at the November 6,1997, meeting, Galef was still chair. At
the next meeting on December 11,1997, it was listed that Ellen Wright was the Chair
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(Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards,
1997).
This group had so many very different personalities that there is a question of
how they could just “operate by cooperative effort.” Things were so contentious at most
meetings that it probably would have been worse chaos than it was already. She said that
every meeting held was contentious. It was very clear there were two distinct groups in
science. Things were complicated by the Board of Education with its devotion to Dr.
Seaborg and whatever he recommended they would accept (Wright, personal
communication, 2006).
Mrs. Wright felt like most of the Commissioners were responsible persons and
wanted to do something good but they were not able (or maybe wiling) to hear each
other. “I felt we were there to do a job with research and evaluation of the materials and
to do our best without being political (Wright, personal communication, 2006).
At one meeting Mrs. Wright brought in an attorney to help her keep:
. . . everyone focused on the issues - without any digressions or speeches. It was
successful, and we accomplished a lot. We had some very vocal people on the
commission (who did not agree with each other), and it required strict
parliamentary law to move forward. (Wright, personal communication, 2006)
Ruth McKenna said it was pretty wild at some points - meaning the Board meetings
(McKenna, personal communication, 2005).
Mrs. Wright said that as she was running the meetings Mr. Evers would get up
out of his seat, as a Commissioner, and go out into the audience and talk to people that he
had brought with him (Wright, personal communication, 2006).
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At one point she wondered why they were all there torturing themselves. She
said that Mr. Aiello had said he felt like this was one of the worst experiences of his life
and she said many others felt the same way (Wright, personal communication, 2006).
Staffer Thallner reported that the second RFP for the consulting contract for
Science Standards was issued on December 3 and responses were due on December 19.
Commissioner Ortiz, according to the minutes of December 11, apologized to the
California State University, San Bernardino group for the proposal evaluation process
(Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards,
1997).
At this meeting there was a discussion among the Commissioners and the
members of the audience about what they thought the big issues were in Science
Standards. Table 5 describes what the group came up with.
Table 5
Big Issues for Science Standards_____________________________________________
Integration - what it means at elementary and high schools levels
Creation/Evolution
Current science teaching practice
ESL learners
Content vs. science process
Are Standards a floor or a ceiling?
What does world-class mean?
Scientific method/process
Technology (and biotechnology)
Amount of material (Do-ability)
Priority of content (selecting one thing may mean excluding another)
Teacher creativity
Strands at which grade levels?
{Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards,
1997).
They discussed comparing other state Standards side-by-side such as Texas and
Virginia because they are written grade-by-grade. Then Chair Harris asked all who were
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106
present again what they though students should have “under their belts” by the time they
finish high school. The results appear in Table 6.
Table 6
What Students Should Know_______________________ _________________________
Things students should have “under their belts” by the time they complete their
secondary education:
• Difference between knowledge and opinion
• Relevance of science in everyone’s daily life - applicability
• Mathematical capability
• Reading and writing ability (absorb, understand, and apply science
• Laboratory skills
• Difference between scientific facts and theories
• Science is not static: “established” science and discovery
Other items to consider included:
• Science literacy vs. scientist training
• Integration at the high school and elementary levels
• Building knowledge from science
• What systems are
• What variables are
• Investigative process
The audience and committee discussed a number of areas the Standards could
cover:
• California-specific science
• Environmental science
• Middle-school science
• Hands-on science experience
• Life science
• Geo. science
• Physical science
• Astronomy
• “Nature of science”
_______ * Marine science________________________________________________ _
(Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards,
1997)
Scott Hill said that after the quick turnaround with the second set of RFPs:
We had the two same responses. But this time the Academic Science Coalition,
loaded their thing up with a whole bunch of Nobel Laureates as well, so they had
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people like David Baltimore from Caltech. It was just absurd there were 15
Nobel laureates on the one hand and 12 on the other, all wanting to play the game
of writing California Educational Science Standards (Hill, personal
communication, 2005)
Dr. Stan Metzenberg from California State University - Northridge (CSUN) had
also put together a proposal with two other friends who were also scientists. The group
was called the Associated Scientists. Going through this RFP process again was when:
. . . things got really sort of tricky because there was a whole bunch of external
environmental things that were very apparent. One is that these groups each
believed that they were on a mission from God to win and that each one of them
believed that only they could represent well what science was supposed to be.
And so, we knew walking into this that choosing one over the other was going to
put us in the worst kind of open public strife and debate and politics and all those
things possible. (Hill, personal communication, 2005)
I let our evaluation committee know, “If you believe that as you evaluate these that
neither of these teams covers all of the evaluation criteria sufficiently well, you can
always award it to no one and direct me to engage both.” I think this is part of what a
good Executive Director does and I’m actually proud of the fact that I did it (Hill,
personal communication, 2005).
We checked with our attorney to make sure that what we were doing was right
and then talked with the Commission Chair and those:
. . . folks who were going to be involved on the science side that I fundamentally
believed that we had to work with both parties and I was concerned about having
one party work for us inside the tent and one sort of banging on us outside. The
group went through the process again and the Commissioners, to their credit,
decided to award it to neither party and the announcement was that neither party
had met the criteria at a level that was sufficient and that they were directing me,
the Commission’s Executive Director, to engage both parties and form a single,
consolidated team. I [Hill] knew that living with that decision was going to be
miserable on a day-to-day basis because I was trying to bring together two
parties that hated each other. (Hill, personal communication, 2005)
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When it was decided that both groups could work together:
The Commission, in conjunction with the CSU Chancellor’s office and the
Governor’s office, asked me to work with Bonnie Brunkhorst to try to reach
consensus. We were permitted to bring forward our teams of writers. Most of
the people I brought were working science teachers, at least after our first writing
meeting in February. (Metzenberg, personal communication, 2005).
Hill was trying to bring the two parties together. They went through a long
process of negotiations that took them to the California State Chancellor’s office and to
Sacramento. Ultimately we came to an arrangement in which we basically said, “Let’s be
really clear about this. You’re not working for yourselves. You are working for us. You
will report directly to me, the Executive Director. I’m calling the shots because I
represent the Commission” (Hill, personal communication, 2005).
We actually had three different arrangements. We had a contract with CSUSB
for Dr. Brunkhorst and her time, along with some of her team. We had a contract with
CSUN for Dr. Metzenberg’s time. Then Dr. Rollie Otto came to us and said:
I have resigned from Bonnie Brunkhorst’s team. I want to be here to represent
and work with Glenn Seaborg, but I think I really represent the best of both
parties. So we ended up paying for his time and said that he was going to be the
facilitator for the entire development process. That was critical for us because
Rollie ended up being the one person who could sort of translate where
everybody needed to go. And so we ended up having three people who sort of
were directing left, right and middle. That ended up being the development, the
team process of how we arrived at our consultants. (Hill, personal
communication, 2005)
Hill said that Otto was the perfect person because he was objective in being able
to read both what the science reformers wanted and what Glenn Seaborg needed out of
the whole process. Dr. Otto was able to help Glenn see where the science reformers were
coming from, but he could also push them into ensuring that there were sufficient basic
skills and sufficient rigor (Hill, personal communication, 2005).
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The resignation of Commissioner Andrew Galef, created a vacancy on the
Commission and it was also at this time that Glenn Seaborg’s name was being discussed
as one of the consultants.
Glenn was such a powerful figure in the . . . world of science, that one of the
major issues was if Glenn said he wanted to be involved in this, the question was,
“What was his appropriate involvement?” We were going through this situation
politically and we knew that the Governor’s office was always going to try to
come down on the side of Seaborg for several reasons. One was that people who
were advising the Governor, their parents had actually worked with Seaborg and
he was just so legendary that if someone was . . . saying that “This is what Glenn
Seaborg believes,” we knew that the Wilson Administration was always going to
support that. So, I put the idea to the Governor’s Appointment Secretary. I said,
“Look, let’s not even play the game. If you really want Glenn involved, why
don’t you appoint him to the Commission and you can just make him Chair of
the Science Committee. That way you’re going to have somebody you feel
comfortable with directing the work. He will work directly with me. I’ll make
sure that we represent all views fairly.” Just knowing where the cards were
politically, to me it was better to have Glenn inside the tent, than to have
somebody like him outside the tent. The Governor appointed him to the
Commission. (Hill, personal communication, 2005)
Dr. Otto said that once Dr. Seaborg was hired for the position as Chairman of the
Science Committee, he agreed to do it if he (Dr. Otto) was hired by the Commission to
assist him with his work. “ The reason being because he was very busy, he was older, and
he and I had a long-standing relationship.” Dr. Otto was hired to support the
Commission and he worked to facilitate the meetings that Glenn was running because of
his hearing and other things. “One of the things that I was asked to do was to facilitate
the actual meeting and discussion” (Otto, personal communication, 2005).
Dr. Caifee felt that the stage had then been set. He said someone had stepped
down from the Commission and that is when they filled the position with Dr. Glenn
Seaborg as Chairman of the Commission. Yvonne Larsen said, “Governor Wilson was
not sure they (the Standards) would be rigorous and so he appointed Glenn Seaborg.
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Seaborg worked hard to make sure there were Academic Standards that would be all
encompassing, provocative, influential and effective” (Larsen, personal communication,
2005).
He was put forward to the Governor and there was a group of support people
who wanted to be sure that their agenda was represented and it was easy to see
that in the minutes and notes of the meetings. There were people who came
forward who spoke for him and Glenn himself was relatively inactive in the main
meetings of the Commission. Well, and what he wanted indeed had been laid out
and I think this was crafted by a group concerned that a particular view of
science, and the Science Standards be represented. He [Seaborg] did speak a
number of times. He always sat next to me for some reason. And we’d chat a
little bit, but he was along in years (Calfee, personal communication, 2005).
Metzenberg was the key player in supporting Seaborg’s position and he
basically was orchestrating him. What you’ve seen there is a very interesting
mix of rallying around a gentleman of enormous qualifications at one time, 30
years ago. When he spoke, he had memorized or stuck in his mind some of the
preparatory notes and materials from A Nation at Risk. And on occasion,
somebody would say something that would stir up those memories and he would,
and it was repetition, you know, he wouldn’t have remembered that he had said
that maybe at the last meeting. The only other thing that I remember him saying
in the open meetings that sticks in my mind was . . . and I think in response to
those who... urged science process be included as well as content, who were
concerned about the amount of material and the level of detail, and he had two
things to say. One was that when he was a child, they had to learn a lot more
science when he was a student, and that everything that had come about in the
last 30 or 40 years, all of that was critically important for kids to know. And it
was important for them to know it and there wasn’t time in schooling for all of
this nonsense of doing anything, they couldn’t do science anyway. Science was
pretty much beyond the scope. (Calfee, personal communication, 2005)
Glenn Seaborg felt that doing hands-on science wasn’t getting to the depth
and breadth of science. And because he had Marion Joseph’s ear on the State
Board of Education, she was in control. Because Glenn Seaborg believed that
and he was the direct line to the State Board, they were buying everything Glenn
Seaborg said. Rollie Otto was kind of like Glenn Seaborg’s protege and was
mimicking everything that Glenn Seaborg said. So when Glenn dropped dead,
Rollie Otto continued the travesty. It is really quite ironic because when Rollie
was Executive Director of California Science Projects, here was a person who
worked with us, the teachers, that believed in hands-on science, believed in
integrated science, believed in conceptual understanding, and then, literally, it
was like an ettu Brute!Julius Caesar attack and he switched camps. (Gilbert,
personal communication, 2005)
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I l l
Because the Governor had appointed Dr. Seaborg to fill the vacancy on the
Commission, Yvonne Larsen was interested in keeping on track with the science
Standards. She and Dr. Seaborg were close friends and they had both served on A Nation
At Risk Commission. She wanted to make sure that Glenn was being well represented on
the Commission. Hill said she made it pretty clear that she was going to take her cues on
what the Standards were like from Glenn as to where we were going to come out on this
one (Hill personal communication, 2005).
There was also a list of items that the Commission sent to the consultants. It is
listed in Appendix G. The Commissioners requested some items, and there were other
national and international science standards to use as guides while writing the California
Standards.
Dr. Rollie Otto understood their concerns because they think “we are not serving
those kids who are like them (Nobel scientists) who got it the first time and went on to
college and excelled.” Otto felt it was so politicized that it was hard to find a middle
ground (Colvin, 1997)
Otto said that when Seaborg ran the meetings:
He would usually write an opening statement that was consistent with the
direction each meeting was to go. It... guided them and said, ‘Here’s what I
think we should be doing; here’s what we should focus on today; here’s how we
should go forward; here’s what’s going to be presented.’ (Otto, personal
communication, 2005)
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Dr. Calfee said that at almost every meeting Dr. Seaborg would come and sit
down beside him and the statement that he made would usually have come from A Nation
at Risk4 (Calfee, personal communication, 2006).
I [Hill] went to Seaborg’s office down at the Lawrence Berkeley Lab and met
with him several times and we drove up together to Sacramento several times and
got to know each other relatively well. That was to me again a strategic move
having Glenn involved in the work from the inside, helping see more
perspectives than if he had just been on the outside. We tried to set this up
so that we had as much control of die process for the entire Commission as we
could. And as can be seen, what I just have described is completely about
politics, not science. So it is important to understand when there is this very
public development process and the first thing you have to conquer is as a public
agency, how do you have very public and open conversations? How do you
insure that as many parties as possible are involved? How do you ensure that
those people who are supposed to control the decision-making process, believe
that they have adequate control? How do you also ensure that in the end you
have good public policy as a result? These are sort of the things that we were
trying to drive through and get to as we established . . . all the ground rules.
(Hill, personal communication, 2005)
Mrs. Wright said that Scott Hill and Paul Thallner met with Seaborg several
times up at Berkeley but she was never invited. She never knew what happened at those
meetings. Seaborg did not come to Sacramento for all the meetings. She did say that he
wanted the “same science as when he was growing up” (Wright, personal
communication, 2006).
At one point Mrs. Wright wanted William Schmidt, the Principle Investigator of
TIMSS (Third International Mathematics and Science Study) now known as Trends in
International Mathematics and Science Study to make a presentation. Dr. Seaborg and
4
Recommendation that came from this report were because “schools and colleges should adopt higher and
measurable Standards for academic performance”
http://www.ncrel.org/sdrs/areas/issues/content/cntareas/science/sc3risk.htm
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113
Dr. Evers got upset about it and Evers said if she did that he would file a minority report,5
so the invitation never happened (Wright, personal communication, 2006).
January 1998
At the January 15,1998, meeting of the Science Committee, part of the
Commission, is where they voted to contract with both leaders of the two proposals,
Commissioner X asked Dr. Brunkhorst if she would go out in die hall and talk with him
at some point. She said she would because “Opportunities to talk with people are
important in the process of communication, understand and identifying potential areas of
agreement or compromise” (B. Brunkhorst, 1999, p. 4).
During the break Dr. Brunkhorst and Dr. Helen Quinn from Stanford Linear
Accelerator and one of the members of the Coalition walked out in the hall to talk to
Commissioner X. When Commissioner X saw Dr. Quinn, he told her that this had
nothing to do with her and she needed to leave, so she did, but this had taken both women
off guard. “He then proceeded to tell Brunkhorst what she understood to be a physical
threat, man to woman, if she were to work for the commission.” She went back in the
room immediately and told the Executive Director, Scott Hill, of the threat that had been
made and the Commission needed to make sure to be “responsible for protecting her from
his threatened actions, should she agree to work with them” (Brunkhorst, personal
communication, 2005).
5 Minority report - a separate, often secret, summary presented by members o f a group that disagrees with the
majority. http://dictionarv.reference.com/search?r=2&(pminoritv%20report
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114
Figure 5 is a memorandum sent to the chief staff personnel and illustrates the
Academic Science Coalition’ s introduction and entry to high stakes politics in California
under which the California Science Content Standards were developed.
Now it was clear how far some people would go to try to intimidate her but Dr.
Brunkhorst was determined that it was important to stay to protect and represent the
scientific community. She would only do it if “she could be provided with a contract that
would protect her personal and professional rights.” It was obvious that there were many
that were anxious to get rid of her (Brunkhorst, 1999, ).
The Academic Science Coalition learned quickly that they were facing a
rough political process. They assumed if they took the high road as far as academics
were concerned, their expertise would provide the academic discussions that were
needed. The Coalition found that there was a political direction that was ready to be
carried out with the support of the governor’s office and was slanted to accomplish a
predetermined outcome (Schultz, 1998).
February 1998
Minutes for the February 2,1998, meeting are missing, but on February 14,1998,
a memo was sent to the Members of the State Board of Education from Greg Geeting,
Assistant Executive Director and the subject was “Meeting of Academic Standards
Commission’s Science Committee on February 2,1998.” After searching up in
Sacramento for all the minutes of the meetings there were not any copies of minutes of a
February 2,1998, meeting.
But the report on February 14,1998, said the February 2n d meeting was a
noteworthy one because Governor Wilson had one vacancy to fill on the Commission and
he appointed as Commissioner, Dr. Glenn T Seaborg. The chairperson then named him
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115
Figure 5
Memo from Ellen Wright about Commissioner X
"Memorandum
22 January, 1998
TO: Julie Justus
George Dunn
cc. Eileen Gray, Attorney General's Office
FROM: Ellen Wright
Scott H ill
RE: [Commissioner X , name withheld]
We mentioned to Julie last week that [Commissioner X ] has inquired at length
about the qualifications of Dr. Bonnie Brunkhorst, ttie chair of the CSU San
Bernardino Institute for Science Education Team.
Commissioner [X ] called the University of Iowa faculty and represented
himself as "affiliated with [name withheld] University (quotation marks not
closed in original memo) checking on the credentials of Bonnie Brunkhorst.
He did not identify himself as a member of the commission, nor did he
provide any disclaimer that he was not checking Dr. Brunkhorst’ s credentials
in reference to employment at [name withheld] University.
Commissioner [X ] has, according to reports we have received from University
of Iowa faculty and CSU San Bernardino faculty, instituted phone calls with
the intent of challenging Dr. Brunkhorst’ s claim of a doctoral major in both
science education and geology. She currently holds a joint appointment in
both fields with CSU San Bernardino at the rank of full professor.
He made a similar call to the CSU San Bernardino Geology Department and
inquired as to whether Dr. Brunkhorst was a member of that department.
As you both know, we have worked extremely hard to arrive at the point we
find ourselves in. We have a unique opportunity to forge a consensus behind
the science education standards that w ill help the commission, State Board,
and governor avoid a protracted curriculum war. Commissioner [X]s’ actions
are a significant threat to all of this hard work. Scott is scheduled to
meet with Dr. Brunkhorst and D r. Metzenberg (of Associated Scientists) in «
Long Beach at CSU headquarters tomorrow morning.
Since Commissioner [X]s' overtures have, of course, reached Dr. Brunkhorst,
she has asked that we guarantee to her that Commissioner [X ] s' antics w ill
cease. We agree that they must.
We are, therefore, requesting that a stem phone call be made to
Commissioner [X ] today ( so we can report this tomorrow) with the following
message:
1.
Commissioner [X ] is to cease all inquiries into the qualifications of D r.
Brunkhorst. They are damaging to the commission's attempt to bring the best
of both groups forward.
2.
The governor’ s office has invested significant capital in trying to assist
the commission and these groups in finding resolution. Commissioner [X ] is
working against the position of the governor by conducting these inquiries.
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116
as the Science Committee chair, and Dr. Seaborg, in turn said he was appointing his long
time student and a former protege, Dr. Rollie Otto, to be a facilitator in the project. Now
the balance on the Science committee was totally gone and Seaborg and the rest of the
Governor’s people held the reigns in the group. The Presenters and Science Standards
support staff also included Dr. Bonnie Brunkhorst (CSU San Bernardino) and Stan
Metzenberg (CSU Northridge). The Commission had decided that they could have both
groups work side-by-side on the Standards (Schultz, 1998).
When Otto was appointed to work under Seaborg, Dr. Art Sussman felt a kind of
betrayal.
As the whole process unfolded,. . . my point of view was that we couldn’t get the
document that we wanted to get because the cards were stacked too much in the
other direction,. .. [because] Seaborg being die Chair,... Bill Evers being on
the science committee, and what the State Board as a whole wanted. There was
at least one, if not two votes in favor of that we wanted that Evers said Seaborg
didn’t want. But, we were told quite plainly by Evers that if we put that through,
then they were going to submit a counter-document, with a very clear threat
that the Board would adopt their counter-document, rather than, you know,
minority report, and the Board would adopt their minority report, rather than the
full report of the committee. (Sussman, personal communication, 2005)
It seems as though whenever Evers did not like the direction the Committee was going,
he would threaten them with a minority report, knowing full well that the Committee
would back off and he would get his way! (Sussman, & Quinn personal communication,
2005), (Wright, personal communication, 2006)
When Commissioner Seaborg called the meeting to order he briefly introduced
himself and said that he was looking forward to the challenge of developing “powerful
Science Standards which he believes are critical to improving scientific literacy.”
Governor Wilson appointed Commissioner Seaborg with this dual appointment (filling
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117
the vacancy on the Commission and chair the Science Committee) and from then on
played a dominating role (Schultz, 1998 p. 3).
Dr. Seaborg made some observations about what the committee should come up
with for the Science Standards. He said the Standards should be “short and concise.”
Also the content and performance Standards should not be separated. He told the
committee that the Virginia Standards were a good model with basic science instruction
through grade six, unifying themes in seventh to ninth, and formal courses in grades ten
to twelve.
Executive Director Scott Hill introduced both Dr. Brunkhorst and Dr.
Metzenberg, telling everyone “how pleased that they had agreed to participate in the joint
venture” together in developing the science Standards. He felt that they had a “workable
approach” and that they would be “putting together a draft based on the Committee’s
direction today.” Dr. Seaborg was positive that they would “work together to produce a
national model that will really spell it out” (Hill personal communication, 2005).
The two main consultants, Dr. Bonnie Brunkhorst and Dr. Stan Metzenberg,
were interviewed. Dr. Brunkhorst talked to the interviewer several times face-to-face and
provided some papers she had written on the experience and also some papers she had
presented to the California Science Teachers Association. Dr. Metzenberg was not as
forthcoming with his information and would only answer questions by email and did so
on two occasions.
The information that follows comes from Dr. Brunkhorst and how she viewed the
process of the writing of the Standards. She sometimes used the comparison of how the
National Science Education Standards were written as opposed to the California Science
Content Standards. She was on the National Committee on Science Education Standards
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and Assessment and the Executive Editorial Committee for writing the National Science
Education Standards.
Dr. Brunkhorst wanted to show when the rules of a process lean more towards
academic rules from her experience with writing the National Science Education
Standards and what type of products are created; as opposed to the writing of the
California Science Content Standards, when the development leans toward a more
political process. Although, one must recognize that every process always contains some
politics.
Brunkhorst and Metzenberg each had a team of writers “and in their proposals
they had two different philosophical approaches to what the Standards ought to be.”
When they were asked:
. . . to do the writing of the Standards in a certain domain... they were to
negotiate and bring in presentations to the subcommittee on science and
sometimes when they disagreed, they would present their two points of view.
When they couldn’t reconcile, they would present their two points of view.
(Otto, personal communication, 2005).
On things they both agreed on, it would be presented as such (Otto, personal
communication, 2005).
When the two groups had to get together before the meetings and decide what
they agreed on and then it got very nitty-gritty . . . I don’t think there was so
much of a problem with the writing of specific contents into the standards
inasmuch as how the standards should be presented, how they should be
organized, and what they should include. (Otto, personal communication, 2005)
When Dr. Metzenberg was asked about the two groups working together he
replied, “When we brought people to the table to work, we all sat together as a collective
group, not as separate caucuses. This was how we agreed to work, in conjunction with
the Commission staff” (Metzenberg, personal communication, 2005).
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Mrs. Petrossian recalled:
We all respected him [Dr. Seaborg] so highly because of his own work and
because of... his background and experience and contribution . . . it was very
hard to disagree. At the same time those of us who were the practitioners, I mean
we had to implement the Science Standards, having children at a very young age
memorize the signs for different elements, made very little sense to those of us
who had taught for years. We wanted children to have experience and knowing
the facts in science, but we also wanted balance with some hands-on. (Petrossian,
personal communication, 2005)
I wanted to make sure we had Science Standards that were rigorous but at the
same time reasonable and attainable, and that would not turn children off to
science, but, rather, excite them because I could see that these were the children
in the future that were going to take me to other planets, that were going to make
sure I didn’t die of cancer at 50, that were going to make... sure that my
grandchildren had a healthy environment So, I wanted to make sure that science
was something that was exciting and it had equal billing to all the other Contents.
(Petrossian, personal communication, 2005)
There was this whole belief that hands-on science had no place just like fuzzy
math, there was this labeling of hands-on science. So we had to work around it
and say, OK, once the child learns those facts, what value does it have so that he
or she will retain the facts and then use them in their daily life or in their future
career? What career goals will all this be to make it valuable to master?
(Petrossian, personal communication, 2005)
I think the level of mastery of the Content Standards is something that still
has not been addressed, but in science, specifically, memorization of facts just
as in history, add very little value for many of us. What you should know is die
concept and you should know the elements if you’re working on something
specific. So, that’s where we landed. At some point we went ahead and
approved something and we were told over and over by Marion Joseph, she made
it very clear, that the State Board would override anything they didn’t like in the
Content Standards, that we were only an advisory body. (Petrossian, personal
communication, 2005)
Gilbert said he thought that Marion Joseph was in the “driver’s seat” and
therefore was in control of things. He said:
She doesn’t think that there’s a place for science in elementary school. If they
were to eliminate science in elementary school and start teaching it in middle
school, she’d be able to have her three hours of reading and her two hours on
math . . . and not worry about it (Gilbert, personal communication, 2005)
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120
He also said, “She’s the one who drove Open Court.6 She is the mother of Open Court”
(Gilbert, personal communication, 2005).
California has grade-specific Standards, many of which are grade-level
inappropriate. The same people that pushed die grade specificity are the ones
that have excluded science in elementaiy. And the only reason why elementary
science now is creeping back into elementary at 4th and 5th grades is because
of the STAR7 (Standardized Testing and Reporting) test We still are fighting
districts to try and get them to understand that a fourth and fifth grade test is a K-
5 commitment, that you can’t teach six years of science in two years and expect
kids to be not only scientifically literate, but ready to address the middle school
standards. And if you are an underperforming school, under sanctions, things
like science and history/sodal science and computer science is stripped from the
day because they’re focusing totally on language arts and math. So, I find that
not only hypocritical but illegal. Illegal because the Education Code says that
there are four core subjects—science, math, history/sodal sdence and language
arts. Core subjects means that they should be treated equally and no decision
coming out of our State Board even lends itself to equality of the four core
subjects. (Gilbert, personal communication, 2005)
In the minutes from the meeting of February 2,1998, Commissioner Aiello made
the comment that the Science Standards could either “help teachers or make their lives
harder.” He said that the best assistance would be to clearly state what students must
know by the end of the tenth grade to be ready for the state exam. He said this might be a
good discussion to have with the State Board {Commission for the Establishment of
Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
6 Open Court Reading is a research-based curriculum grounded in systematic, explicit instruction of
phonemic awareness, phonics and word knowledge, comprehension skills and strategies, inquiry skills and
strategies, and writing and language arts skills and strategies.
http://www.sraonline.com/index.php/home/cuniculumsoliitions/reading/oci/622
7
STAR (Standardized Testing and Reporting) the California Standards Tests in English-language arts,
mathematics, science, and histoiy-social science are comprised o f items that were developed specifically to
assess students' performance on California's Academic Content Standards. The State Board o f Education
adopted these Standards that specify what all California children are expected to know and be able to do.
http://testing-borderlink.org/nage.php?pid=SO&book=cst
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After much discussion about covering many topics by the end of tenth grade, the
importance of setting the tenth grade benchmark, Executive Director Hill suggested that
the exam horizon might change. Mr. Aiello commented, “If you want the content, then
you have to specify it.” Dr. Quinn said that an integrated approach might be considered
and then followed by a “higher order” science instruction {Commission for the
Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
Commissioner Harris said that it was not possible to “mandate all this course
work.” She believed that things should be reasonable. She agreed with Executive
Director Hill’s suggestion to give much local flexibility in determining how each teacher
would deliver the content. Commissioner Evers suggested that the group start working
up from kindergarten. Dr. Quinn reiterated that all disciplines must be included in the 9-
10 Standards {Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance
Standards, 1997).
Dr. Brunkhorst asked, “What is the vision?” She also asked that the group stay
focused on “what we are doing in science education, K-12.” Commissioner Treadway
said the group needed to focus on the “world class Science Standards” in a continuum
from K-12.
After some formatting issues and more group discussion, Commissioner Ortiz
commented on the idea, “strands don’t have to be taught in isolation,” and he
recommended four strands, including one for scientific investigation. Commissioner
Evers was “troubled by strands.” ‘They leave too much ambiguity.” Treadway did not
think it was a “parallel structure” with other proposed strands. Aiello suggested it was
okay because “we will use the scientific method in the other strands.” Commissioner
Harris emphasized that science is inquiry, thus investigation needs to be stressed.
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Commissioner Evers commented that “an investigative strand would have to be
‘a lot tougher’ than those he had seen—‘not so much fluff,’ Standards in the area of
investigation need to be ‘measurable and assessable’” (Commission for the Establishment
of Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
Dr. Metzenberg suggested investigation could be put into all strands, otherwise
all the areas would be weakened. Also, Dr. Brunkhorst told the Commissioners there
were ways to assess investigation, so that is not a problem.
Commission Hernandez finally made a motion to draft standards with a separate
strand for scientific investigation to see what it looks like. And if they did not like it, it
could be taken out When the vote was taken all were in favor except Commissioner
Evers. After more discussion about the strands a vote was also taken that there be
support for four strands (earth, life, physical, and scientific method) for K-8. All
members voted for the proposal, except Commissioner Evers who abstained (Commission
for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
Hill said the fundamental fight was between basic content knowledge and the
application of that knowledge through inquiry and hands-on learning. This was a critical
debate and “Bonnie, Stan and Rollie Otto . . . together solved this problem.” This was the
investigation and experimentation strand that became the fourth strand in the Standards.
They said:
This basically is an overlay that applies to each of the other three content areas
grade by grade. You should be able to do these things and you should be able to
have access to, you should have hands-on and inquiry-based investigation and
experimentation in every grade, in every content area. (Hill, personal
communication, 2005)
Mrs. Petrossian also discussed how other countries were doing in science and she
said, “So, as the world passes us by in the science and information age, maybe our
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Science Standards and Glenn’s perspective on things were the past and not the future.” It
is the hands-on science that gets kids excited. Mrs. Petrossian replied,
Bill Evers didn’t think so and Marion Joseph doesn’t think so. Also, Bill Evers
had a fit over children working in groups. We had put in the intro that we
believed that cooperative learning should play a large role in a society where the
business world says we have people who don’t know how to work together. Bill
wanted it out. He didn’t think cooperative learning had a place in our schools.
(Petrossian, personal communication, 2005)
For Hill this was:
. . . what was supposed to give fidelity to the idea that science is a hands-on
activity, that we take seriously the idea that investigation and experimentation are
the core elements of science. It gives us a chance to celebrate the whole issue
around scientific inquiry and scientific method and solving problem and all those
things that are fundamental to all learning. (Hill, personal communication, 2005)
Commissioner Hernandez said that the consultants should consider these strands
but then have flexibility to change them if they come up with an alternate idea. Finally
Executive Director Hill summarized four alternatives that he had heard in the discussion:
(1) biology, chemistry, physics, and scientific method; (2) adding geology; (3) the
Virginia Standards; and (4) the four strands for K-12.
Commissioner Seaborg asked the audience for any suggestions and one member
recommended aligning the Standards with the current California Science Framework that
is highly respected. That ended the meeting of February 2,1998.
February 1998
Before the February 10 meeting, a memo dated 12/19/97, from Ellen Wright had
gone out to the commissioners telling them that they needed to be “knowledgeable about
current scholarly opinion and K-12 practice and even though the agenda was not out the
meeting would likely involve a discussion among scientists and science educators about
some of the important issues to be aware of as science Standards are developed”
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{Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards,
1997).
In a discussion document for the February 19,1998, meeting there were two lists.
The first was the “Roles of Brunkhorst and Metzenberg” and the “Roles of Science
Committee.” See Tables 7 and 8.
According to the minutes on February 10,1998, there was a joint meeting with
the State Board of Education and the Academic Standards Commission. Commissioner
Jerilyn Harris and State Board of Education member Bob Trigg led a panel discussion on
science education and standards. The speakers were introduced and were told there
would be no questions or answers. This was an information only panel (Commission for
the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
Table 7
Roles of Brunkhorst and Metzenberg:_________________________________________
- Understand and follow the policy direction and guidance provided by the
science committee
Write the Standards for science (get the writing done using depth of
resources)
Provide electronic and print copy of documents to Standards committee staff
for distribution (should be one person - to be determined 2/10)
Revise documents as directed
Advise committee on content and format issues related to the document
Summarize public hearing testimony
_______ Meet all deadlines._______________________ ______________________
(Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards,
1997).
Table 8
Roles of Science Committee:_________________________________________________
Discuss and set policy for the formation of the Standards documents
Provide direction to science consultants
_______ Approve and recommend final draft Standards documents________________
(Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards,
1997).
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The following comments were reported in the minutes of February 10,1998:
Dr. Glenn Seaborg referenced the report A Nation at Risk (1983) and said that
science and math needed to be improved and an investment still must be made.
Dr. Donald Kennedy: Stanford University - He said the National Standards are
benchmarks and not curricula. The process of standards emphasizes inquiry, and the
standards are to help all students in the science and technology-based society.
Dr. Steven Oppenheimer: CSU, Northridge - Dr. Oppenheimer was very
encouraged by the fact that California was going to develop the nation’s best Science
Standards. He said Science Standards need to be crystal clear and great science involves a
mix of memorization, discovery/hands-on and lecture approaches.
Dr. Stan Metzenberg:, CSU, Northridge - Dr. Metzenberg emphasized the
importance of basic scientific research and that this was the only way to make progress
and fundamentals allow you to make discoveries. He said students in the 21s t century
need to have built in them fundamental knowledge that with help them survive in the
global economy.
Dr. Bonnie Brunkhorst: Professor of Science Education and Geology, CSU San
Bernardino - Dr. Brunkhorst referred to her group with following defining characteristics:
1. A group of “scientists and science teachers”
2. They were about factual reporting that included all students and the coalition
has not written Standards thus far.
3. The group is about world-class achievement in science for all Californians
and the Standards should be for all career paths, this is the best opportunity
for economic and personal success.
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4. Standards should expect the highest level of knowledge, with the ability to
analyze and use the scientific knowledge and skills.
Dr. Helen Quinn: Stanford Linear Accelerator Center - She said science education in
California schools is erratic today. She said all citizens needed to be able to understand
and analyze science information. We need solid, basic science concepts/facts and know
how to analyze, collect and plot. She said much thought had gone into the National
Standards and California should build on that work (Commission for the Establishment of
Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
Commissioner Harris and Board Member Trigg both said it was an honor to have
these people speak. Ms. Harris said their remarks would enable California to have world-
class Standards and Dr. Trigg was excited that the panelists were interested in K-12
education. He said this is a time when the public is interested in their work. The
speakers were upbeat and encouraging. He said they had outlined a challenge for the
Board and Commission.
Sheila Byrd said that the Commissioners double-checked between the Science
Standards and the Math Standards to make sure that anything that might require math
while doing any science concept, would be aligned. This was so whatever might be
requested of them in science would not unrealistic. They would have already learned
what was needed in math to complete the science project or problem.
At the full commission meeting on February 11,1998, Commissioner Aiello
gave the committee an update on the consultants. He said that they were:
. . . working amicably together. The committee is dealing with format issues.
The committee decided to do grade-by-grade Standards for K-5 and will do a
grade span for grades 6-8. He said that high school generally does not take a
strand approach to science. The committee has directed the consultants to use
verbs from Bloom’s Taxonomy in the development of the Standards.
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(iCommission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance
Standards, 1997)
Staff Consultant Thallner told the Commissioners that the consultants were
discussing the volume and depth of each grade and they will present a preliminary first
draft in March for consideration. Commissioner Evers said that the Board Members did
not want an overload in the lower grades because there needed to be time for sufficient
emphasis on reading and math. Shortly after this report the meeting was adjourned.
On March 5,1998, a memo went out to the Science Committee from Dr. Seaborg
about the March 17th meeting. He said that the first preliminary draft was not included
in their mailing. “ The commission staff is still working out final contract agreements
with one of the consultants. The consultant’s representatives and commission staff
expect to finalize the contract arrangements” soon but the legal council “advised against
sending to the commission a draft that purported to represent the consultant’s work and
approval thereof.” The commission staff said that the preliminary draft is almost ready
and when the legal matters are resolved they would receive copies. The legal matters
referred to were with Dr. Brunkhorst, CSU San Bernardino and the Academic Standards
Commission (Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance
Standards, 1997).
Along with the memo about the delay in receiving die preliminary draft was
included a summary of findings from a survey that the staff compiled and had sent to
different school districts in the state. The survey was to find out what the current
practices were in the schools, issues that teachers and administrators felt strongly about
and areas where time and resources have been heavily invested.
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According to the memorandum of March 11,1998, Ellen Wright wrote to the
Commissioners about the First Preliminary Draft of Science Standards. Along with it
was a memo from Dr. Seaborg. The Science Committee made some policy decisions to
help guide the work of the consultants. At the February 10-11,1998, meetings the
Science Committee finished the initial phase of policy direction. Along with the
Commission staff, Dr. Brunkhorst and Dr. Metzenberg decided they could jump-start the
process if they brought together teachers, educators, and scientists representing a range of
experiences and philosophies (Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content
and Performance Standards, 1997).
Dr. Helen Quinn said in an interview “it was very hard to find any middle
ground. Both Stan and Bonnie tended to sort of take extreme positions where they had
nothing in common.” Dr. Quinn said “Art Sussman and I were working very hard to find
middle ground to make it work.” Quinn and Sussman were working in the background as
advisors to help write the Standards. Quinn said “it’s not a dichotomy between learning
facts and learning process of science. You need to have both in order to have good
science education” (Quinn, personal communication, 2005).
Quinn said that when the polarization is so great it is hard to move forward.
Even when people would say rational things, “it was heard from the case, ‘Well, you’re
speaking for that side or you’re speaking for this side’” (Quinn, personal communication,
2005).
Whenever anything was brought to the Commission for a vote, the votes were
very polarized by the fact that Bill Evers really manipulated that process in the
sense that there were times when the Commission voted for our position and then
Bill Evers would say, ‘Well, if that’s the decision, I’m going to write a minority
report. ’ And then the Commission would vote again and change its position.
(Quinn, personal communication, 2005)
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At the March 11 meeting, it was reported in the minutes that there had been the
decision to invite approximately 25 people to come to a three-day meeting in Los
Angeles. The meeting was February 16-18,1998, because the commission had set the
deadline for March 5, for the first draft. Before the beginning of the Los Angeles
meeting the participants had received a comprehensive package including Science
Standards, background on the commissioners and the policy direction from the Science
Committee (Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance
Standards, 1997).
On February 16 when the initial meeting began the commission staff reviewed
the policy direction that had been given to the science committee. They also were told
what the legislative requirements and the commission’s criteria were. The Commission
also went to great lengths to let the Committee know that Dr. Brunkhorst and Dr.
Metzenberg were the sole consultants responsible for providing the first draft of the
Standards to the committee. The work of all who were meeting there would be viewed
just as recommendations to the consultants who would modify and revise as they saw fit.
At the end of the meeting some of the participants asked if they would have a chance to
“approve” the Standards along with their names on the document. The staff was very
clear that only the consultant’s names would be listed on the Science Standards. The
reviewers’ only purpose was to provide recommendations to the consultants (Commission
for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
During this three-day meeting each group “went off with their drafts and then
added to them and worked on them, and there was back-and-forth email.” When they
came together each group had their own draft and the State Department of Education
said, “OK, we want you, Bonnie and Stan, to come to a meeting and bring the drafts.”
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Dr. Quinn said she forgot who had come with Stan, but she believed that Art [Sussman]
and she “both went with Bonnie to this meeting, and there were two drafts,” and Bonnie
and Stan were each saying this is the draft to look at and “the State was saying, ‘Well, we
want one draft, not two.’ And they were saying, ‘Well, they’re different.’” This was
when Quinn said she would take a look at both drafts and color code them and have one
color for each difference and another color for the similarities. After that “it was from
there that we worked toward the final version. There was a lot that went into the
common color.” Quinn said she “was the person in the middle that mediated going from
a place where the two of them were saying, ‘There’s no way we can go from here to a
common ground, to make a common draft’” Whether this was right or wrong, it was the
only path forward at that time (Quinn, personal communication, 2005).
According to Dr. Metzenberg:
We prepared a series of drafts, using writing teams to help construct the
language. Brunkhorst and I would trade emails about the language. Drafts were
usually prepared on a deadline, so they could be discussed at the next
Commission meeting. The Standards Commission would make remarks, give
instructions, etc. We would go away and try to incorporate the thoughts,
sometimes writing late into the night between two meeting days. (Metzenberg,
personal communication, 2005).
This made it sound as though everything went smoothly when they were writing the
drafts together.
The minutes report that the staff went to great lengths to explain why only Dr.
Brunkhorst’s and Dr. Metzenberg’s names were going to be listed. They were the
commission’s consultants. After this three day meeting the staff asked the two
consultants to continue making progress by exchanging views and drafts by email,
telephone, etc. On March 3 Dr. Brunkhorst asked to hold a meeting with Dr. Metzenberg
and a small group of her advisers. The purpose of this was to figure out where the
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consultants found total agreement and where, in the draft, they needed to annotate their
different recommendations.
Dr. Metzenberg sent his version of his own recommended draft to the
Commission on March 5. The draft included places that differed from the more
universally held recommendations of the Commission, as well as other participants in the
process with whom he had disagreed.
Chair Wright had said that unfortunately Dr. Brunkhorst’s participation in the
final preparation of the first draft had been restricted by the failure to reach a contract
agreement with CSUSB. She told the commission that she could not provide her
recommended draft without an agreement. “/ therefore want to make very clear that in
no way should the attached draft be construed to represent Dr. Brunkhorst’ s
recommendation, judgment, or approval” (Commission for the Establishment of
Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
When Dr. Seaborg sent the preliminary draft to the Science Committee on March
11,1998, his memo said he was a bit disappointed that the consultants disagreed
significantly in the life sciences while other subjects were treated disproportionately such
as tectonics in the earth sciences. Dr. Seaborg also reminded that when the science
committee convened on March 17 they must have a document ready for approval for
public and expert review on April 2,1998. He asked the committee to focus on the
Standards by asking themselves this question: “Does each Standard presented to us
constitute the core essential skills and knowledge in science that all students must
attain?”
In the minutes of the DRAFT Summary for the Full Commission Meeting of the
Academic Standards Commission on March 12,1998, Chair Wright told the committee
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that there were contractual problems with one of the consultants that had delayed the
commission’s timeline. Mr. Hill explained briefly that there was a problem with the
contract between the Commission and Dr. Brunkhorst and California State University at
San Bernardino. The Commission was told they could not expect that the preliminary
draft that had been received by the commission reflected Dr. Brunkhorst’s approval or
judgment even though, many of Dr. Brunkhorst’s colleagues had given input to the draft
(Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards,
1997).
It was at this time that Commissioner Codding said that the relationship with Dr.
Brunkhorst was not going very smoothly. She said that if this was going to continue
maybe the commission should stop interaction with her because there was too much to
do. If there were going to be personality issues, work or quality issues, then maybe the
commission needed to cut its losses and move on.
Commissioner Codding still had a concern about the satisfaction of the work
even though they legally could go on working. One of the Commissioners asked who
would be in charge and coordinate the work. Mr. Hill said that the staff had made it clear
that the Commission is in charge.
According to the minutes of March 12,1998, Commissioner Evers said that he
thought the relationship between the Science Coalition and Dr. Metzenberg has worked
out so far but he had a concern about Dr. Brunkhorst’s legal situation. Commissioner
Codding was still concerned that the quality of work and other work issues still may be a
difficult relationship to work out. She wanted to see the work go forward but it is the
staff, Chair Seaborg or the Science Committee’s decision if they want to terminate the
contract.
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Finally, according to the minutes of the March 12,1998, meeting Commissioner
Fisher reminded the commission that the reason they had decided to go with the two
consultants was because of the diversity. He said they both can give recommendations
but also they all must hear from teachers and students. They aren’t here just to carry the
consultant’s agenda. Commissioner LaTanya Wright also said that she was concerned
about spending “premium dollars on a consultant [referring to Dr. Brunkhorst because of
the legal situation] who has not done any work on a draft that will soon go to public
hearing.”
Mr. Hill made a clarification saying not to construe what the preliminary draft
represents. He said the Commission should not state that Dr. Brunkhorst did not have
any direct involvement in the draft. She just could not put final input, approval or
judgment on the preliminary draft because of contract negotiations at the time.
Commissioner Aiello said that it looked like lawyers were stumbling all over each other
and the Commission was caught in the middle.
Aiello was reported to have said that he was still in favor of using Dr.
Brunkhorst’s services as a consultant, because she brings “something that others cannot
bring, and that he would be reluctant to see her leave.”
Mr. Hill told the Commission that many people have been working on the draft
but only the names of Drs. Brunkhorst and Metzenberg were die ones named to work on
behalf of the Commission. The product has been worked on direcdy by many in the last
month including Drs. Helen Quinn and Art Sussman.
Dr. Quinn said, “Everybody obviously has a different perspective.” But “it was
an incredibly frustrating process for everybody involved and there were very few rational
players” (Quinn, personal communication, 2005).
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There were still some Commissioners who were concerned about being sued for
lack of performance. Also, Mr. Hill told the members that the draft the Commissioners
received had three different independent sets of input. He said the directions were for
only one draft but if there were disagreements those could be brought to the Commission.
To handle this, Mr. Hill said that there are three font styles used in the draft, one for Dr.
Metzenberg’s views, one reflecting a collection of views and one that all the consultants
agreed upon (Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance
Standards, 1997).
All of the legal business is because of what was reported in the paper that Dr.
Brunkhorst wrote and gave at the California Science Teachers Association (CSTA) and at
the National Association for Research in Science Teaching (NARST). The paper was
entitled: “California Science Standards and the National Science Education Standards:
A Comparative Analysis of the Political and Academic Processes and Products, Framing
Questions of Significance to the Scientific Community.” The legal concern was mainly
because she wanted security from CSUSB, promising that Commissioner X would stay
away from her and there would be no more threats.
After the meeting of March 12 Dr. Brunkhorst read the minutes and sent a
correction to the Public Record for The Commission for the Establishment of Academic
Content and Performance Standards. The Subject: Public Meeting of the Commission,
March 12,1998, Setting the Record Straight, re: Consultant Contract (Commission for the
Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
Information presented to the public was incomplete, biased, and contentious.
Unprofessional accusations and slurs were made to the detriment of the professional work
of the consultant, Dr. Bonnie Brunkhorst. She provided nine items that should be
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corrected or added to the minutes of the meeting. She then said that the work of
developing academic standards for the children of California was too important to
continue conflict. She proposed that with this information, “respect, civility can prevail
and work can progress (Brunkhorst memo, 1998).
On March 17 Chair Seaborg called the meeting to order. With Commissioners
and both consultants, Dr. Metzenberg and Dr. Brunkhorst, in attendance. When
Commissioner Lee made the motion to pass the minutes from the previous meeting of the
science committee, it was seconded and passed unanimously. Nothing was said by any of
the Commissioners about the submission of the paper that Dr. Brunkhorst had given the
Commission in order to correct what had been said in the minutes of March 12. It was
only later in the meeting that the minutes said she had submitted a “written response to
the discussion that had taken place at the March 12, full commission meeting regarding
her contract.” It was not read to the group or otherwise commented upon.
Dr. Quinn said that at this time “the proposal was getting some stature behind it.”
But Seaborg was the only Nobel Prize winner who really was engaged. Dr. Quinn also
said, “He was 90 years old and practically deaf, so he was engaged at some level, but
mostly with friends telling him, ‘This is what you should do at this point.’” She also said
that:
Whenever I tried to have a conversation with Glenn, I had to shout and he could
barely understand what I was saying. He’s a man who forms his opinions and
makes a decision as to how things should be and then works from there. That
was his style and almost every time there was something that Glenn wanted, the
Commission would vote that way. (Quinn, personal communication, 2005)
Dr. Seaborg again asked for a short concise document that was like A Nation at
Risk report. He told the commission that other countries are looking to the United States
for leadership.
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Dr. Seaborg then asked each Commissioner to make comments on the
preliminary draft that the consultants had produced. In Table 9 there is a summary of
some of the comments that were made about the draft.
Looking at the general comments of the Commission in Table 9, not all of the
Commissioners reported comments. Some did have positive things to say, though there
were still many comments telling the consultants there were many places to improve
upon. Commissioner Wright had been in the meeting but was not assigned to the Science
Committee. She did not think that they were well written and that the objective of the
standards was unclear.
Table 9
Comments from Commissioners on Preliminary Draft
Commissioner Negative Feedback Positive Feedback
Aiello Too many Standards, not age
appropriate, too many factoids,
looks like a “brain dump, asks for
equipment some schools do not
have
Carrabino Scope of topics too wide
Lee Some Standards too difficult for
the grade
Teacher friendly Standards
Davis Investigation strand has
consensus, on the right track
Fisher Concerned about amount of
content being proposed
Hernandez Common sense content and
structure, middle grades look
strong
Condron Format was a little difficult
Evers Need an adequate verb to use,
“recognize” is too weak
Good beginning document,
need to strive for tough
material
Harris Content seemed uneven and
inconsistent, no connection
between them
Ortiz No comment
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( < Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards,
1997)
Scott Hill had thanked the commissioners for reviewing the document and said
that Dr. Rollie Otto had “been tapped to be the meeting facilitator.” Again there was no
explanation in the minutes as to why this happened. Some of the interviewees said that
with Dr. Seaborg increasing more frail and unable to be at the meetings, Dr. Otto as his
protege, was assigned to be there in his place.
According to the minutes, it was then that Dr. Brunkhorst handed the commission
some recommendations that they needed “to consider for her and Dr. Metzenberg to
continue their work:” She wanted him to consider: 1) balance of treatment across subject
matter areas; 2) volume of Standards/specificity; 3) age appropriateness; 4) missing
content: technology, history of science, etc,; 5) level of knowledge - Bloom’s taxonomy
levels of thinking from low to high, i.e. recall, summarize and create (Commission for the
Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
The National Academies: Advisors to the Nation on Science Engineering and
Medicine “standards” were also reviewed with this and attached. (When going through
the binders of the minute, most of the time there were very few, if any, attachments added
to meeting minutes where it said, “see attachments”).
At this point in the meeting Commissioner Evers said, “much of science does not
apply to eveiyday experience.” When interviewing for the history of the Standards, this
statement was made to many of the interviewees: “No matter where you are, you can
look around and almost anything that one sees around him a scientist has had something
to do with it.” And all the interviewees agreed with the comment, no matter which side
of this story they were on. As James Burke writes, ‘This interdependence is typical of
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almost every aspect of life in the modem world. We live surrounded by objects and
systems that we take for granted, but which profoundly affect the way we behave, think,
work, play, and in general, conduct our lives and those of our children” (Burke, 1980, p.
2).
Dr. Evers would have been asked about this comment had he responded to the
request to be interviewed. He said he would email his answers in and requested to be
reminded if it had not been done. Nothing ever was answered. This seemed very strange
because through all the reading and articles, Dr. Evers almost always came out with most
of the things that he had championed along with Dr. Seaborg and Dr. Metzenberg.
Commissioner Evers made a motion, which he withdrew later, that the Science
Standards have superscripts of Bloom’s taxonomy with each content standard. The
Commission discussed this but decided that this would not be veiy useful except to
curriculum people.
At this point in the meeting, Dr. Seaborg asked if there should be anything else
added to the document. One item listed was technology, along with the issue of
creation/evolution. A third item was the History of science. And lastly, Dr. Seaborg said
the number of Standards needed to decrease before adding anything else to the document.
Comments were then allowed from the audience:
Dr. Quinn suggested “that the document lacks process of design as it applies to
technology” and if it is not included students will not understand it.
Dr. Martha Schwartz, from the Mathematically Correct Group “warned the
committee to be careful about deciding what is essential and what is not She said it was
more important to include all essential content than it is to cut pages.”
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Dr. Art Sussman told the commission that the science and technology influence
on society is very important in making decisions in the real world. He said the document
was weak in this area, in his opinion.
Tom Smithson suggested that the creation/evolution subject not be opened. He
said that this had already happened when the science framework had been written.
The commission recessed after this but came back to review three topics: 1)
specificity of content standards, 2) creationism, and 3) review content recommendations,
see if it comprises the core content.
There was only a very brief discussion on the specificity and felt they had
received enough comments earlier in the meeting. When it came to the subject of
creationism, Commissioner Evers told the rest of the committee that they should give
Commissioner La Tanya Wright sufficient time to lay out her argument. She wanted to
include the study of creation on the same level as evolution.
Commissioner Aiello reminded the commission of the court ruling, McLean v.
Arkansas Board of Education and said that such inclusion is illegal. This ruling was
attached to the minutes. There was a motion to exclude any aspect of creationism in the
content Standards; a roll call vote was taken and the motion passed. Commissioner
LaTanya Wright was not a member of the science committee but was on the
history/social studies committee at the same time the other Commissioners were writing
the Science Standards and therefore was not able to vote on this decision (Commission
for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
The Commission was politically appointed and its recommendation to the
politically appointed State Board of Education was easily adopted. Because Governor
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140
Wilson was able to appoint the majority of Commissioners, he was contacted hoping that
he would explain his reasoning for choosing the appointees, but he did not respond to
requests for an interview.
The third issue was about the content in the Standards. Most of the discussion
was about the Standards in high school. There were Standards written for grades 9-12
and that was where the discussion of the asterisks came in. There had been a decision
made “by the committee to denote with asterisks Standards that ‘represent those that all
students should have the opportunity to learn; such opportunities should be part of the
program offered at every high school’” (Commission for the Establishment of Academic
Content and Performance Standards, 1997). In the California Science Content
Standards for grades nine through twelve it says: “Standards that all students are
expected to achieve in the course of their studies are unmarked. Standards that all
students should have the opportunity to learn are marked with an asterisk (*) (CSCS,
2000). At this time in California, high school students are only required to take two years
of science. So most of the conversation that went on then is not of much use at this point
in time (2006).
On March 26,1998, Dr. Brunkhorst submitted to the Academic Content and
Performance Standards Commission a memo about Conveyance of March 26 Draft
Science Content Standards. Dr. Brunkhorst said that they had worked to reduce and
refine the Standards. Dr. Brunkhorst said the consultants were presenting two versions of
the Life Sciences Standards. The main difference was the level of specificity. Words
could be reduced but there would be some sacrifice in the level of specificity and vice
versa. Both have desirable goals. They were asking the Commission to give some
guidance related to what level they desired and use a representative comparison sample in
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141
discussion during the next Commission meeting (Commission for the Establishment of
Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
Also in the memo, she gave them some recommendations for future work and
one was “identification of which high school content is to be learned by all students, and
which for ‘science-specializing’ students” (Brunkhorst, 1998). So the ones without the
asterisks all students must learn and if you are in Advanced Placement (AP) classes, the
ones with the asterisks are to be learned. Dr. Calfee felt “that was our minor victory, to
be able to say, “Some of those things are more important than others. And that was
fought out largely in the whole Commission” (Calfee, personal communication, 2005).
At the end of the meeting Dr. Seaborg said he thought the meeting was useful
and hoped that the consultants could come up with a grade-by-grade document that is
both concise and emphasizes the core values.
Mr. Hill said on April 1 the full commission would meet and the consultants
would present what the status of their draft was and then ask for input. Final comments
would be made from April 2n d to the 6th . The documents would be cleaned up and then
mailed to the commissioners on April 6. The next formal meeting would be May 6-7.
On March 26,1998, Dr. Brunkhorst submitted to the Academic Content and
Performance Standards Commission a memo about Conveyance of March 26 Draft
Science Content Standards. Dr. Brunkhorst said that they had worked to reduce and
refine the Standards.
Distribution of the First Draft of the California Science Standards
On March 27,1998, the Draft Science Standards are sent out with a cover letter.
The introduction is by Dr. Seaborg from A Nation at Risk. No one takes individual
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142
responsibility for writing up the Introduction but it says the first draft “represents the
talent and expertise of many California scientists as well as the thinking of scientists and
standards writers from across the nation and around the world” (Brunkhorst, 1998). The
first draft was distributed by the Commission to statewide organizations and county
offices of education, to scientists, national experts, and teachers. Everyone was invited to
come to the public hearings scheduled for the last week of April. There are places, dates
and times listed along with this. The Commission asks that groups get together to discuss
and review the first draft and then come back with suggestions or email comments in to
the Commission. A sample from the first draft is shown in Figure 6.
Scott Hill said after the public hearings they received a lot of feedback. “We
were reading hundreds of comments.” They also received email comments. He said it
was an open process with a lot of participation (Hill personal communication, 2005).
The Science Committee Meeting Summary on April 1,1998, was a discussion of
the science draft. None of the attachments that were used as overheads were included
with the minutes at the Mosk Library in Sacramento. So it was hard to follow part of
what the members were talking about. There were two versions of the Life Sciences
Standards because there had not been an agreement reached by the two consultants.
Commissioner Aiello noted a third version that had Chair Seaborg’s preferred Standards
and wondered where they came from.
Dr. Quinn commented on the different versions and said:
What puzzled me throughout, very clearly there was some organizational
structure behind Stan Metzenberg and I don’t know what that group was. So,
here’s another story. Fairly late in the process we were at one of these meetings
and I had read the high school Biology Standards. And I made the comment,
‘This is very interesting. These Standards have lots of good things about
evolution, but they never mention man.” Then Stan said, “That would destroy
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143
our carefully crafted compromise with the Christian Right.” And I said, ‘Well,
interesting, I didn’t know we had one.’ (Quinn, personal communication, 2005)
Figure 6
Sample of First Draft
C A Academic Standards Commission Page I
Second Preliminary Draft - Science Content Standards__________________________________ March 27,1998
Kindergarten
Physical Sciences DRAFT
OBSERVING THE PHYSICAL WORLD
1. Students state common properties of materials, such as color, shape, texture, relative size and
weight..1 - 20
2. Students compare and sort common materials based on one physical characteristic such as
color, shape, texture, relative size and weight, attraction to magnets.1 -2 0
Earth Sciences
OBSERVING TOE EARTH AND SKY
1. Students compare the properties of Earth materials (rocks, soil, water and air), and sort them
by one property.1 - 2 3
2. Students observe, describe, and compare die appearance of objects in the sky at different
times — including the moon, sun, clouds, planes and living things.1 - 2 3
3. Students recognize changes in weather from day to day and over the seasons. They relate their
daily activities to weather conditions.1 - 2 1
Investigation and Experimentation
Students will participate in a variety of investigations in which they demonstrate the ability to:
• observe common objects using the five senses.1 - 2 5
• describe the properties of common objects.1 -1 1
• describe the relative position of objects using one reference (e.g., above or below).124
• compare and sort common objects based on one physical attribute (including color, shape,
texture, size, weight).1 - 2 3
• communicate observations orally and in drawings2-1 0
(California Academic Standards Commission, 1998)
She said that this is one thing that she remembered vividly.
And he said, “Yes, and there’s one more thing that they want.” And I said,
“What’s that?” He said, “Well, in the Investigation and Experimentation
Standards at the high school level, you wrote a Standard which says “students
will understand the uses and limitations of models as representations of reality.”
They want you to add “and theories. Uses and limitations of theories.” So I
mean, there was some organization out there. There was somebody who had
been hrough these, who had had access to the drafts and knew exactly where they
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could put that “and theories.” And it was, ‘They want you to add,” not ‘” want
you to add” (Quinn, personal communication, 2005)
After that it seemed it was a clear indication that there must be other
organizational structure. . . behind Stan Metzenberg and I don’t know what that
group was. But there was a suggestion of some group just by the way Stan never
answered a question until he’d had time to check with somebody else, but in this
particular case, it was explicit. (Quinn, personal communication, 2005)
Phil LaFontaine, science consultant for the California Department of Education,
was working on writing the Earth Science Standards behind the scenes. He said they
would write something and then would bring it to us and we would kind of look at it and
say “Well, can you do this and this and this,” and then shove it back in. That is where
the issue really began. When you had people working with Standards in a meeting and
then the stories that were coming out is, “
We’ll draft these Standards, we’ll leave the meeting and then when we come
back to the meeting all of a sudden all of our work is suddenly changed. You just
can’t do that kind of work. That’s my personal opinion. You have to trust that
the people you have empowered to do this work really understand what’s going
on and you can’t have back door work. (LaFontaine, personal communication,
2005)
Jo Topps, Regional Director for the K-12 Alliance, was on the physical writing
team and also the Investigation and Experimentation writing team and she said she “went
in naive, thinking it was a consensus process.” She told Dr. Quinn with whom she was
working with:
“She couldn’t live in a world like this in education.” Dr. Quinn told her later, “I
can’t do this without you and you can’t do this without me.” And I said, “You’re
absolutely right. We have to work together.” That was the great part of the
process but where the process kind of went sour is where we were emailing stuff
back and forth to each other. If your work was sent to somebody and somebody
altered it, you knew they were altering it. That was part of the process. You
knew it was getting altered and it was getting revised, going to the next person
for revision, and when it came back, it would look similar to what you’d written,
but in this process things were added. (Topps, personal communication, 2005)
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145
Then I got very suspicious and started saving things on my computer that I
would have normally tossed. Look at this. Look at this. Who looked at it last?
Who didn’t participate in more of a consensus process? What I felt was going on
is I was representing teachers, professional developers, practitioners. (Topps,
personal communication, 2005)
So those people would assume that things were good because Jo had worked on them.
“Well, I helped write the part over here, not that one” (Topps, personal communication,
2005).
Marion Joseph was on the BOE at the time and “she called a lot of shots” (Topps,
personal communication, 2005). An Anonymous Commissioner said she held much
power at that time on the Board (Anonymous Commissioner B, personal communication,
2005).
Dr. Brunkhorst said that neither version of the life sciences drafts represents
one person or another entirely. She said that version one was a mutual version
developed by all the consultants, but it was stopped mid-stream. She then said
that she could not speak to version two. (Commission for the Establishment of
Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997)
Dr. Metzenberg said that the two versions are departures in different
directions from the March 16th meeting (this version was not distributed nor
discussed in committee). He said that he had cut the volume of the document by
sixty- percent in grades 6-8 and forty-percent in high school (he displayed a
graph of word count by grade). He said that both versions one and two are
tremendous improvements over the previous one. He said that there were points
of departure, though. In version two, he found that teachers were being held
accountable for things that they may not understand. (Commission for the
Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997)
Dr. Brunkhorst said that she and Dr. Metzenberg discussed specificity, and
that they were told to strike a balance on specificity and conciseness. She
questioned which version had the right balance, in addition to conveying the
fundamental principals and the examples of those to students. (Commission for
the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997)
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146
(No specific examples were given. The continuing discussion was partially about the use
of the verb “know”) (Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and
Performance Standards, 1997).
Dr. Otto said there had been an explosion of breadth and depth of life science
content in the last few decades, and that life sciences is very much a part of
students’ lives today. He said that there was a hope that there would be a
convergence of the different documents but it did not happen. He said that the
consultants needed additional guidance from the committee. Chair Seaborg had
thoughtfully considered both versions, and he wanted a concise document. Dr.
Otto said that he would present Chair Seaborg’s views. (Commission for the
Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997)
Dr. Otto displayed an overhead illustrating wording options for the final Life
Science Standards by laying isolated Standards from versions one and two next
to each other. The overhead also exhibeted [sic] Dr. Seaborg’s preferred version
of each of the science Standards, (which are not attached in the minutes)
(Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance
Standards, 1997)
“Dr. Brunkhorst said that she works with other writers and wanted them to offer
comments. Kathy DiRanna and Margaret Clark were asked to sit at the speaker table”
(Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards,
1997).
“Dr. Otto presented an overhead (#3; attached) that was a little more
complicated about verb choice with extension. He said that the preference was the verb
‘know.’ He was trying to avoid the restatement of words.” (Attachment #3 was not found
with the minutes)
Ms. DiRanna said that there was an entirely different concept in the two versions
of the Standards, and she asked if it was intentional to eliminate the student
function. Dr. Otto responded yes. Ms. DiRanna said that it was a verb choice
and also a concept choice. Commissioner Evers said that the committee also
needed to make a decision abut the number of content items. (Commission for the
Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997)
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“Commissioner Aiello referred to overhead #1 and said there was a problem with
the verb “know.” He said that ‘know’ implied memorization and ‘analyze’ raised the
ante of what students are supposed to do.” (Overhead #1 was not attached)
Dr. Metzenberg said it was important to put Bloom’s taxonomy numbers in the
document and not focus too strongly on the verbs. He said that there was too
much pressure on the verb to convey the level to which a student will learn the
content. {Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and
Performance Standards, 1997)
Commissioner Aiello said that he enjoyed Dr. Metzenberg’s graphs, but there
was still an issue. He said that ‘know’ has a place in Bloom’s Taxonomy and
‘analyze’ has a higher place in Bloom’s. He said that the latter gives more
information on how students are learning. He said that replacing all verbs with
‘know’ implies that teachers only have to teach to the lowest level of Bloom’s
(Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance
Standards, 1997)
Dr. Calfee also commented in his interview that an “important feature of the
Science Standards is the verb that is used almost to the exclusion of any other verb is
‘know.’ Not to understand, not to experience, not to do, not to be interested in - ‘know’”
(Calfee, personal communication, 2005).
“Commission Evers said that there was a difference between reminding a student
of a science principle and ask him/her to apply it and/or recall it He said that the most
important thing here is the number” {Commission for the Establishment of Academic
Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
Commissioner Fisher commended his colleagues on the discussion regarding the
verbs. He, however, wanted to discuss Dr. Seaborg’s document. He said that Dr.
Seaborg’s document is close.. .he said that he would like to see more of the
level one numbers in the early grades because students must have the
fundamentals first and the more difficult application after. {Commission for the
Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997)
Dr. Metzenberg said that the document might be too long if “level one”
classifications were continued through the sixth grade. He said that the nice
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148
thing about the verb “know” and a Bloom’s number is that it sends a positive
message. (Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and
Performance Standards, 1997)
“Commissioner Aiello said that there could be a pyramid where standards build
on each other, and that perhaps the committee could place a notation about its intent by
the use of the number” (Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and
Performance Standards, 1997).
Dr. Brunkhorst made several points, the first being that “upper level thinking
requires working with fundamentals. If a student is required to analyze, he has to have
the fundamentals. The two come as a package. She suggested using die verb that is
associated with Bloom’s Taxonomy.” The last thing she said was, “Specificity is the key.
It is not fair to students to imply something and not state exactiy what one wants.
Sometimes specificity means more words” (Commission for the Establishment of
Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
Dr. Otto summarized the previous conversations, stating that he had heard
that the committee wanted to focus on the content statement, as well as
convergence. He said he heard that the statements should be concise and
they should be specific (targeted to a piece of content knowledge). He had
also heard that students should operate at a ’know’ level, and that the use of
extensions might help clarity or specificity (Commission for the Establishment of
Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
On different drafts, Karen Cerwin from K-12 Alliance, said she was.
. . . aware of the different drafts that came through, one of them was to get the
headers on, to help organize the content, and there seemed to be a big difference
of opinion about whether the headers were actually Content Standards or just
organizers. And, it’s like those are the ones that are the easiest to follow. Even
when I was on the Instructional Materials Advisory Panel, we were specifically
told, ‘These are not part of the Standards.” Just what was underneath them was
part of the Standards. (Cerwin, personal communication, 2005)
“Dr. Brunkhorst said that if the committee can tell the consultants what they
need to identify as the fundamental principles, then the specific context for those
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1 4 9
principles will be easier to cut.” She “requested clarification about reaching consensus.
She asked what the consultants shoud [sic] do if they were unable to reach some mutual
agreement. Would Dr. Seaborg’s draft be the default document?” Between the
discussion of the commission and public comments there did not seem to be any
consensus before the meeting was recessed until the next day {Commission for the
Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
When the meeting reconvened the net day, Dr. Otto announced that because of a
long meeting into the early hours of the morning, Drs. Metzenberg, Brunkhorst and he
worked until they had a unified document and “the consultants agreed on every item in
the draft” {Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance
Standards, 1997).
It is in this meeting that:
Chair Seaborg recommended that an appropriate reference to the Periodic Table
be made in all grades, perhaps as early as first grade. Also, he suggested that the
committee’s final report to the State Board recommend that the Periodic Table of
Elements be displayed in early grade classrooms. {Commission for the
Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997)
Dr. Otto said:
The periodic table issue was one of several places where Glenn Seaborg
felt veiy strongly that there should be early introduction of science concepts.
It was one area he picked as being really bringing home his philosophical
views about the early introduction of science concepts at a level that was
appropriate to the student. So you have a third grade standard that talks about
knowing that there are atoms and they’re the foundation for all of the things
that are in all the material in our life. It was one of those areas where it differed
significantly from the philosophy or education philosophies in the National
Science Education Standards. If you read the National Science Education
Standards at the middle school, they recommend explicitly not to introduce that
word ‘atom’ and the concept of an atom, but just stick with developing
particulate nature of materials. So that was one of the places where Glenn
pushed very hard for his point of view on what the Standards should contain. He
believed very strongly in the fact that the Standards should be rigorous and as I
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150
said, the early introduction of science concepts throughout the grade levels.
(Otto, personal communication, 2005)
Mr. Thallner said that almost 200 expert reviewers were asked to read and
review the Standards, there would be four public hearings conducted throughout the state,
and the Standards would be available on a website for anyone to look at. Dr. Metzenberg
added, “I myself sent them [drafts] out to a substantial number of teachers and scientists”
(Metzenberg, personal communication, 2005). County office science specialists would
be encouraged to pass out the draft Standards to science teachers and conduct forums to
get feedback from the teachers. The science committee agreed to hear feedback from the
public on nine different issues and then “include them in the introduction to the first
draft” (Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance
Standards, 1997).
Sheila Byrd said she thought a “very good job had been done about getting our
documents out there for all four content areas and really making an effort to get input
from people We sent the drafts to every single person in the State we could think of.”
And asked them ‘what do you think of these? And took the feedback very seriously”
(Byrd, personal communication, 2006). (Table 10)
Table 10
Issues Heard from the Public_____________ ____________________________
1 . Format
2. Overarching Statements - with example from National
Science Education Standards
3. Use of Bloom’s Taxonomy
4. Assessment Implications
5. Standards for all or some students
6. Grade spans vs. grade-by-grade
a. Grade/age appropriateness
b. Range of difficulty
c. Balance between facts and concepts
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151
(Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards,
1997)
Mr. Hill said after the first draft had been sent out for public comment:
We just got roasted on the K-6 part of it and it was because it was loaded up with
an awful lot of fact-based learning and a lot of the criticisms were directed at
Glenn Seaborg because there was a lot about learning things in the periodic
table with elements and things like that. (Hill personal communication, 2005)
Rollie Otto was one who was instrumental in getting Glenn Seaborg to have an
agreement that they would go back and look at the National Science Education
Standards. They would do an alignment study of what was going on in the early grades,
see what the level of rigor was in the NSES. Hill said this was a:
. . . big give on Seaborg’s part Huge! And the fact that Seaborg blessed it was
something. It made it possible for the Academic Science Coalition with Bonnie
Brunkhorst to stay committed to the process. On the other hand, the one thing
they did have to swallow was Glenn’s absolute insistence, and he would not let
go of this up until the very last day, he was ready to vote against the Standards.
There were continued calls about the periodic table in the third and sixth grades.
Seaborg said, “That has to stay there for me to vote for these things.” And we
knew that we had to get Glenn’s vote. So we kept telling everyone, “Let’s be
really clear. We have done an awful lot to bend Glenn along the way with the
NSES in the early grades, you cannot bend him on this one.” (Hill personal
communication, 2005)
On April 23,1998, Scott Hill sent a memo to the science committee saying that
Dr. Seaborg had “prepared a draft introduction to the Standards that reflects his hope for
a hard hitting opening” (Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and
Performance Standards, 1997). He also asked for a reorganization of the Standards and
the verb forms be changed in some of the Standards. In the examples shown, verbs such
as describe, compare, identify and analyze are all changed to “know that.” (Figure 6)
The Summary of Science Committee Meeting from May 6-7,1998, is written up
in two different versions. The first person wrote up the minutes and then a second
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152
Figure 6
Reorganization of verb forms in Standards.
Overarching statement for grades K - 4
The National Science Education Standards for Physical, Life and Earth Sciences can
be used as a guide to overaching concepts for the following sections. The NSES
states that: As a result of the activities in grades K-4, all students should develop and
understanding of
• Properties of objects and materials
• Position and motion of objects
• Light, heat, electricity and magnetism
• The characteristics of organisms
• Life cycles of organisms
• Organisms and environments
• Properties of Earth materials
• Objects in the sky
• Chapges in Earth and sky
NSES* - ppl23-134
I. Kindergarten
A. Science
tLjfh
t r '• m i
1 1
#
1. Exploring the World Around Us
a) Students know that describe and compare the
characteristics of living-and-nonliving things in simple
torms such-as movement, growth, breathing and eating
are the characteristics of living and non-living things.
B. Investigation and Experimentation
II. Grade 1
A. Physical Sciences
1. Fundamentals of Forces
B. Life Sciences
1. Basic Needs of Living Things
a) Students know that describe how organisms sometimes
live together in groups, whether for mutual or social
support, or because the local environment is favorable.
_ C. Earth and Space Sciences
m
{Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards,
1997).
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153
person made changes to it by using the Word document “track changes.” The changes
were there to see but what had been there first was left for anyone also to read. None of
these documents have ever been signed by anyone who might have taken the minutes.
Sometimes a motion to adopt the minutes from previous meetings was made and other
times it does not happen. This seems rather disorganized and odd.
Dr. Roland Otto spoke at a Conference on Standards-Based K-12 Education in
1999, at California State University Northridge. He said that for Dr. Seaborg “the focus
is on the organized body of knowledge” During the hearings on the Standards many
cautioned that there was already too much emphasis on current science teaching and
learning on memorization. Glenn Seaborg took exception to the view in his May 6th
opening remarks to the Science Committee of the Academic Standards commission [sic]”
(Otto, 1999, p. 4-5). (None of this is mentioned in the May 6th minutes.) They just want
to emphasize the larger ideas. He told the group that he could not agree with this and:
Memorization has been the lifeblood of my entire career. During my high school
chemistry and physics courses, I read and re-read my textbook assignments until
I had memorized them. This led to my understanding and ability to work
problems. . . rather than discourage, I would encourage memorization for science
students” (Otto, 1999, p. 5).
When the meeting on May 6 began die Commissioners were “expressing concern
over the consultants’ ability and willingness to work in the best interest of the
commission. Concerns over e-mail correspondence were raised as an example of
unacceptable actions.” This is the portion that had been deleted in the minutes. ‘The
commissioners were unanimous in their desire to have the consultants either work
together for the commission or allow other consultants to take over to do the work”
{Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards,
1997).
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154
The committee then gave the consultants issues to be addressed for the next day’s
meeting. They gave them a list of 14 items. (See Table 11)
After this discussion almost a whole page of information was added to the
minutes showing the tracking changes. This meeting had been open to public testimony
and one copy of the minutes had more people speaking and their names had been added
Table 11
Major issues needing to be addressed by Consultants_____________________________
1. Where/what to cut
2. More content in investigation strand
3. Time to teach--# of days
4. Philosophical differences/definitions - what are they?
5. Process
a. Commissioner Harris - timeline and release of drafts
b. Commissioner Wright - adequate time for consideration of final draft
c. Consultants need firm direction (votes necessary)
d. Role of consultants, process they follow
6. Balance
7. All students
8. Commissioner Aiello’s 6 issues:
a. grade-by-grade vs. grade span
b. eliminate redundancies
c. overarching statements
d. use of verbs
e. role of investigation strand
f. relationship of AAAS and NSES and Framework to the commission’s
Standards
9. Grade-by-grade vs. grade span
10. Investigation strand and relation to concept development
11. Good process in El Segundo - what happened?
12. Lawrence Hall document should be considered
13. Research: Where is it? What is it? Experiential vs. fact-based? AAAS and
NSES?
14. Science community - is it represented________________________________
(Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards,
1997).
to the minutes. The tracking changes made were also shown here. Who was to know
which set of minutes was correct because they both had the same dates of May 7-8,
1998?
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155
There was a discussion about whether to benchmark8 the Science Standards to
AAAS and NSES documents. “Dr. Metzenberg addressed the research base of the
AAAS and concluded that much of the research had not been peer-reviewed and was in
places, fraudulent.” When looking at the distinguished list of people that put together the
AAAS one wonders where Dr. Metzenberg got his information.
The final part of the meeting discussed the extremely tight timeline and the
committee voted to have the Executive Director of the Commission be responsible for
getting the Standards prepared and submitted by the consultants.
On June 5,1998, there was a Summary of the Science Committee Meeting.
Minutes of the May 6-7 meeting were adopted and then the minutes of the May 20th
meeting were also adopted. There were no minutes found in the archives of the Stanley
Mosk Library, in Sacramento, for the May 20 meeting in the binders where the rest of the
minutes were found The question still remains. Which set of minutes from May 6-7 did
they adopt?
Chair Seaborg said that the second draft of standards is improved and is going in
the right direction but is not yet up to the level of world-class Standards. Reports were
given from some of the public hearings that went on in the State. At the end of the
evening Commissioner Evers made the motion for the consultants to keep refining and
improve the overarching statements and the motion passed. There was then a timeline
but it was not included with the minutes.
g
Benchmarks specifies how students should progress toward science literacy, recommending what they
should know and be able to do by the time they reach certain grade levels.” (Benchmarks for Science
Literacy, 1993, p. xi).
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June 1998 - The End of the Science Standards Writing
The last set of minutes found was from June 11,1998, in which Dr. Otto
said that the last 30 days had been very constructive. The consultants, Dr.
Brunkhorst and Dr. Metzenberg had lead teams that worked collaboratively with
small groups of scientists, teachers and science education leaders. He said that
this process would remain in place until June.
Dr. Calfee said that at one of the last joint meetings with the State Board there
were several agenda items and:
. . . it was a progress report more than anything else. One of the things on that
agenda was the work of the Performance Standards, Literacy Performance
Standards. And I headed up that group and made our report. I can remember
Marion Joseph coming out of her chair when I finished because we had portfolios
and things of that sort in the mix. And she said, “I knew you guys were up to no
good!” And just went on and on and on in that same vein that, you know, she
said, ‘This is going to turn into CLAS (California Learning Assessment System),
you know, the CLAS9 test.” (Calfee, personal communication, 2005)
I think the Commission may have had one meeting after that when, you
know, that was very, it was discouraging because she (Joseph) said in those
uncertain words, “If anything like that was brought before the Board, they would
turn it down.” So, we just thought, “Forget it.” And apparently she got back to
the Governor and it was shortly after that I think, that the Governor said it was
very clear our work was coming to an end, the Performance Standards were
simply a technical matter of taking the assessments that had been developed and
establishing cut points, but we didn’t have any time and he was going to make
sure we didn’t have any money. And, so, we closed down. (Calfee, personal
communication, 2005)
9
When the new Mathematics Framework for California Public Schools was approved in 1991, the California
Learning Assessment System (CLAS) “was designed to reinforce instructional changes advanced by the
Frameworks. The emphasis on thinking and reasoning led CLAS to decrease emphasis on multiple choice
items solely devoted to measuring simple operational skills and to add open-ended tasks requiring thinking
and reasoning - this is, performance on the assessment should be better for students who have acquired these
abilities. In turn, students in classes using instructional strategies intended to promote these abilities should
also perform better, if the strategies are effective. The chief purpose of CLAS was to improve instruction and
learning. One aim was to make test exercises as nearly as possible similar to good instruction” (Wiley, 1991)
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The Governor seemed to have quite an active part in this and Commissioners
would reportedly get private calls from his office instructing them how “we” would like
to see these particular Standards voted on. Chair Ellen Wright said that toward the end
she was not in the good graces of the Governor (Wright, personal communication, 2006).
He sent out a letter saying that he did not want the Commission to work on Performance
Standards but to let the Board take on that task. He told the Commission that “ time was
running out and” he did not like the direction the commission had taken (Lawton, 1998
p.32). He said that if any of the Commission disagreed and continued working on the
Performance Standards, he would remove them from the Commission. “Since the
majority of commissioners serve at my pleasure...” (Wilson, May 18,1998) Wilson said
this because over half the appointees had been made by him. Mrs. Wright said that all
she received from him at the end was a note saying, “Thank you for all your hard work.
The rest will be taken care of by the State Board” (Wright, personal communication,
2006).
Some saw this action by Governor Wilson as a political power play “who has
presidential aspirations.” An aid for the Governor disputed that pointed saying it was not
political. He said that it “was intended to move the reforms ahead in a timely fashion”
(Lawton, 1998).
Reactions to the Process and the Standards
Commissioner Aiello said that the committee is trying to honor all students. He
said that the Standards contained good content and plenty of inquiry. And he said that it
would be the people that would determine whether the Standards were designated
“world-class” over time (Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and
Performance Standards, 1997).
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There was always one person that would vote no on the Commission and this
Anonymous Commissioner said, “That was Bill Evers. And he was with Marion
Joseph” and a few others ’’ there was a small group of them. Bill was the only one on the
Standards Commission. And every single time Bill lost in terms of what the Standards
Commission voted in favor of. But, in the final analysis, what he was wishing for won”
(Anonymous Commissioner, 2006).
This same Commissioner contrasted by stating that there were “all these expert
groups coming before the Commission, as well as all these public hearings, and the
Standards that were adopted by the State Board never went up through public hearings,
which is what was required” (Anonymous Commissioner, 2006). The public hearings to
be held before the State Board of Education on the last draft of the Standards were
scheduled in August, but people were given only a two-week notice. The ones that might
care were probably on vacation at that time (Schultz, 1998. p. 4). This Commissioner
“found that it was a very flawed process. It became very political.” It did not seem to
“matter that we were not following the law. These were not the Standards that the
Commission recommended to the State Board” (Anonymous Commissioner, 2006).
Delaine Eastin also said that she did not believe:
It was an open and public process. It was in the backroom. They (the Board of
Education) had a huge amount of power.. .they set policy. So they just took
whatever the Standards Commission had produced and... completely rewrote it.
(Eastin, personal communication, 2005)
The State Superintendent appointed the Anonymous Commissioner and the
Governor appointed Chair Ellen Wright. The Anonymous Commissioner thought:
Ellen... did a fabulous job because she’s a very good person and she tried her
best to make it come out right. And she lost control of the process through the
Governor’s Office I think she began to feel very tom and I think Ellen really
tried to do the right thing, which did not represent Marion Joseph and what the
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Governor thought should happen. And I’m sure this was a terrible experience
for Ellen. (Anonymous Commissioner, personal communication, 2006)
This Commissioner, Superintendent Delaine Eastin and Dr. Larry Woolf from General
Atomics, all said they felt the process had been hijacked (Eastin & Woolf, personal
communication, 2005), (Anonymous Commissioner, personal communication, 2006).
Many of the Commissioners came to the job thinking they were “to develop the
best kind of Standards we could for the kids in California. I don’t think we understood
that for some there was a political agenda around this” (Anonymous Commissioner,
personal communication, 2006). Delaine Eastin said that there was some name she was
trying to block out of her head, but knew:
He wasn’t even officially on the Standards Commission but was working behind
the scenes constantly. Evers was on the Commission, but it was a real hi-jacking
and it was not - the documents that were adopted as the Standards of the State of
California. (Eastin, personal communication, 2005)
They were not the documents that they held the hearings on. They publicly said they had
made only minor changes, which Eastin did not believe was at all true. She asked them
to resend them out for comment, since they had been so fundamentally rewritten, and
they turned her down (Eastin, personal communication, 2005).
Dr. Calfee said the textbook companies had representatives during all of the
meetings and they sat in the back of the room. They were there taking notes (Calfee,
personal communication, 2006). It had been reported by some that there might have been
some mingling of textbook company members and Commissioners or State Board
members. Dr. Helen Quinn said:
There was one place where I saw visible evidence that there was some
involvement by at least some members of the State Board and the textbook
publishers in that the public hearing had been closed and then the Board member
said, “I wish to invite so-and-so to speak” and it was the textbook person who
spoke. (Quinn, personal communication, 2005)
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Kathy DiRanna also offered an opinion, I don’t have proof, but I just think that there is
something that has to be exposed here; my opinion is that the large textbook publishers
have a major plan in all of this. Dr. Andy Sessler, from the Lawrence Berkeley Labs also
felt this way about the book publishers (DiRanna, Sessler, personal communication,
2005). Mrs. Wright said that she saw the publishers there all the time at the meetings
until towards the end and then they were gone and never came back (Wright, personal
communication, 2006). Yvonne Larsen said that the publishing companies were waiting
in the wings to see what the final product was going to be. “They were groupies poised
and ready to do the book thing” (Larsen, personal communication, 2005).
Mrs. Petrossian said she:
. . . got the feeling Marion Joseph concurrently, as an activist on the State Board,
was doing her thing. She was holding secret meetings. In fact a State Board
member at the time called and informed me that Marion Joseph was holding
secret meetings in her room at the Hyatt and these State Board members were
there and they were going to override anything the State Commission on
Standards did. There was a lot of real, what I considered, not clean political
activity going on. (Petrossian, personal communication, 2005)
Dr. Larry Woolf attended one of the public hearings and he said it was
remarkable the amount of boredom of the people that had to listen to these public
hearings It seemed as though it was a formality the Commission had to go through so
that they could look as though they were responsive to everyone in the State (Woolf,
personal communication, 2005).
LaFontaine asked, “What is it the general student really needs to know to be
scientifically literate?” He said this is the first battle and these Standards are
inappropriate, they’re placed at inappropriate grade levels, they’re too rigorous and
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they’re too high, especially when you get to the high school Standards (LaFontaine,
DiRanna, personal communication, 2005).
Unfortunately, the powers that have the State Board of Education’s ear at
the moment are the ones that think that we’ve learned science this way for
gobs of years and so what’s good for us is what’s good for them. We’ll lecture
and we’ll do very cookbook, canned labs. It will demonstrate exactly what I
want the student to know. I don’t want them learning something or discovering
their knowledge. I’m going to tell them what to know. And this is not how
kids learn. It truly is not how they learn. (LaFontaine, personal communication,
2005)
For general learners, much of this information is not needed. The question is:
“How do you become a life long learner? How can you help children be community
members?” LaFontaine said:
If I’m a general public person, I don’t need to know what some of those dead
guys know because it’s not going to be of importance to me. What I need to
know is how can I make a decision about my health? (LaFontaine, personal
communication, 2005)
How can I make a decision about yours or my parents’ health? It’s making decisions, but
it’s pulling in the data and then trying to make an informed decision. (LaFontaine,
personal communication, 2005)
Dr. Brunkhorst wanted to show “that different political and academic rules of
process can create widely different products related to the same ‘academic’ content area”
(Brunkhorst, 1999, p. 2). To make her point, she cited the article, “National Science
Education Standards: A Political Document,” by Angelo Collins has used ‘politics’ in
regard to the National Science Education Standards with the connotation: ‘policy is a
principle, plan or course of action pursued by a government for the intended welfare of
the body politic. And politics has to do with the design, execution, and evaluation of
such a policy.’ She therefore concludes that the National Science Education Standards is
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a political document, in design, in content, process, and intent” (Collins, 1998, p.l). Dr.
Brunkhorst said:
I am, however, using “politics” here with the more common usages related to
partisan activities in government, including characterized by shrewdness in
contriving, and politicizing as in giving political tone or character to; political
intrigue, patronage, and manipulation. Politics used here is that which is
generally lacking in objective, balanced consideration, and open-mindedness;
characteristics that should be the hallmark of disciplined academic research
processes. (Brunkhorst, 1999, Objectives of the study)
The California Science Content Standards was a document that was political in
nature and created by the rules of politics. The National Science Education Standards
were produced by rales in the academic process and are academic documents. Dr.
Brunkhorst admits that there is academic politics that operates in the course of the
development of the National Science Education Standards but they are still the goals of
academics. To her it was without a doubt a political process and the goals of politicians
that represented the California Science Content Standards.
The direction of the science education policy and the politicization of
California’s K-12 Science Standards are significant to the rest of the country. It is
important to the research community’s core contributions in the reform of science
education and research contributions that are continually aggressively challenged. “In
California, one commissioner, a governor appointee, verbally assaulted Brace Alberts,
President of the National Academy of Sciences, following Dr. Alberts’ public testimony
to the Commission, challenging: your ‘research is bogus . . . is ridiculous’” (Commission
for the Establishment o f Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
Ms. DiRanna said that when the Standards were to be adopted, national people
such as Dr. Brace Alberts, President of the National Academy came to speak. Dr.
Alberts came because groups such as WestEd and “10 scientific societies - including the
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over-arching societies, the American Association for the Advancement o f Science and the
National Academy o f Sciences, have . . . voiced their concerns . . . about the Proposed
California Science Standards” (Sessler, personal communication, 1998). Dr. Alberts was
asked “to testify in their favor and he was treated with such disrespect, it was just
absolutely awful. Commissioners were asking silly questions and refuting things. It
didn’t make any sense” (DiRanna, personal communication, 2005).
On December 22,1999, there was a Science Education Petition (http://www.sci-
ed-ga-org/standards/petition-htmlt stating that the California Science Education Standards
are:
. . . based on neither the spirit nor the letter of the National Science Education
Standards, the Benchmarks for Science Literacy,. . . are incorrect, misleading,
ambiguous, and age-inappropriate, the Commission ignored offers from the
National Academy of Sciences and other scientific societies to improve the
quality . . . of the Standards... Whereas the California Board of Education has
approved a policy that effectively prohibits the adoption of scientifically
accurate, thoroughly tested, and highly regarded kit-based science curricula. . .
has approved a policy that allows the adoption of materials that have never been
thoroughly tested in classrooms” (Science Education Petition, 1999).
They called for:
1. The revision of the California Science Standards so that they are correct,
unambiguous, and age-appropriate and are consistent with peer-reviewed
published academic research and die National Science Education Standards;
2. Rejection of the current policy that only allows the adoption of curriculum
materials that meet all of the current California Science Standards at the
specified grade level;
3. The immediate allowance of waivers for school districts so that they may
purchase curriculum materials that are scientifically accurate, age-appropriate,
and thoroughly tested. (Science Education Petition, 1999)
There were over 300 scientists, business leaders, science educators, professors,
instructors, teachers, principals, and superintendents that had signed on when the
Commission was moving toward approving the Standards (Science Education Petition,
1999).
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Since then, CDE and the State Board have used that list of names on the petition
as a black list. So now when I get a call from the Assessment Division of CDE
and they say, “Dean, can you recommend anybody to write assessments or to
read papers, or to be a reviewer, etc.,” and I’ll recommend people, then they will
say, “Did they sign the Petition?’”(Gilbert, personal communication, 2005)
In fact, two of the Commissioners at the end of September when they were
selecting new candidates for the Commission, disqualified some people and said,
‘ These people I don’t approve because they signed the 1999 Petition.” So
you’ve got (1) an infringement on the First Amendment rights and you’ve got
people in control that don’t want anybody to rock the boat or to express an
opinion that is not company policy. So, you can’t get into constructive
criticism, you’re not listened to, your voice is muted, and this has been the
State of California. I mean, in the instructional materials, one of the criteria is
the publishers cannot mention Benchmarks ox National Standards or they will
automatically be disqualified. We’re the only state that is so egocentric to think
that we’ve got these world-class Standards and everything else is no good.
That’s the attitude of the politics and the people in charge and the people in
power that we are up against in this State. It’s an uphill battle, going in a canoe,
going upstream with a hole in the canoe, and having no paddles to row. It’s been
an interesting ride” (Gilbert, personal communication, 2005).
Christine Bertrand, executive director of the California Science Teachers
Association, who was an observer at many of the meetings said:
I thought that a number of the Commissioners were incredibly rude to the
science experts who came to testify, including Dr. Bruce Alberts. I thought
there was an amount of arrogance on the part of some of the consultants that
were working for the Commission. I can’t say, with any clear recollection, that
the Commissioners themselves were arrogant, but I know that some of the
consultants and people that they had working for them were rude,. . . and
arrogant, and treated noted scientists and experts with. . . disdain and disrespect,
and Ithought it was embarrassing. It was extremely embarrassing. To me it was
a horrible experience to witness. (Bertrand, personal communication, 2005)
One of the consultants to the Commission who actually helped write the
Standards brought in the National Standards and disputed it and the AAAS document. He
disputed what was written, refuted footnotes and also the studies.
This is a person who, in his own words, I mean in his own words, works at a
second-tier university in California. I mean his own testimony says, his own
admission is he works at a second-tier university and then has the presumption
that he can refute what the National Academy o f Sciences thinks? I mean that’s
absurd and they listened to him. (Bertrand, personal communication, 2005)
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National Reaction to the California Science Content Standards
At the National level Dr. Metzenberg was in front of the House of
Representatives Committee on Science and testified on July 23,1998, trying to discredit
the research upon which the reforms are based. He said ‘The NSF has chosen the wrong
path in endorsing these documents (National Science Education Standards and
Benchmarks for Science Literacy). They have set a standard of achievement for students
that is shockingly low, and federal funding is helping to create an entire generation of
scientific illiterates” (Metzenberg testimony, 1998,5 6).
It is often erroneously said that these two documents,
. . . represent the widespread consensus of scientists and educators as to what
all high school graduates need to achieve reasonable literacy in science. In fact,
there is no such consensus. Although there are some well-meaning scientists
who stand behind these documents, they are primarily written by education
specialists rather than scientists, and the sentiment of most scientists has been
one of indifference rather than consensus. (Metzenberg testimony, 1998,5 7)
It is also said with some frequency that these documents are based on
scholarly research on how students learn. What I have found is quite disturbing.
The National Science Education Standards and AAAS Benchmarks are based on
the flimsiest excuse for research that I have ever encountered. Fewer than half of
the papers covering student learning . . . are in peer-reviewed publications.
(Metzenberg testimony, 1998, Jf 9)
(He made no mention of which articles those might be.) “In fact, quite a few of
the references are to unpublished talks and this is certainly the lowest form of review”
(Metzenberg testimony, 1998,5 9).
After that Metzenberg cited three examples from the AAAS Benchmarks research
base to try to provide evidence of poor research methods or a lack of scientific
understanding on the part of a researcher. He then asked what the systemic initiatives are
doing to help prepare students for the global economy? He took three exercises out of a
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ninth grade book, Issues, Evidence and You, being used in the Los Angeles schools by the
LA Urban Systemic Initiative. Dr. Herbert Thier is the founding Director of Science
Education for Public Understanding Program (SEPUP) at the Lawrence Hall of Science
at the University of California at Berkeley. Dr. Thier said Dr. Metzenberg took questions
out of context from the book, Issues, Evidence and You (Brunkhorst, personal
communication, 2006).
Dr. Thier said he did not know what Dr. Metzenberg’s qualifications were as a
scientist or science educator but he questioned his commitment to scholarly work when
finding that he took things out of context from a student book. There are teacher guides,
material kits and other related resources that are provided to go along with the student
textbook. (None of which Metzenberg had said to have used or referred to.)
One example Metzenberg used was “from the middle of the book, students
mixing hot and cold water, and predicting the outcome (if you guessed warm water, then
you must have studied in advance!” - Metzenberg’s comment) (Metzenberg testimony,
1998, S 31). Dr. Their said this was the introduction to the concept of heat flow and
energy equilibrium. The students investigate a heat exchange between hot and cold
water.
Peanut calorimetiy introduces the transformation of chemical energy to heat, the
use of calorimetry to measure energy, and the calorie as a unit of energy.
Students are introduced to the kinetic molecular theory of heat as an explanation
for temperature and phase changes. The objectives were for the students to study
heat transfer, conserving energy and explore the transfer of energy from hot to
cold objects. To just use the student’s science book without anything else is a
superficial way to try to assess any types of materials. (Brunkhorst, personal
communication, 2006)
After Metzenberg, George Nelson, the Director of Project 2061, AAAS sent a
response prepared by Dr. Andrew Ahlgren, associate director of AAAS Project 2061, to
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the House of Representatives Committee on science.. In his response he said, “We
believe any evidence. The response included two parts and the first was a detailed
refutation of nearly every point in the testimony, and the second is a fair account of the
significant issues that underlie the case he tries to make” (Ahlgren commentary, 1998, J
1 & 2).
Still in 2005 there were national articles that tell of California students struggling
with low scores. Comparisons of international scores revealed that American students
have not gotten the basic concepts yet. There were also fewer students graduating in
science and engineering. There were more students from overseas that come with a visa
and study in the United States (Vaughn, 2005; Garrett, 2005).
It is time to begin the cycle over again for adopting standards in all areas and the
English language arts has finished their adoption in 2006 but it was a tight vote by the
Board of Education, 6-4 to pass the new curriculum. Again they say “that the curriculum
will provide California with some of the most rigorous standards in the nation and ensure
equity for all students.” We have heard this before and Carla Rivera (2006) of the Los
Angeles Times reports that it amounts to a ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach. An English-
leamers advocacy group is outraged and cannot believe that California can say this again
with 1.6 million students that speak little or no English in this state. It does not look like
the battles are going to end anytime soon with many standards’ adoptions (Rivera, 2006).
The bottom line goal for the National Science Education Standards was “Science
education is for all students.” The California goals were stated to.
. . . raise the level of expectation for what students know and are able to do at
each grade level by defining the essential skills and knowledge in science that
will enable our students to compete with peers from around the world. (State of
California, July 1,1998)
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The goals were not used to guide die development as the stated equity goals.
Since California Standards were to be used for norm-referenced testing purposes, which
meant that there had to be scores above and below the mean. Popham said that it is
impossible to have successful learning by all students if norm-referenced tests are used
(Popham, 1999).
Norm-referenced tests are to use the:
. . . student’s relative knowledge and/or skills . . . to be compared with those
possessed by a national sample of students of the same age or grade level. Items
that do the best job of discriminating among students are those answered
correcdy by roughly half the students. Developers avoid items that are answered
correctly by too many or by too few students. (Popham, 1999)
This is why when California says, “Science education is for all students,” and the
Standards are to be used for norm referencing, this is an oxymoron. The Standards are:
. . . to be able to cite improvements in education with sanctions for local non-
compliance. The goal is a ‘stick’ for achievement based on norm-referenced
tests, which are constructed to create a spread of scores above and below a point
defined as successful. By design they prevent success for all students.
(Brunkhorst, 1999b, p. 10)
When Dr. Brunkhorst asked the Commission repeatedly who these Standards
were being written for, she never received an answer. The dismissal of concern about
age-appropriate Standards was just more evidence that the California Standards did not
really concern themselves with the intention of helping all students to succeed (Olson,
1998, p. 28).
Dr. Bruce Alberts, president of the National Academies, also said “When you
start teaching first and third graders about abstract things like atoms and molecules, what
we actually do is not have kids understand anything.” Dr. Andrew Sessler, President, of
the America Physical Society said, “These Standards are so chock full of factoids that the
only way you can get them across is by rote learning” (Vogel, 1998, p. 389). “Science
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education success is not for all, but for all to compete and for many to be eliminated”
(Brunkhorst, 1999b, p. 11). In competition, there are winners and losers and some of the
children in California will be losers because of this.
Because of the one opening on the Commission the Governor appointed Dr.
Glenn Seaborg as the chair of the Commission subcommittee for science. It was always
Seaborg and Commissioner Bill Evers who would vote no against what the
commissioners would work for. “Decisions were often made based on political threats,
tacit and overt. Amazingly, to the best of our knowledge, the media did not report on the
threats made or reported in public meetings” (Brunkhorst, 1999a, How were decisions
made).
The State Board of Education was not obligated to accept the Standards that the
Commission set forth before them. The Board was mostly appointees by the Governor
and one Commissioner told Dr. Brunkhorst that you have to be a loyal Republican to be
part of the Board, especially since there was a certain outcome that the Governor was
looking for. Some of the Commissioners wondered if the Governor was above the law
and whether the Commission might be breaking the law if they went along with the
requests of the governor (Brunkhorst, 1999a).
The process of developing the Standards was very disjointed. There were
agreements among the Commissioners that were made in public and then a few would
turn around and go in the back room, change and omit things before they would take
them to the Board (Anonymous Commissioner, 2006; Brunkhorst, 1999b).
There were public and private professional assaults that “emanated from the
Commission and Commission staff focused on Dr. Brunkhorst and California State
University- San Bernardino, without a check on the validity of the accusations nor any
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apology when assaults were established as unfounded or contrived.” One Commission
staff member told her, ‘That’s the way of this political world” (Brunkhorst, 1999a, What
was the process).
All writing was to be done according to the Commission’s guidelines. Some
people seemed to hear directions differently and so it was necessary to get the rules in
writing. After that Dr. Metzenberg only wanted to do things by email and in two separate
groups Dr. Brunkhorst demanded they have face-to-face sessions to guarantee openness
and “input from appropriate content and teacher expertise” (Brunkhorst, 1999a, How was
writing and review done).
After a two day meeting of writing biology content, Dr. Metzenberg told the
team to destroy their work and start over and reorganize it as he told them to (Brunkhorst,
1999a). From the looks of things, he had been given overnight private instruction. This
type of thing happened many times, and some felt that the Standards had been “high
jacked” (Eastin, anonymous Commissioner, 2006).
When the first draft went out there was only a short list of very general questions,
nothing of great substance. Also the Science Coalition wanted the community to know
that just because Brunkhorst’s name was on it did not mean she had approved of it but the
Commission would not bother giving that information to the public {Commission for the
Establishment o f Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
After four public hearings, Dr. Otto summarized and selectively interpreted and
took excerpted statements to use in front of the Commission. They were taken to discredit
the people that gave testimony at the hearings. There was a large set of letters that came
from some of the “expert reviewers” and was given to the Commission in a pile.
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Commissioner Carabbino asked that an analysis be made of the letters but his request was
not acknowledged and was deleted from the official minutes {Commission for the
Establishment o f Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
This sums up some basic comments from the reviewers; teachers, educators, and
science associations:
1. The word “know” is used too much.
2. Are the Standards grade/age appropriate or is it content for all or some?
3. Points missing a) what is science b) impact of science upon the quality of life,
c) no history of science.
4. Too much to cover in high school if only two years of science is required.
5. Standards serve more as a goal than minimum - impressed by sophistication
and comprehensiveness.
At the State Board meeting on September 10,1998, a reporter from the
Sacramento Bee said there was very little opposition heard at the meeting
Despite a push by nearly a dozen national scientific organizations to redraft the
standards with less emphasis on memorizing facts and more on experimentation
and conceptual understanding. “That document is, in many of its details, utterly
preposterous,” said James Langer, a University of California at Santa Barbara
physics professor and Vice President of the American Physical Society. “ Doesn’t
take a rocket scientist to know you can’t teach atomic physics in third grade.”
Langer represented a group of scientists and scientists and science educators,
including former astronaut Sally Ride and former Stanford University President
Donald Kennedy who offered to rewrite the science standards. (DeFao, 1998, 3 f
1)
The State Board ignored their offer and said such concerns already had been taken into
account in drafting the document (DeFao, 1998).
At the State Board Meeting on September 10,1998, there was public discussion.
There were only 5 people that spoke about the Science Standards and they each had two
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minutes. There were five people to speak on the science standards. They were James
Langer, Rollie Otto, Stan Metzenberg, Joe Epperson and Art Sussman. James Langer is a
Professor of Physics at UC Santa Barbara and Vice President of the American Physical
Society. He incorporated testimony from 11 scientific societies, he said some standards
are ‘preposterous’ and gave the Commissioners an official offer by the scientific societies
to assemble a panel of California scientists to amend the standards
(http://www.sbcss.kl2.ca.us/educators/math science/legislation.htm. 1998).
The APS presentation included statements from 11 National Scientific Societies.
These are the American Chemical Society, the American Physical Society, AAAS,
National Academy o f Sciences, American Astronomical Society, American
Geological Institute, American Society for Cell Biology, American Vacuum
Society, Acoustical Society o f America, Microscopy Society o f America and
Optical Society o f America. These eleven societies called for a press conference
that day and labeled the California Science Standards as “Unfit for Children
(Commission for the Establishment o f Academic Content and Performance
Standards, 1998)
There was a letter included from each of the scientific societies. The main
concerns expressed were that there was too much detailed content, too little
emphasis on how science is conducted, presentation of material at
inappropriately early grade levels (atomic physics at the third grade and college
level physics in high school), and very few connections to the applications of
science in students' lives. All these factors would result in science education that
turn off students and does not equip them for their life as citizens, workers or
even practicing scientists. (Appendix H)
The scientific societies presented an offer to rewrite the science standards for the
State Board. (Appendix I) They have named six highly esteemed California scientists
who have offered to do the work, such as Bruce Alberts (President of the National
Academy of Sciences)
(http://www.sbcss.kl2.ca.us/educators/math science/legislation.htm. 1998). After all of
this the Board never publicly responded, implying a total rejection of any offers from the
scientific societies.
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To support the last two issues of Dr. Seaborg, Dr. Rollie Otto gave testimony for
the current draft. Both men had wanted some of the asterisks removed from many of the
high school science standards. The other issue was that the Board should specify Biology
in ninth grade, Chemistry in tenth grade; Physics in eleventh grade and in twelfth grade
would be Earth Science.
Art Sussman focused on the two proposals from Glenn Seaborg and Rollie Otto.
He stated that the Commission had considered both of these many times and
voted them down many times. He claimed that taking the asterisks away from
those standards and making them mandatory for all students would result not in
the rigorous standards that the Board wanted but in rigor mortis standards. He
also cited the need for chemistry and physics to understand the Biology
standards. He also included an article from Science magazine where Nobel
Laureate Leon Lederman advocates the opposite sequence - Physics in 9th grade
then Chemistry and then Biology in 11th grade.
(http://www.sbcss.kl2.ca.us/educators/math science/legislation.htm. 1998)
After a recess of the Board they discussed their ideas. The basic message was
they were going to make very few changes to the Science Standards received from the
Academic Standards Commission.
Both Ms. Nicholas and Ms. Josephs spoke in favor of the Commission approach
at the high school level. They like the flexibility that this gives to districts and
think it would be a mistake to designate a particular sequence. Local districts
would have the option of meeting the requirement through discipline based
courses, integrated courses or a mix
(http://www.sbcss.kl2.ca.us/educators/math science/legislation.htm. 1998).
The Board did acknowledge that there was controversy in the group that wrote
these standards, but they were pleased with what they had received from the Commission
(http://www.sbcss.kl2.ca.us/educators/math science/legislation.htm. 1998).
Even the Board President, Yvonne Larsen who was absent from the meeting, said
she would take full responsibility for the Science Standards. Any suggestions for
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changes would be brought up at the October meeting, voted on, and then the Standards
would be finalized.
After this meeting there was quite a reaction from the American Physics Society.
They took the “lead in denouncing the current draft of the California Science Content
Standards. APS representatives convened a press conference in Sacramento on
September 10th (before the Board session on the standards). About 10 people from
newspapers, radio and TV attended”
(http://www.sbcss.kl2.ca.us/educators/math_science/legislation.htm).
The review process of the next draft had testimonies from two influential men
who were verbally assaulted by Commissioner Evers and Dr. Metzenberg. Evers and
Metzenberg both told Drs. Alberts and Johnson they were representing “bogus” research.
One testimony came from the President of the National Academy of Sciences, Dr. Bruce
Alberts and the other was Dr. Fred Johnson, President of the Nation Science Teachers
Association.
When the final document was prepared the same process was used and Dr.
Alberts offered to provide reviews and there was an offer from the Lawrence Hall of
Science to write the final draft, “for free” but both offers were turned down. Three
Commissioners threatened to overturn everything by turning in their own “minority
report” and “Seaborg was heard to say: ‘I’ll fight this to the end’” (Commission for the
Establishment o f Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1997).
The Commission accepted compromises behind the scenes, ignored Dr.
Brunkhorst’s final recommendations and accepted the recommendations from Drs.
Metzenberg, Seaborg and Otto. The Standards were then turned over to the board where
more changes were made. It was kept secret whom the authors on the Board were, and
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according to Dr. Otto could not be revealed. He had made this statement at the
California Science Teachers Association annual meeting in October 1998 (Brunkhorst,
1999a). This was the end of the writing of the 1998 California Science Content
Standards when they were handed over to the State Board of Education.
Summary o f Reactions After the Approval
“There’s so much backdoor politics that goes on with these things. That’s why
people get frustrated. And I know the Standards were riddled with it” (LaFontaine,
personal communication, 2005). Christine Bertrand, President of the California Science
Teachers Association (CSTA) said she was just an observer of the process. She saw the
meetings of the Science Committee and some of the full Commission but she said,
I think there was a lot that was done behind the scenes that wasn’t done publicly
and that by the time it got to the public meeting, there were a lot of decisions that
had already been made. I thought that there was absolutely no input from the
public that was listened to unless it conformed to the preordained direction they
wanted to go. (Bertrand, personal communication, 2005)
“Science education reform emerges from the body of research literature. While
the conservative activists focus their assault on reform research, when asked in
California, they could not cite research supporting the traditional content and pedagogy
they espouse” (Brunkhorst, 199, p. 18). Some of the information just discussed was
from a paper that Dr. Brunkhorst wrote and also gave at a California State Teachers
Association meeting the National Association for Research in Science Teaching
(NARST).
Dr. Otto was asked the question about whether he thought the Standards were
heavy on facts and he said:
No, I don’t I think that they’re actually concepts, principles and theories that are
mostly brought out in the writing of the Standards. The statements are made as
though they’re factual statements, but the teaching of the science contents on any
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one of these things is not limited to just know the factual statement. What we
tried to do in the writing of the Framework was to focus on the idea that facts are
really those things that we observe. These things that we develop an
understanding for through the study of the natural world become the concepts,
principles and theories on which we basically learn. We understand the world
around us, and that’s what science is all about. (Otto, personal communication,
2005)
When Dr. Metzenberg was asked to be interviewed he chose only to send emails
two different times and would not be interviewed face to face or over the phone.
California State University, Northridge is only a short distance from where the author of
this paper lives. Dr. Metzenberg was also asked if he thought the Standards were heavy
on facts and he replied, “No.” He was asked why he did not think so because it seemed
as though when looking through the Standards there are many facts that a child has to
learn or memorize and his reply was only, “I guess we don’t agree then” (Metzenberg,
personal communication, 2005).
Dr. Otto was asked if he felt that there was enough hands-on to keep a child’s
interest. It is going to depend on how the Standard is taught. You have a range from
memorizing the Standards and have an open-inquiry-based approach, and discovery
opportunities for students. That is the implementation of the Science Standards (Otto,
personal communication, 2005).
Mr. Jerry Valdez, the K-12 Science Coordinator of the Fresno School District,
was involved as a reviewer and provide feedback to the consultants. He was involved
with the National Science Foundation before the Science Standards. He was very much
involved with the science education community at the national level. He said once it
comes down to what happens in the classroom with the five minutes that the teachers get,
there isn’t much they can do. He said the system is in misalignment, the State of
California says all kids should live up to these Standards. The State is only funding two
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years of science. But when the kids get to the University of California they require most
applicants to have three to four years of science (Valdez, personal communication, 2005).
Mr. Valdez also related that:
The two years they (the State) will fund is questionable. I have schools trying to
live up to the Standards right now. We don’t have enough chemistry labs. We’d
like to create more sections of chemistry. We have no place to teach chemistry.
And the State won’t fund us to put in the additional labs and equipment. The
State Board just sits there saying; “You shall do this.” Fine. Ok. So, they just
close their door and they have kids read out of books. That’s what happens.
What else are they going to do? (Valdez, personal communication, 2005)
There is also the recognition that science is connected to our lives and if you
teach it in a way that connects it to the lives of the students, you get a deeper
understanding of the relationship and the nature of science to our lives and to the way
science is actually done. In Dr. Otto’s view:
What was never fully accomplished was the integration of this
investigation/experimentation section where the content, concepts, principles and
theories that were to be taught and then you do activities, but the activities were
to include the concepts, principles and theories. Now, the problem is time in the
classroom. (Otto, personal communication, 2005)
That is where the two philosophies differ. One group says:
If we do inquiry-based science, it’s a slow process, you can’t get enough
materials in, students need to know more than just a few things at each grade
level and just have a lot of experience doing the inquiry-based aspect. (Otto,
personal communication, 2005).
The other side says, “Well, we think that there is a lot of evidence that students learn
science more effectively if it’s hands-on inquiry-based.” That is where the tension comes
in (Otto, personal communication, 2005).
Janet Nicholas, who was a Board of Education Member at the time of the writing
of the California Science Content Standards, was asked to participate in the interview
process for this history. She said she had read the paper from the IRB the author had
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emailed and replied saying she did not want to participate. She gave no reason why she
made this decision. In 1999, she did speak at a Conference on Standards-Based K-12
Education at California State University Northridge. She said that the most difficult kind
of reform is content reform. She said, “what we teach in the classroom actually matters,
and matters most” (Nicholas, 1999, 5 9).
When Ms. Nicholas was asked who determines the content, she said that after
two years of hearings throughout California, the board adopted what students should be
able to do at the end of each grade, K-12.
When that subject or skill is first introduced it is entirely up to a local school
district arid their system of governance. How it is taught is entirely up to that
local school district.. .and their teachers. Nicholas also said that there is “terrific
flexibility in California Standards, but not flexibility in end results.” (Nicholas,
1999,526)
Some of Ms. Nicholas’s comments are very interesting. It seems as though she
was not there at some of the board meetings when they were looking at the Science
Standards as an example. At year-end each grade has a certain amount of facts and other
information that students must know for the tests. Also within the Science Standards
there is not “terrific flexibility in California Standards.”
There is a curriculum commission that oversees the adoption of the textbooks. In
1992, it was called the Instructional Materials Evaluation Panel (IMEP) and now it has
been changed to the Instructional Materials Advisory Panel (IMAP). The first group was
supposed to give advice but with the change the new panel can say ‘Thank you for your
advice. We don’t want it. We’re going to do what we want.” The first panel in 1992
would listen to the advice of the Commission about why certain books were better than
others and listened to them as the experts.
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Reflecting Back By Those Interviewed About the Standards
For the California Science Content Standards some of the people that were in the
background that were asked to review the drafts were Dr. Herb Brunkhorst and he was
asked mainly about the biology part because that was his field. When he look at them he
said:
I thought they were frankly, “dumbed” down. There was very little investigation
and I have always been an inquiry teacher and have always been an inquiry-
oriented student, so, you know, I thought that compared to the National
Standards, they were lousy. A step backwards. That seems to be the best,
politest way to put it. I mean they basically took us back 30 years, where science
education was then. (H. Brunkhorst, personal communication, 2005)
Brunkhorst (Herb) thought BSCS was very much guided. It took a certain
teacher and a different teaching style. ‘The No Child Left Behind” is asking for better
content preparation and that is what it takes for a good inquiry teacher or else you won’t
know which way to turn next. The trouble is that is has all become so politicized that
there are elements from both groups that have validity but they can’t seem to talk to the
other.
But as far as the Standards are concerned there is too much minutia and they
have missed the forest for the trees. The big ideas aren’t learned because they are too
interested in learning all the facts listed in the Standards. One of the greatest concerns of
teachers now is that there is not enough time to learn all the facts especially now that
everything has been scripted (Brunkhorst, H., 2005).
Ruth McKenna, Chief Deputy Superintendent for the California Department of
Education, said that the results of what “came out was very strong content Standards by
discipline,” and she thought it had improved science education. It was “a good result
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after all that. I think they’ve improved the level of rigor in science education.” Having a
balance of hands-on and memorization of science is what is going to help children. The
State Board members “were very serious about their responsibility, they took it seriously
and that was their job . .. to be the final word” (McKenna, personal communication,
2005).
Phil LaFontaine said:
I guess I would want to be quoted as saying, ‘I think the Standards are good.’
I know too many students who are getting absolutely nothing, or were getting
incidental teaching and it was not helping them to further their education. And
this incidental teaching, while it was fun, and I’ve done it while it was fun, I
actually tried to take the incidental teaching to hook it into what I was talking
about, where some people were just like ping-ponging all over the world.
Students need to have a rigorous structure that helps them to move from where
they’re at to where they’re going. I really do believe that. I feel there’s two
parts of content. There’s the knowing of science and there’s the doing of
science. And it’s that doing part that I think is never really attached or
attacked, so the students can really apply that. (LaFontaine, personal
communication, 2005)
Mrs. Petrossian said:
I believe in Standards. I believe Standards are the reason why California’s come
such a long distance from the days where we thought children couldn’t reach
these levels to the days where we’re advocating even higher levels than what the
Standards contain. (Petrossian, personal communication, 2005)
The work of the Commission was outstanding. The Governor and Delaine
had both appointed some truly bright and brilliant people. I think some of the
underhanded things that happened by a handful should never overcome the
commitment of that group of people that gave voluntarily without any
remuneration for their hours; weekends or workdays, (Petrossian, personal
communication, 2005)
Dr. Otto said:
I think clearly the two philosophies that were working against each other,
one was the Brunkhorst group, probably would have been in favor of a National
Academy of Science Standards adoption. Basically, we’re relying that a lot of
the people who testified in favor that, including Bruce Alberts who was the head
of the National Academy of Science, and others, so they came and testified in
favor of the National Academy of Science Standards. On the other side was the
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desire to have rigorous science Standards that were quite explicit and grade level
buy grade level, so there had to be some rewriting of the National Science
Education Standards anyway. And there was also this other philosophy of
Standards that were written in very specific language and were quite specific in
their scope of content. So, if you read these Standards, they’re probably some of
the most specific Standards that you will find anywhere of all the state’s
standard-setting process. (Otto, personal communication, 2005)
Dean Gilbert said he believed that when it came down to the final edits “it was a
stacked deck.” Twice since then a group of people have
tried to submit legislation to revisit the Standards on a cyclic basis and yet they
believe the Standards are perfect. No alterations are needed. It is ludicrous to
think that the Standards are perfect, the Standards shouldn’t be revisited, they
shouldn’t be edited, that you shouldn’t let them research. It is not a one-size-fits-
all. It does not meet the need of all the kids. They talk about research-based
decision-making and they don’t practice what they preach. So, that’s the
dilemma that we’re in right now and the people that have a voice, like on the
Curriculum Commission, are clones of the people that are controlling the politics,
like Marion Joseph. Marion Joseph goes back to the Wilson Riles days and she
is not on the Board any more, but she is stronger now... (Anonymous
Commissioner, Gilbert, personal communication, 2005)
as a consultant of the Sacramento County Office of Ed than she was on the Board
and she’s getting paid for it” (Gilbert, personal communication, 2005).
Another Adoption Cycle Again
Now it is almost time to start the cycle all over again. There is a timeline already
setup for the 2006 Science Primary Adoption.
In an article in Education Week, in January 2004, Michelle Galley reports that
California Students may have less opportunity for hands-on science activities. The State
Board of Education is scheduled to vote on a new set of criteria for K-8 textbooks and
vote to limit exploratory lessons to 25 percent. Instead, teachers are expected to “use
more direct instruction and group discussion in their classrooms.” (5 4).
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Christine Bertrand, executive director of the California Science Teachers
Association said, “They believe that students learn best by being told. That is ludicrous.
Science, by its very nature, demands lessons that involve more discovery-based learning
activities.” It the time is limited for students to do experiments it “runs contrary to what
we know about how students learn, and how science is done in the real world.”
Thirty state legislators led by Assemblywoman Jackie Goldberg were prompted
to write a letter to urge the members of the curriculum commission to change the
guidelines “before California is the laughingstock of the nation for taking a hands-on
subject like science and limiting the amount of hands-on instruction” (Galley, 2004).
If such a change occurs in the criteria for K-8 science textbooks, this will be “felt
across the country, as textbook publishers tend to produce materials that meet
California’s-and Texas’-requirements for the nation as a whole” (Galley, 2004, A
‘Laughingstock’? 5 1).
Sharon Janulaw, the President of the California Science Teachers Association
also wrote letters to the Vice Chair of the Curriculum Development and Supplemental
Materials Commission and one of the new State Board of Education Members telling
them of the concern they have over the newly proposed criteria. Janulaw told them that
the criteria denies districts to teach they way they see fit to teach it best for their diverse
student populations. It denies using multiple instructional strategies.
The criteria specifically states that the teachers’ edition of materials must
describe ‘what to teach, how to teach, and when to teach,’ completely negating the ability
of teachers to determine the structure and timing of units and lessons for greatest effect.
We find it beyond odd that textbook publishers should be considered to have the
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expertise to tell teachers how and when to teach.” This is all counter to the purpose of
inquiry-based instruction.
On March 10,2004, the eleven-member Board of Education voted unanimously
to adopt criteria that had been revised. They reversed the earlier position that they had
taken of limiting the time that pupils could spend on hands-on lessons.
The board had received “widespread criticism from state business leaders and
higher education administrators, who argued against the cap.” The issue led to a
discussion “with the executive director of the state school board, representatives of Gov.
Arnold Schwarzenegger, business leaders, legislators, higher education officials,
teachers, and officers of the California science Teachers Association, said Christine
Bertrand, the executive director of the CSTA.” The language of the proposed guidance
for textbook publishers was changed to make the 20 percent to 25 percent proportion for
hands-on lessons a minimum, not a cap,
As Dean Gilbert put it at the end of his interview, ‘They [the Commission]
wanted it their own way.” And they got it!
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CHAPTER V
DISCUSSION AND IMPLICATIONS
This chapter provides commentary, discussion and recommendations with
respect to the histoiy of the writing of the California Science Content Standards. This is
particularly important as we move toward the crafting of the next set of California
Science Standards in 2012.
Basis for Findings
Two main data sources were used to discuss and illustrate how the California
Science Content Standards were developed and ultimately written. The major data came
from interviews with those who were involved in different areas of writing or reviewing
the Standards. Another information source came from a review of the formal minutes of
the Commission for the Establishment o f Academic Content and Performance Standards
Commission and the State Board o f Education located in the Stanley Mosk Library in
Sacramento.
Interviews with many of the participants were revealing, since everyone had their
own story to tell, always adding something new to the history. For most, it only took a
question or two for them, to recall the process and recount what happened eight years
earlier. There were several other important individuals found in the minutes who were
asked for interviews but they either did not want to participate or would only answer
questions by email.
Looking Back: Education and the Standards Movement
Diane Ravitch, (1995) Research Professor of Education at New York University,
defines “education standards” as goals, what should be done, and a measure of how well
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the goal was met. She says in all of life standards are needed or life would be chaotic.
Standards are established and improved because they better the quality of life. Beginning
in the early 1800s, philosophers and educators began to realize that having certain
principles to guide learning science was important.
In the mid-1800s, Herbert Spenser, an English philosopher shared his belief that
the scientific approach is the only way to gain knowledge. It was his thought that
students needed to learn through sensory experiences, so he was strongly opposed to rote
memorization. This was the same argument that went on with the group writing the
California Science Standards in 1998. This hands-on approach was strongly suggested
by the consultant, Dr. Brunkhorst who advocated such an approach in the California
Science Standards.
Charles Eliot, President of Harvard University in 1869, said that science was an
indispensable subject for children. He also said it must be taught with an instrument in
hand and a good textbook is not sufficient. He said that learning should be enjoyable:
delightful but not painful (Eliot, 1909).
The National Education Association founded a group called the Committee o f
Ten in 1892 made up of college and scholastic leaders. They divided into three groups to
address different areas of science. They thought that students should be able to infer
from their own observing. They also believed that the laboratory should be the central
part of science, with inquiry as the proper method to use the lab. This is just what the
consultant group from California State University San Bernardino wanted as part of the
California Science Standards. In the last set of Frameworks from the 1990s, such an
approach was strongly inquiry oriented.
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John Dewey, in 1938, also knew that verbal knowledge is of restricted
usefulness. Because of this he too, recommended that there be activity in cuniculums for
science. Learning by direct experience is just as important as reading and listening to a
teacher. Olson (1973) reminds us that Dewey knew there was an important link between
the process of education and direct experience. He saw the contrast between children
learning only with tests and learning through experience. Olson suggests that
psychological research supports this view.
In 1946, President Harry Truman created the President’s Scientific Research
Board. This Board was to study the country’s research and development activities and
science training programs. Among their findings they recognized that if children in the
early elementary school grades were not interested and stimulated in science they would
never go on to college science programs (DeBoer, 1991).
When the Russians launched Sputnik, the United States was caught by surprise
and educators’ and scientists’ responses along with the public, demanded changes in the
education of math and science. This was a huge turning point in the Nation. With the
help of the National Science Foundation, they began to provide funding for schools to
renew education in science and math.
All of these events that have happened in the last 175 years along with the people
involved, continue to point to the same idea every time. The main thought is to use
inquiry and hands on experiences along with the use of knowledge from books, for
learning science.
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Standards and Frameworks
When Hailey’s comet last came close to earth in 1985, Project 2061 ’ s writers
thought about all the technological and scientific changes that children entering school
would see before the Comet would return in 2061, thus the name. After Project 206,1
there were two other milestone reports that influenced national reform. Science for All
Americans (SFAA) and Benchmarks for Science Literacy both communicate principles
that should direct efforts and set specific goals for student learning.
(http://www.educationworld.com/standards/national/science/index.shtmll.
Beginning in 1970, California entered the discussion of how science should be
taught with the development of the first of four frameworks. There is a difference
between science frameworks and science standards. A science framework provides a
model for the teacher to use as a pattern for improving on and having more ideas for
instruction. The framework is a blueprint used for reform. In California there were four
sets of Science Frameworks written in: 1970,1978, 1984, and 1990. After the
development of the 1990 Science Framework for California, the National documents
SFAA, Benchmarks, and NSCS appeared. Therefore a total of seven documents were in
existence before the California Science Content Standards were available. Beginning
with SFAA, each document became more detailed in what should be included in K-12
science education.
Educators and policy makers in California wanted to have a set of Science
Content and Performance Standards that were the most rigorous in the Nation but there
was also criticism that the frameworks did not work. Schultz (1998) said the legislature
“authorized a Commission for the Establishment of Academic Performance and Content
Standards” to create “world-class” standards for both content and performance standards.
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In a moment there will be a discussion of how the very first set of Science Content
Standards were written in California. Even though the legislature authorized
performance standards too, the committee never was allowed to write them.
Standards describe what a student needs to know and understand in each area of
science by the time they have finished a certain grade level. California’s definition of a
standard includes skills, knowledge and concepts that students must acquire at the
completion of each grade level.
Beginning the Process
Creation of a Commission
The State of California designed the Academic Standards Commission (Appendix
E) to consist of twenty-one people, plus the State Superintendent, a designee, executive
director, deputy executive director and a senior consultant Governor Pete Wilson
appointed over half of the Commissioners and it would be beneficial to further analysis
know what criteria he used in making these important choices. The former Governor was
contacted by email several times at his law firm in Los Angeles, but did not respond to
these requests for comments.
The biographies of those on the Commission revealed that there were university
educators, one elementary school teacher and two science teachers. Several appointees
were electrical engineers but Seaborg was the only real qualified scientist. Interestingly
there were no science educators on the Commission itself. An examination of these
people on the Commission who were responsible for writing the language arts, math and
social science standards also showed that there were no real experts in any of the fields
directly relating to the process relating to the writing of Education Standards. The list
looked
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impressive, but it could be argued that they were not the people who should have been
asked to write Standards relating to educations. Appendix B shows the list of the Board
Members and the Commissioners; those with asterisks by their name were on the Science
Committee.
Many individuals bring expertise to science instruction; scientists, science
educators and science teachers play important but distinct roles. All are important but
each has a different type of job to do. The people on the Academic Standards
Commission were all people who had been chosen by the Governor or the State
Superintendent.
Roles of Commissioners and Consultants
Dr. Rollie Otto explained how the Academic Standards Commission was put
together to write the Standards. There was one staffer hired to be the head of the group
and he facilitated everything. This staffer was paid just to facilitate the work of the
Commission. The Commission was divided into two subcommittees that ran
simultaneously. Once they finished overseeing the math and English standards being
written by consultants, they took on the next step, keeping the same two groups and the
history and science committees did their jobs (Otto, personal communication, 2005).
The Consultants retained to write the science standards were hired by sending out
RFPs to many places in California. Once chosen (and there were two consultants) they
were the ones that wrote the real Standards along with the groups of people (reviewers,
teachers, and educators) they had chosen to help them.
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The Commissioners who served on the Science Committee did not actually write
the Standards so one could argue whether the make up of the Commission really mattered
or not. They hired the consultants, gave them guidelines, met with them, and looked at
what had been written. The Commissioners could modify, send out different drafts and
receive input from the public and other experts. They also gave oral presentations at
public hearings. Even though the Commission received input from the outside, it did not
seem to matter to them. They went on as though no one had even heard it. They gave no
credence to any of it.
The Commissioners were ultimately responsible for the final product but it was
the consultants whom they depended upon for the nature and quality of the standards
(Schultz, 1998). In the end the Commissioners would then send on the approved
Standards to the Board of Education for the official vote.
The Request for Proposals to Write the Standards
The Commissioners designed the Request for Proposal (RFP) together and sent
them out to those schools or persons whom they thought might be interested in sending in
a proposal. When the proposal due date came, two groups applied to write the Standards.
One proposal was received from Dr. Bonnie Brunkhorst, California State University at
San Bernardino. The other was from a group of three Nobel Laureates: Dr. Glenn T.
Seaborg, Dr. Henry Taube, and Dr. Dudley R. Herschback. Atkin (1997) said that never
before had so many high-ranking scientists had such a controlling influence on the
education in the K-12 schools in the United States. In the Nobel Laureates’ proposal they
said they could do the work and the cost to the Commission would be nothing.
Somewhere along the way Dr. Stan Metzenberg and a group, he called the Associated
Scientists, became involved with the group of Nobel Laureates. But after questioning
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several people and researching the material it was never quite clear where it was that he
entered the picture in this whole history of the Standards.
The Commission was looking for consultants to write the California Science
Content Standards who should know about science education, the subject matter and
teaching children in K-12. A point system was used for “grading” every proposal but the
point system was mismanaged somehow and the whole process failed and had to begin
again. The next set of proposals came from the same two groups again so the
Commission decided to “merge” the groups together. They decided to hire the
competing groups with completely different philosophies. It was thought that a balance
had been reached between those that were more “hands-on” and those that wanted more
memory work, because they included people from both sides.
Commissioner Andrew Galef was originally chosen to be the chair of the Science
Committee. He resigned in October 1997, with no apparent reason reflected in the
minutes. Governor Wilson appointed Dr. Seaborg “when they ran into problems .. with
reconciling the two positions of the two groups and getting the Committee to go
forward.” The Governor decided to elevate him from consultant role. . . “to actually
being on die Standards Commission and chairing the Committee. So that was an
important move” (Otto, personal communication, 2005).
Dr. Glenn Seaborg first was appointed as a Commissioner and then because of
the resignation of the chair of the Science Committee, he was appointed to that position.
It was Seaborg who also was the one that sent in the proposal for the consultant’s job in
the beginning. It looks as though he had three votes, one for each position he held.
When Seaborg was asked to chair the science committee “he agreed to do it if I
was hired by the Standards Commission to assist him with his work. One reason for this
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was that he was busy and getting older, “and he and I had had a log-standing
relationship.” Otto was hired and he was to report to the staff supporting the
Commission. He also was to facilitate meetings that Seaborg ran. “It was “because of
his [diminished] hearing and other things. . . that I was asked to... facilitate the actual
meeting and discussion” (Otto, personal communication, 2005).
Dr. Rollie Otto started out as a member of Dr. Brunkhorst’s consultant team
when they put in the proposal but he soon moved to Seaborg’s group and was appointed
the “facilitator” between the two consulting groups when both were chosen to serve. At
this point balance between the two groups was gone. With Metzenberg, Seaborg and
Otto all on this committee, Dr. Brunkhorst and her group were in the minority. Dr. Otto
was a protege of Dr. Seaborg and Dr. Metzenberg was the other consultant who had been
“running” against Brunkhorst with their proposals. Dr. Brunkhorst and her group
supported inquiry and hands-on science education while Dr. Metzenberg and Dr. Seaborg
were more intent on having students learn the facts through memorization. The balance
seemed to be shifted in favor of Dr. Seaborg’s group.
The Commissioners were split into two groups (first, subcommittees to write the
reading and math standards, and then for science and social science standards) because
they felt if they did not divide up it would take much too long to get all of the standards
written. Dr. Calfee said they divided into half because if they “tried to do all four, then
we would have been . .. much smaller groups.” He said, “it was basically the math
group that moved over to do science. We did offer opportunities for regrouping. . . it
didn’t work out that way.” The groups had gotten close to each other and he said when
they got to the history and science, there were almost two cabals formed in the
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Commission. In his opinion, the more conservative group wrote science and the more
progressive team wrote history and social studies standards (Calfee, personal
communication, 2005).
The two groups designing the reading and language arts and the math standards
had many conflicts during their meetings. There was never any indication of who
divided the members into groups or if there was any reasoning about how it was done.
When it came time to write the next two sets of standards; science, and history and social
studies, there is evidence to the fact that they should have divided into two new groups,
because of the problems that had occurred, especially with the writing of the math
standards. My research found that there were “wars” over the math standards, just as
there were over the science standards. The Standards Commission thought after the first
set of Standards’ writing was over with, the second set would be much easier, which in
the end certainly was not true by anyone’s analysis.
The Consultants and Science Committee
Each consultant’s group would meet separately and then get together to see upon
what they could agree. For Dr. Brunkhorst and her group it seemed that when a Standard
was proposed to the Commission, the next day it was changed. In the end it was the
“scientific community and K-12 science education that largely lost, [and] the
traditionalists . . . won.” One argument that Dr. Seaborg lost was to have grade-by-grade
programs in the high school with four full years of science. This meant having biology,
chemistry and physics for grades 9-11 and an option in grade 12 of earth science. At this
point Seaborg remarked, “I’ll fight this to the end.” But the concept of four years of
science was never adopted, at present only two years of science are required in California
schools (Schultz, 1998).
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Public Hearings
During public testimony on the first draft of the Standards there were some
concerns about what had been written. A woman from the Riverside County Office of
Education said, “She is worried about what appears to be a checklist versus what needs to
be covered.” Some of the Commissioners said there were too many items in the
document. Martha Schwartz, from Mathematically Correct1 0 , was “concerned with the
integration of different topics in science. She suggested keeping the integrity of
chemistry, biology and physics so students can put them together.” Another teacher from
the Los Angeles Unified School District said he “thought that the Standards did not
present the information as an integrated body of knowledge.” The teachers are supposed
to present the science information as an integrated whole and that cannot happen if the
Standards separate the disciplines of science (Commission for the Establishment of
Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1998).
Another administrator commented that providing the Periodic Table posters for
every teacher was going to be a financial issue at some schools. Also is this a priority
that should be given in the early grades? One Commissioner said that introducing the
Periodic Table in the early grades may be too early (Commission for the Establishment of
Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1998).
One science teacher noted that Newton’s second law of motion, “ f=md” does not
even appear in the Standards but some other more obscure formulas do appear. A high
school teacher from the Southern California area said her reaction was “these standards
were probably more applicable to a college level course.. . . the level seems unrealistic
1 0 This group is an informal, nationwide organization of parents and scientists concerned about schools and
the “fuzzy math” they say is being introduced and the need to restore basic skills to math education.
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for the average high school student.” If they were made into goals to work toward rather
than requirements, these Standards would be acceptable (Commission for the
Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1998).
From the comments written by scientists, science educators, and science teachers
when the first draft of the Standards was sent out in 1998, there was widespread
agreement that they were much too skewed toward fact-based learning. Mr. Hill, one of
the staffers, sent the first draft of the Science Standards for comment and when he began
receiving remarks back he said, “we just got roasted. . . especially in the K-6 grades . . . a
lot of the criticisms were directed at Glenn Seaborg because there was a lot about
learning things in the periodic table and the elements” (Hill personal communication,
2005).
Concluding the Process: The California Standards and Frameworks
It was not until February 6,2002, when the State Board of Education adopted the
Science Framework.1 1 The Content Standards were adopted in 1999, so the textbook
publishers had no choice but to take the science standards and use them to publish the
science books long before they would ever see the Framework. The Curriculum
Development and Supplemental Materials Division developed the Framework. There
were only two names on the list of people that developed the Framework and also worked
on the Standards, Dr. Rollie Otto was directly involved with the writing of the Standards
and Phil LaFontaine, Education Programs Consultant for the State who was only a
reviewer of the Standards.
1 1 The Framework adopted in 2002 was to go with the 1998 Science Content Standards and help guide
teachers in doing a better job teaching what is required by the Standards.
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Before the Commission finished their work at one of the last meetings in June
1998, the Governor had told the Commission they were to end their work with the
Content Standards, and not to continue with the development of the Performance
Standards. He thanked them all and said the State Board would he taking care of the rest.
The Product
Inquiry or Memorization?
In 1968 when the Lawrence Hall of Science (LHS) began, Dr. Seaborg talked
about the need for children to learn by doing and also that hands-on science was
important. The Hall is a major hands-on-science museum where Dr. Seaborg began the
Great Explorations in Math and Science (GEMS) program. This is where science
teachers go to expand their knowledge of inquiry-based science institution. Since that
time Dr. Seaborg seemed to change some of his ideas and decided it was important for all
children (K-12) “to know” what the periodic table is and possibly that it should begin as
early as first grade. He said as much at one of the Academic Standards Commission
meetings in March of 1997.
It seemed Dr. Seaborg wanted education to be the same for the current generation
of students as it had been for him in the 1920s. When Dr. Rollie Otto spoke at the 1999
Conference on Standards-Based K-12 Education at California State University
Northridge he quoted Dr. Seaborg from the May 6th opening remarks to the Science
Committee of the Academic Standards Commission.
During my high school chemistry and physics courses, I read and re-read
my textbook assignments until I had memorized them. This led to my under
standing and ability to work problems. As a working scientist, memorization
of experimental data led to discoveries - memorization of the chemical
properties of the heaviest elements led me to propose the actinide concept
for which I received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Rather than discourage,
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I would encourage memorization for science students. {Commission for the
Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards, 1998)
It seems that he wanted twenty-first century children to engage in memorization
just as he had done almost a century earlier (Otto, 1999). It is unclear what happened in
his thinking at the time of his founding of the Lawrence Hall of Science with its emphasis
on inquiry-based science and the writing of the new Science Standards for California in
the late 1990s?
Knowing these facts about the Lawrence Hall of Science and Dr. Seaborg, it
would be interesting to know what it was or who it was that changed Dr. Seaborg’s mind
seemingly almost 180 degrees. Even though in a recent conversation with Dr. Rollie
Otto, he disagreed with the author and said “Glenn never changed his mind at all on this
subject of memorization” (Otto, personal communication, 2006).
Mistakes Along the Way
The timing of the writing of the Standards was poorly thought out ultimately
because of the order in which things took place. After the writing of the Standards came
the textbook review, which should not have happened at that time. There is evidence to
support that the Framework should be written before textbook companies enter the
picture. The Framework builds on the Science Standards and is the blueprint for
curriculum, development, instruction, professional organization, and instructional
materials to help align with the textbooks.
It seems that there should have been a better timetable for when the Standards,
both content and performance, and then the Framework to be written. Maybe the whole
process should have been delayed until all sections were ready to be published. At that
time the publishers from the book companies could have been invited to come and review
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what was written and then go back and publish textbooks that could possibly be more
useful to students and teachers alike.
The process of writing the Science Standards did seem to go astray at various
points with section being missed along the way. The State Board did not put the Request
for Proposal (RFP) together very well especially with respect to the point system they had
assigned. The first RFP was approved by the Commission on September 7,1997, and
was sent out for bids. The second round of RFPs were sent out at the beginning of
December, 1997, but they did not give out any reasons why the first set of proposals one
failed, so those applying again would not fall into the same trap. Instead, the data
suggests much of the same things happened again.
The one or two people who always voted against the rest of the Board seemed to
end up getting “their way” whenever there was a vote about the Science Standards.
These people, curiously, were also the ones who refused to speak with the researcher
about the process. It seems that these people passed up the chance to supply more
information to this history about how they saw the process take place. The impression
was that these people were the ones that were able to create the Standards that they
thought should be adopted for California’s K-12 science students in education.
Several times in the minutes there were attachments mentioned that were either
provided to the Commissioners or used as overheads by the people who were speaking.
On April 1 there was a discussion of the two versions of the life sciences standards, at
which Dr. Seaborg was present, but the overheads Dr. Otto displayed were not attached
to the minutes. He presented overheads that illustrated the options for wording and
showed the ones that Dr. Seaborg preferred. There were other attachments mentioned in
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meetings but were apparently not included to the minutes found in the library. At the
public hearings throughout the State, the Commission would ask people what their
opinions were about the Standards. There were never any minutes taken from these
meetings and there were not any reports listed in later minutes as per the records kept by
the State.
Dean Gilbert, Science Consultant for Science Education and Programs from Los
Angeles County of Education, said, it is people like Marion Joseph1 2 , a former Board
Member, who has:
indoctrinated key people, like the Chair of the Science Instructional
Materials Adoption [Committee], and Stan Metzenberg down at Cal
[California] State [University] Northridge, and [the] Chair of the Subject
Matter Committee plus she’s won Commissioners. There you’ve got
very powerful people and they’re powerful because Marion Joseph has
blessed them. So, people... have been indoctrinated to think a certain
way and to vote a certain way and not embrace or validate the input
from the teachers in the field. They’re almost condescending to
teachers. They almost disregarded unilaterally any comments that
teachers gave them during the field input. They wanted it their own way.
(Gilbert, personal communication, 2005)
The California Standards: The Reaction
On December 22,1999, Dr. Larry Woolfe from General Atomics sent out an
Education Petition calling for:
1. The revision of the California Science Standards so that they are correct,
unambiguous, and age-appropriate and are consistent with peer-reviewed
published academic research and the National Science Education Standards',
2. Rejection of the current policy that only allows the adoption of curriculum
materials that meet all of the current California Science Standards at the specified
grade level; 3. The immediate allowance of waivers for school districts so that
12
Marion Joseph was Former Executive Assistant to State Superintendent of Public Instruction Wilson Riles.
She was also the one that started looking into reading programs because her granddaughter was in the Los
Angeles Unified School District and as a result LAUSD now has the Open Court Program in the schools.
She has served on the State Board of Education and has made herself know as a political gadfly in
Sacramento.
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they may purchase curriculum materials that are scientifically accurate, age-
appropriate, and thoroughly tested
( http://www.sci-ed-ga.org/standards/petition.htmn.
Over 300 people signed the petition; educators, scientists, science teachers, university
professors and others involved with education in California. There were also letters
written by Dr. Ramon Lopez, Director of Education and Outreach; Dr. Andrew Sessler,
President of the American Physical Society; Dr. Bruce Alberts, President of the National
Academy of Sciences and professors from a variety of universities, colleges, and schools.
A Process Gone Awry
In some personal communication uncovered, Gary Nakagiri from the San Mateo
City Office of Education, K-12 Science (1998) said, “Attending one of the State Board of
Education (BOE) meetings will quickly convince you that politics, power, and some
thinly-disguised elitism is the overall agenda I have come to realize that the entire
controversy over these standards is not about “world class” standards, not about “experts’
- and certainly not about what’s best for kids” (Brunkhorst, personal communication,
1998).
The Thrust of the Minority Reports
One of the Commissioners repeatedly threatened to write a minority report unless
they all decided to go along with the minority position. A minority report is just a
summary presented by a small group of members who disagree with the majority.
Several examples of this are shown here from the minutes of the meetings. These
examples demonstrate that the process was out of control during the meeting and no one
really had the ability to keep the meetings in check.
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This happened in February 1998, “But, we were told quite plainly by [Bill]
Evers1 3 that if we put that [move toward the problem-solving, bigger ideas] through, then
they were going to submit a counter-document, with a very clear threat that the Board
would adopt their counter-document, rather than... minority report, and the Board
would adopt their minority report, rather than the full report of the committee” (Sussman,
personal communication, 2006). It seems that whenever Evers did not like the direction
the Science Committee was going, he would threaten to write a minority report, knowing
full well that the Committee would back off and he would get his way! Nothing in the
record shows any reaction from Chair Larsen about why this was permitted to happen.
There are no legal implications for writing a minority report. It is just on the record that
certain people disagreed with a vote.
Dr. Quinn1 4 commented, “Whenever anything was brought to the Commission
for a vote, the votes were very polarized by the fact that Bill Evers really manipulated
that process in the sense that there were times when the Commission voted for our
position and then Evers would say, ‘Well, if that’s the decision, I’m going to write a
minority report.’ And then the Commission would vote again and change its position.”
In a September 1998 meeting there were threats from three Commissioners to
overturn everything by turning in their own “minority report” This was from the
discussion about having all four subjects in science, physics, chemistry, biology and earth
science, in that order for grades 9-12. At a meeting in the spring, Mrs. Wright wanted Dr.
William Schmidt, the United States Research Coordinator and Principle Investigator of
13
Dr. Evers was one of the members of the Academic Standards Commission appointed by Governor Wilson
and was part of the Science Committee.
14
Dr. Quinn was a Commissioner and was employed as Assistant to the Director for Education and Public
Outreach at the Stanford linear Accelerator Center, Stanford University
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TIMSS, the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study to make a
presentation. Dr. Seaborg and Dr. Evers were ostensibly upset by this suggestion, and
Evers said if she did make the invitation, he would file a minority report, but again it
proved fruitful for Evers just as Dr. Quinn had reported earlier. The invitation was never
offered to Dr. Schmidt (Wright, personal communication, 2006). No reason was given in
the interview in 2005, as to why they did not want anyone from TIMSS to speak to the
group. It could possibly been because at the University of North Carolina (UNC) around
the same time a Mathematics and Science Education Network hosted a TIMSS forum.
The results were extremely disappointing for the United States when participating with
fifty other countries. The results showed that there was a great need for reform in science
and math education. Seaborg and Evers probably suspected Dr. Schmidt might say the
same thing to California if invited to speak
('http://www.unc.edu/depLs/msen/200Q/schmidt.htmn.
Letters of Concern About the Science Content Standards from Scientific Societies
The Board soon received many letters from scientists and science educators
about what they thought the Commission had left out of the Standards. These letters
written during August and September of 1998, addressed to the State Board of Education
and were from national scientific societies, their officers or various committee chairs. Dr.
Andrew Sessler from the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratories, in his letter to the
Commission, listed the “history of science” as an important omission from the Standards
as well as the question, “What is science?” He also thought it was important to (liscuss
the, “Impact of science upon the quality of life” (Sessler, personal communication, 1998).
Dr. Andrew Sessler proposed to the science community that letters of concern be
written to the Board and he then sent all of them in a package, telling the Board of the
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“considerable concern within the scientific community about the Proposed California
Science Standards.” He also said:
A group of California scientists - of which I am one - have formed a panel,
the Scientist’s Standards Panel, which has offered to help correct the Proposed
Standards by bringing them into line with the National Standards and
developing hands-on and exploratory activities, which we are convinced are
required so as to keep and develop children’s interest in science. (Sessler,
personal communication, 1998)
These letters were found in the Mosk State Library in Sacramento.
On Thursday, September 11,1998, there was a press conference set for 11 a.m. at
the Holiday Inn Capitol Plaza in Sacramento. It was titled: “11 Major Scientific
Societies Slam California Science Standards as ‘Unfit for Children’” and these were the
eleven major scientific organizations that called for revision of the Standards. This
conference was led by Dr. Sessler, who also had proposed the letters of concern that were
sent to the Board.
The eleven major scientific societies called for revision of the proposal the
Academic Standards Commission had left on the doorstep of the Department of
Education in California. They stamped the proposed California Science Content
Standards as “Unfit for Children.” The American Physical Society led the group along
with the National Academy of Sciences, the American Chemical Society, the American
Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Society for Cell Biology, and
the American Geological Institute.
The eleven scientific societies said:
the Standards are a giant step backward___ they will turn our children off to
science and deprive them of the tools they need to succeed in the high-tech
economy. While educators and political leader in other states around the
nation are marching forward, California is on the verge of an about face.
(Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance
Standards, 1998)
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There were representatives from the group that would announce their plans to
amend the Standards so they might make California number one in the nation in science
education. The representatives included Dr. James Langer, Vice-President of the
American Physical Society (APS); Dr. Theodore Schultz, Education and Outreach for
APS; Dr. Helen Quinn, Senior Staff, Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (she had also
worked with the consultants); and Dr. Eldridge Moores, past president of the Geological
Society of America and Professor of Geology and the University of California, Davis at
(Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards,
1998). There is no record that the Commission and the Board of Education ever made any
reply to all of this. They had their minds already made up.
What’ s Next for Science Standards in California?
Every seven years the Science Standards and the other three major subject areas,
math, language arts and social science are to be reevaluated. According to the State
Department of Education in 2006, it is time again to reevaluate the Standards. Hpw can
people be found who would be willing to be on the committee if they know the history of
how the last processes went? If there are Board of Education members that try to
influence or intimidate people, who will want to have the job? Can qualified professional
be found to serve, when it is seen as unlikely that they will be able to produce a
meaningful set of standards
All four subject areas: language arts and reading, math, science, and history and
social science, are up for review again this year. In the Los Angeles Times on April 18,
2006, it was reported that the State Board of Education adopted a new set of guidelines
for English language arts and for reading textbooks. The vote was close, 6-4, but it
passed.
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‘The new curriculum... is critical because it will be used to provide detailed guidance
for textbook publishers who will supply the books, teacher guides and other instructional
materials for classrooms over much of the next decade” (Rivera, 2006,5 2).
The timeline for the next California Science Standards adoption has been set and
the decisions made with respect to science textbooks will remain in force from 2006 to
2012 (Appendix J). Teachers and the general public have a chance in the summer of
2006 to review materials that 12 publishers will submit. Christine Bertrand, the
California Science Teachers Association (CSTA) Executive Director, says that teachers
need to make sure they are actively involved to “ensure there are good materials on the
list, they won’t have another opportunity to impact the selection of materials they use in
their classroom for a very long time” (CSTA, 2006).
When “ Knowing ” Just Isn’ t Good Enough
With the California Standards, the verb “know” has ended up not meaning very
much since it is used with every standard. Dr. Metzenberg thought it was important to
note the level of Bloom’s taxonomy implied by bad standards and not focus on the verb.
Unfortunately, when the Science Standards were finished each item began with,
“Students know ...” Only in the Investigation and Experimentation strand are those two
words missing.
A random review of nineteen other state science standards documents shows that
all but Alaska used verbs other than “students know.” Alaska had a very short and basic
set of standards that included the phrase “develop an understanding.” Even
“understanding” is at a higher level than mere “knowledge of.” Out of the states
examined; New Hampshire, Maine, Oregon, Kentucky, Oklahoma, approximately
seventy-
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three percent used many different types of verbs to help children and teachers understand
what to do. Some of the verbs used in thee documents include: demonstrate, record
communicate, ask, collect, estimate, interpret, conduct, recognize, investigate, inquire,
formulate, justify, compare, examine, classify, describe, measure, plan, observe, develop,
decipher, and evaluate. In Bloom’s taxonomy there are six different levels in the
cognitive domain. The lowest level is related to recall and each step becomes more
complex and abstract until the sixth level is classified as evaluation. There are verbs
examples that represent each different level and the lowest level begins with knowledge
(http://www.officeport.com/edu/blooms.html. From this information it is clear that many
of the other states have higher levels of verbs and intellectual activity.
It is said that as goes California (and maybe Texas) so goes the nation, because
once either of these states have written their standards and frameworks then the textbook
companies come in and fit their new books to the new standards. Once either of these
states decides what books are on the adoption list, smaller states and the non-adoption
states then assume that those are good choices for them also. The direction of the science
education policy and the politicization of the development of California’s K-12 Science
Standards are significant to the rest of the country. Textbook companies often publish a
single book that meets the needs of many states, resulting in books that are all-inclusive
and cover far too many topics (http://www.nsta.org/textbooksl.
Implications for Practice: Lessons Learned
It is clear from this research that students and teachers in California were not well
served by the process that generated the Science Content Standards. As was mentioned
earlier, it was not the students’ best interest that was at the center of this process.
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207
The problem is that it is now already “next time.” Looking at the “2006 Science
Primary Adoption Timeline” (Appendix J) it may be far too late this time. The time is up
for any changes in the writing of the science standards. Now there is only enough time
for the adoption of books.
Next time, what will have to happen before 2012 comes? First, the RFP process
should be re-evaluated and redesigned. It needs to be very clear and the ’’point system,”
for each section included in the proposal needs to be explained in the RFP. A more
fundamental recommendation for 2012, should be that there be a whole new group of
people on the State Board of Education and Superintendent of Public Schools to choose
commission members.
The data and analysis the researcher found, suggests that it would be a major
improvement to have an independent panel choose members for the commission and in
turn for that panel to assist the commission in choosing consultants with the background
of expertise in the different areas of science education, standards creation and
implementation. With the evidence of the problem of polarization in the 1998
Commission there should be one person that needs to have strong leadership and
management skills, and can also listen without imposing their own personal agenda on
the process. Another suggestion would be to bring someone in from outside the State
system guiding the deliberations and mediate if a problem arises. The last and perhaps
most significant suggestion is to carefully craft a list of people who are well qualified in
the educational areas of science, math, language arts and social sciences and who are of
the correct professional temperament to serve on the Commission and the various subject
matter panels.
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208
Implications for Future Research
Before Standards are rewritten in California, it would be wise to review how
other States have handled the same issues. When looking at other such science standards
much variation in process and product were observed, although the use of the different
verbs made other standards seem more interesting. Another beneficial investment for the
State would be to study how other standards were written in order to learn what
procedures were applied to write a state’s science standards. This study has shown that
there is much California could learn from this in order to avoid such conflicts and
polarization in their next process.
A side-by-side comparison of different state science standards might help
California and other states to see which one are more effective for teachers to use.
Teachers and other science educators could be brought together nationally to shed some
light on which is the optimal way to write science standards and to learn how other
commissions and standards-setting processes were organized.
How much did the legislature know about what was going on with the writing of
the California Standards? They funded the project but this study suggest that someone
from the legislature should have been involved at some level, even though the Sliate
Superintendent and the Chair of the Board of Education were part of the process;
This history of the California Science Standards has been an interesting and
revealing story, but it has left more questions that one might want to address. However,
the overall lessons are clear; the process did not work well, politics and personalities
played too strong a role. In the final analysis the process seems to have gotten in the way
of producing the product. We can only hope that the mistakes will not be repeated when
California next crafts an important document such as the Science Content Standards.
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209
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APPENDICES
APPENDIX A
Interviewees and Biographies
Alberts, Bruce - Chairman of the National Academy of Sciences
Brunkhorst, Bonnie - Professor of Dept, of Science, math and technology at California
State University at San Bernardino
Brunkhorst, Herb - Chair and Professor of Dept, of Science, Math and Technology at
California State University at San Bernardino
Bertrand, Christine - Executive Director of the California Science Teachers Association,
was an observer at many of the meetings
Byrd, Sheila - Deputy Executive Director to Scott Hill
Calfee, Robert - Vice-Chair of the Commission Standards, Professor of Education at the
University of California, Riverside, a cognitive psychologist
Cerwin Kathy - from K-12 Alliance part of WestEd
Codding, Judy - Commissioner and Vice President for Programs and Chief Operating
Officer for the National Center on Education and the Economy (NCEE).
DiRanna, Kathy - Director for the K-12 Alliance, part of WestEd, which combines three
professional development programs - California Systemic Initiative (CSIN), Science
Partnership for Articulation and Networking (SPAN), and Scope, Sequence, and
Coordination (SC&C).
Eastin, Delaine - Superintendent of California State Schools
Gilbert, Dean - Science Consultant for Los Angeles County of Education
Hill, Scott - Executive Director of the Academic Standards Commission
LaFontaine, Phil - Science Consultant for the California Department of Education,
Larsen, Yvonne - President of the California State Board of Education
McDowell, Marion- California State Board of Education member
McKenna, Ruth - Chief Deputy Superintendent for the California Department of
Education
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219
Metzenberg, Stan - Associate Professor in the Department of Biology at California State
University Northridge, only one to be interviewed just by email
Otto, Rollie - Nuclear Physicist at the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory
Petrossian, Alice - Chaired the English Language Arts Standards and Assistant
Superintendent of Glendale, CA Unified School District
Quinn, Helen - Assistant to the Director for Education and Public Outreach at the
Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, Stanford University
Sessler, Andy - President of the American Physical Society (APS), Theoretical Physicist
at Lawrence Berkeley Laboratories and former Director of Berkeley Labs
Sussman, Art - Director of WestEd, a nonprofit research, development, and service
agency, works with education for children, youth, and adults
Topps, Jo - Regional Director for the K-12 Alliance, was on the physical writing team
and also the Investigation and Experimentation writing team for Science Standards
Valdez, Jerry - K-12 Science Coordinator of the Fresno School District, involved as a
reviewer and provide feedback to the consultants for Science Standards
Woolf, Larry - research physicist from San Diego’s General Atomics, active in science
education outreach in the State for over 10 years
Wright, Ellen - Chairman of the Academic Standards Commission
Declined to be Interviewed
Evers, Bill - Commissioner for Academic Standards, one of the strongest of the more
conservative voices from the Hoover Institute at Stanford University
Harris, Jerilyn - Commissioner for Academic Standards, former Executive Director of the
Employers Council of Mendocino County and former chair of the Commission on
Teacher Credentialing.
Nicholas, Janet - California State Board of Education member, connected with
Mathematically Correct
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220
APPENDIX B
Publishing Information
When the Science Content Stamfords fo r California Public Schools, Kindergarten Through Grade
Twelve was adopted by the California State Board of Education on October 9. 1998, the members of
the State Board were the following: Yvonne W, Larsen, President, Robert L. Trigg, Vice-President;
Marian Bergeson: Timothy C, Draper; Kathryn Dronenburg; Marion Joseph; Marion McDowell;
Janet Ci, Nicholas; Gerti B. Thomas; Marina Tse; and Richard Weston.
This publication was edited by Sheila Bruton and Faye Ong. working in cooperation with Greg Gccting,
Executive Director, Slate Board o f Education, !t was designed and prepared for printing by the staff of
CDE Press, with the cover and interior design created and prepared by Cheryl McDonald. Typesetting
was done by Jamie Contreras and Carey Johnson, ft was published by the California Department of
Education. 1430 N Street, Sacramento, California (mailing address; P.O. Box 944272. Sacramento. CA
94244-2720). It was distributed under the provisions o f the Library Distribution Act and Government
Code Section 11096.
0 2000 by the California Department of Education
All rights reserved
Reprinted with revised introductory material in June 2003.
ISBN 0-8011-1496-9
Special Acknowledgment
The Stale Board of Education extends its appreciation to Stan Metzenberg. Science Standards Consult
ant. California State University, Northridge; Bonnie Brunkhorst, Science Standards Consultant.
California State University, San Bernardino; and the members and executive staff o f the Commission for
the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards (Academic Standards Commission!
for their outstanding work in developing and recommending the science content standards to the State
Board o f Education under the provisions o f Education Code Section 60605.
The members and executive staff of the Academic Standards Commission at the time of the approval of
the draft science content standards were the following:
Ellen Wright, Chair*; Robert Catfee, Vice Chair; Mike Aiello*; Joseph Carrahino*; Judy Codding;
Daniel Condrcm*; Linda Davis*: Bill Evers*: Tony Fisher*; Jerilyn Harris*; Dorothy Juc Lee*; Mark
Ortiz*: Judith Panton; Raymund Paredes: Alice Petrossian; Glenn T. Seahorg*: Kate Simpson;
Lawrence Siskind: Jerry Treadway: LaTanya Wright; Delaine Eastin, Stale Superintendent o f Public
Instruction; Sonia Hernandez*, the Superintendent's Designee: Scott Hill. Executive Director; Sheila
Byrd. Deputy Executive Director: and Paul Thallner. Senior Consultant.
Note: The asterisk (*) identifies those members who served on the Academic Standards Commission's
Science Committee.
Special commendation is extended to the outstanding leadership of the late Glenn T. Seaborg, Chair of
the Academic Standards Commission's Science Committee, to whom this document is dedicated; Janet
G. Nicholas. State Board of Education member; and Rollic Otto. Head o f the Center for Science and
Engineering Education, E. O. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and Consultant to the Academic
Standards Commission's Science Committee. Their service and contributions to this document deserve
special recognition.
Ordering Information
Copies o f this publication are available for $9 each, plus shipping and handling charges. California
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APPENDIX C
Commission for the Establishment of
Academic Content and Performance Standards
Business Plan: November 1997-August 1998
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Commission for the Establishment of
Academic Content and Performance Standards
Business Plan
November 1997-August 1998
Introduction
1.0
This business plan includes the distinct components that comprise the Academic
Standards Commission’s work between November 1997 and August 1 .1998.
During that lime the commission will develop academic content standards for
history-social science and science~ati3 rhake decisions fegardlhgpeifottnancb
standards for language artsj matnematics, history-social science and science.
Drafted in October 1997, this business plan does not reflect the commission’s
decision o f September 16,1997 to develop performance standards. Since further
discussion of performance standards is planned at the November meeting,
performance standards activities will be incorporated into the business plan
afterwards.
1.1
The business plan addresses three core questions:
* W h at is the commission’s work and “ product?”
* W hat calendar and timeline will the commission follow to ensure that its
product is completed?
* H ow will the commission ensure that it maintains a strong understanding of
how the commission is going to proceed?
The business plan includes three distinct elements:
1. This overview of the the commission’s work, including background, mission,
goals, and project status, development, and evaluation.
2. A calendar that includes key dates for meetings, product development,
evaluation, public engagement, and completion.
3. A projected budget that provides item-category information for the rest of fiscal
year 1997-98, as well as a breakdown o f major expenditures on monthly and
special project categories, such as payroll, office expenses, contractors, public
hearings, and mailing/photocopying.
B a c k g ro u n d
AB 265 was signed by Governor Wilson in October 1995 following the demise of
the California Learning Assessment System (CLAS). In the vacuum left by CLAS,
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223
a number of efforts began-including those by Senator Leroy Greene, the
Governor’s Office of Child Development and Education, the California Department
of Education, and the Joint Organizational Task Force on Assessment (including the
California School Boards Association, Association of California School
Administrators, California Federation of Teachers, California Teachers Association,
and California State PTA) that eventually coalesced behind language developed by
the Governor’s Office of Child Development and Education. All parties agreed that
among the crucial elements missing from the state’s previous assessment system
was a true alignment between what was taught in California’s classrooms and what
was tested. There was a clear need to anchor the curriculum and assessments to
strong statements of what students should know and be able to do. That anchor had
to be academic standards.
Thus the Academic Standards Commission was created. The commission was
charged with developing one product (and only one product): academ ically
rig o ro u s co n ten t sta n d a rd s a n d p erfo rm an ce sta n d a rd s to be used in
public schools for students in grades kindergarten through 12.
2.1
AB 265 (and related subsequent legislation AB 2105 and SB 430, both 1996) also
established several criteria that have guided the Commission's work to date. The
academically rigorous content and performance standards must comply with the
following criteria:
• Be measurable and objective;
• Reflect the knowledge and skills necessary for California’s work force to be
competitive in the global, information-based economy of the 21st century;
• Be comparable in rigor to academic content and performance standards used in
the school systems of America’s global economic competitors; and
• Provide the basis for assessments for kindergarten through 12th grade.
2.2
In addition to the criteria listed above, the legislation established several parameters
within which the standards had to be developed. These include:
• Developing content and performance standards in reading & writing and math
first and then develop standards for social studies and science;
• Holding at least six public hearings throughout the state to solicit public input;
• Considering the testimony provided to the State Board o f Education during its
public hearings on the State curriculum frameworks, which were held
throughout California in 1995-96. The commission must make available the
information from these hearings and provide opportunities for comment on this
information at its public hearings; and
• Submitting its recommended content and performance standards by August 1,
199S to the State Board of Education for its approval by November 1,1998.
2.3
Finally, it is helpful to acknowledge four additional environmental factors that,
given the commission’s charge, add complexity to the tasks at hand:
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• The commissioners were appointed by a number of public authorities, with the
expectation that they would represent parents, classroom teachers, and the
business community, as well as individuals with expertise in pupil assessment
or specific curriculum areas. California’s commitment to making the
development of standards a very inclusive process makes that process more
time-consuming. However, it is likely the standards recommended by the
commission to the State Board of Education for adoption will reflect the
public’s expectations for its schools.
• While a majority of states have either adopted or are in the process of
developing content standards, California is among a few states that also is
developing performance standards. Because performance standards are more
difficult to develop than content standards, the addition of this responsibility is
significant;
• The commission’s work is being carried out in a timeframe that is substantially
shorter than in other states; and
2 .4
The commission began meeting in September 1996 as an independent state
agency. The commission has the ability to hire its own staff, set its own
procedures, adopt a budget, and establish processes for conducting its
work (e.g., via committees). The commission also selects its officers.
In addition, many elements of the commission’s work are predetermined by it’s
enabling legislation, including:
• The commission's product-academ ically rigorous content and performance
standards in reading & writing, math, history-social science, and science, for all
grades, K-12.
• The criteria against which the standards are developed (Note: the commission
did establish its own supplemental criteria in December 1996, amended in
February 1997).
• The broad tim elines and processes that govern product development and
completion.
• Public engagem ent, such as the public hearings, that are integrated into the
development of the standards.
M issio n
3.0
• Produce content and performance standards that are grounded in solid research,
reflect the best of other local, state, national and international standards-setting
efforts, and provide to state policy makers the commission’s insights,
perspectives, and recommendations on next steps.
• Communicate with all who have a stake in improving education, including
students, parents, teachers, administrators, school board members, business
and community leaders, the media, public officials, and the public about the
work of the commission as the standards are developed.
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225
• Provide to the State Board o f Education insights gathered by commissioners
regarding the development o f and consequences and outcomes associated with
standards-based education and the implementation of such a system.
Goals
4.0
• Submit academically rigorous content and performance standards in history-
social science and science to the State Board of Education on August 1,1998 as
well as any final recommendations to state policy makers.
• Comply with applicable laws and regulations and the intent of the legislation
(AB 265, AB 2105, SB 430).
* Communicate the work of the commission to the public and specific
constituencies, including teachers, parents, and business.
• Staff, provide quality support to the commission, including strong fiduciary,
administrative, and content expertise.
4.1
While the basic product-content and performance standards in the prescribed,
curriculum areas-is clear, the commission’s work also is driven by an external
goal: to communicate with and engage the public in a broad discussion about
standards.
T he commission’s work is both substantive and symbolic. While standards are a
tangible product, they also represent hope for public education in California. For
too long, the broad public and educators alike have been baffled by the lack of
coherence among schools, school districts and the state, and between what is taught
and what is tested. It is difficult to ignore the broader context in which the products
o f the commission are anticipated. Public education in California needs what these
standards are designed to provide: a solid, understandable, world-class anchor for
students, teachers, families, business, the media, public officials, and all citizens so
that they can understand what students should know and be able to do in a
sequential, systematic way.
The standards developed by the commission, and ultimately recommended to the
State Board of Education, must reflect the criteria already mentioned. In addition,
by law, the content and performance standards the commission develops must be
consistent with the following definitions (from AB 265):
* Content standards means the specific academic knowledge, skills, and abilities
that all public schools in this state are expected to teach and all pupils are
expected to learn in each of the core curriculum areas, at each grade level tested.
* Performance standards are standards that define various levels of competence at
each grade level in each of the curriculum areas for which content standards are
developed. Performance standards gauge the degree to which a student has met
the content standards and the degree to which a school or school district has met
the content standards.
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5.0
Budget
The commission’s budget for fiscal year 1997-98 is $1.407 million. While staff is
providing monthly budget updates, it may be helpful to get an idea of where money is
routinely allocated:
Personnel
$47,000 per month, including exempt and civil service salaries and benefits
projected annual expenditure:
$640,000
O ffice R ent
$3,757 per month
projected annual expenditure:
$41,330
G e n e ra l O ffice E xpenses
including: travel (air/private and rental car/per diem)
meeting space
photocopying/paper
postage
telephone
$17,000
projected annual expenditure:
$204,000
C o n tra c te d Services
fiscal and legal services
$2,600 month
projected annual expenditure:
$32,000
content standards contractors (estimated)
projected annual expenditure:
$300,000
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227
Note: commissioners will find in a separate document an updated budget worksheet that
includes monthly information as well as a projection for the entire 1997-98 fiscal year. As
of November 1997, the staff projects expenditures of $1,369 million for the year (recall
that the commission budget is $1,407 million).
6.0
Project Status, Completion and Evaluation
The accompanying calendar attempts to integrate a variety of tasks and activities related to
the development of history-social science and science content standards. Previous versions
of the business plan separated distinct tasks-content standards, performance standards,
communications, and administration. This version attempts to integrate the sum o f the
commission’s work into a single timeline. A s the commission’s work evolves, staff will
attach indicators to the tasks and activities to signify progress.
Key: V completed
• to be completed
Proposed Outline of ASC Work Plan for
Historv-Social Science and Scienee
November. 1997- A ugust. 1998
Dates in bold are commission/committee meeting dates
October/November
Content Standards;
Distribute RJFPs
Receive Proposals
Evaluation Team meets and recommends contractors
Communications:
State Board of Education Public Hearings
Editorial Board meetings
November 6 Review frameworks/staff research; choose contractor
November 14 Deadline for December binder mailing
December 1 Deadline for districts to submit surveys and copies of their
district standards to ASC office
December 9 Sen. Alpert hearing on ASC (San Jose)
December 10 Direct contractor to begin base model
December 17 Deadline for January binder mailing
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January 14 Examine base model; offer policy guidance on first draft
January 21 Deadline for February binder mailing
January 26-30 Directed Community Input Meetings
Febraury 11 Examine first draft; offer revisions
February 18 Deadline for March binder mailing
March 11 Refine first draft
March 18 Deadline for April binder mailing
April 1 Approve first drafts for release
April 6 Frrst drafts mailed to public, experts for review
April 15 Deadline for May binder meeting
April 28-May 1 Public Hearings
May 6 Incorporate public input; offer guidance on second draft
May 13 Deadline for June binder mailing
May 25-29 Directed Community Input Meetings or Public Hearings
June 10 Expert Review Panel Discussion; revise second drafts
June 17 Deadline for July binder mailing
July 1 Approve final drafts
August 1 Submit Final Drafts to SBE
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229
APPENDIX D
Chronology of Key Dates
SCIENCE CHRONOLOGY
NOVEMBER, 1997
6 Commission accepts proposal from Institute for Science Education.
17 Science surveys mailed to each California school district.
DECEMBER, 1997
1 Deadline for district Science surveys.
2 Commission rescinds decision to accept proposal from Associated Scientists; reopens
RFP process.
11 Science Committee Meeting: comparison of state standards
JANUARY, 1998
14 Commission votes 12-0, with two abstentions, to direct staff to work with the group
leaders of the two proposals.
15 Science Committee Meeting: comparison of state frameworks and the National
Standards.
20 Focus group meetings in Santa Ana and Glendale
21 Focus group meeting in Stockton and Santa Rosa
22 Focus group meetings in Vallejo and Placerville
23 Focus group meetings in Yuba City and Redding
26 Focus group meeting in Moreno Valley
28 Staff meet with Drs. Brunkhorst and Metzenberg in Long Beach to discuss workplan.
28 Glenn T. Seaborg named to Commission.
FEBRUARY, 1998
2 Science Committee Meeting: discussion of format options and verbs.
10-11 Science Committee Meeting: discussion of format options and verbs.
16-18 First w riting team meeting: El Segundo. Rough draft created through work of
consultants and 27 of their colleagues.
MARCH, 1998
3 Consultants meet in Ontario to hone rough draft into the preliminary first draft.
17 Science Committee Meeting, discussion of preliminary first draft: specificity,
creationism, and content.
APRIL, 1998
1-2 Science Committee Meeting: release first draft for public comment.
6 First drafts mailed to expert reviewers and posted on web site.
20 Expert review comments deadline.
28-May 1 Public hearings on the first draft.
MAY, 1998
6 Full Commission Meeting: Science expert review panel.
6-7 Science Committee Meeting: incorporate public input. Discussion of format,
investigation strand, grade-by-grade vs. grade span, grade-level appropriateness, and
process for proceeding.
11-14 Second writing team meeting: San Francisco, Pomona, and Los Angeles.
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230
r
f 20 Science Committee Meeting: concentrations in the middle school grades. Second
draft released for public comment.
26 Second drafts mailed to expert reviewers and posted on web site.
JUNE, 1998
4 Public hearings in Sacramento and Burbank.
5 Science Committee Meeting: public hearing input.
9 Third writing team meeting: El Segundo.
22 Science Committee Meeting Conference Cali.
30 Science Committee Meeting: Science Standards Approved 8-0-1.
JULY, 1998
1 Full Commission Meeting: Science Standards Approved 16-0-2.
t
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231
APPENDIX E
Academic Standards Commission Members and Their Brief Biographies
Appointed By Name Biography
Governor Pete
Wilson
Ellen Wright Dr. Wright earned her degree in Education
and Law, and is now working as an education
consultant. She was chosen as Chair of the
Academic Standards Commission.
Governor Pete
Wilson
Joseph Carrabino Dr. Carribino earned his degree in
Production Engineering. He served on the
State Board of Education from 1986 to 1992.
Since 1957 he has served as professor of the
Anderson Graduate School of Management at
the University of California, Los Angeles.
Governor Pete
Wilson
Daniel Condron Mr. Condron earned his Master’s Degree in
Electrical Engineering. He served as the
statewide public policy coordinator for K-12
education issues and also worked as manager
for the division of public affairs for Hewlett-
Packard in Sonoma County. He was
instrumental in creating California’s first and
only work site school at Hewlett-Packard’s
facility in Santa Rosa.
Governor Pete
Wilson
John D’Amelio Mr. D’Amelio received a degree in
Communication Arts and his teaching and
counseling credentials. He taught English
from 1962 to 1988 and is now retired. He is a
trustee with the Escondido Union High
School District.
Governor Pete
Wilson
Bill Evers Dr. Evers earned his Doctoral Degree in
Political Science. He has been an adjunct
professor at Santa Clara University, a
research fellow with the Independent Institute
in Oakland, and an adjunct fellow at Auburn
University in Alabama. He is a member of a
steering committee for math reform in Palo
Alto, and is a research fellow at the Hoover
Institute.
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232
Appointed By Name Biography
Governor Pete
Wilson
Dorothy Lee
Governor Pete
Wilson
Cornell Maier
Governor Pete
Wilson
Judith Panton
Governor Pete
Wilson
Alice Petrossian
Ms. Lee earned a Bachelor’s Degree in
Business and a Master’s Degree in
Educational Administration. She was a
member of the California State Board of
Education from 1990 to 1996. She worked as
an elementary school teacher from 1959 to
1992 in Ventura Unified School District and
is now retired at Stanford University.
Mr. Maier earned his Bachelor’s Degree in
Engineering. He was chairman, president,
and chief executive officer for Kaiser
Aluminum from 1969 to 1988. He is now a
consultant for Kaiser.
Ms. Panton earned a Master’s Degree in
Education and is a licensed speech language
pathologist. She has been co-owner and
director of Del Mar Pines Elementary School
in San Diego since 1978. She is a member of
the International Reading Association and the
National Council for Teachers of
Mathematics.
Ms. Petrossian earned a Bachelor’s Degree in
Speech, with a minor in Drama, a Master’s
Degree in Administrative Services, and was
completing a doctorate in Policy and
Management. She is currently president of
the California Community College Board of
Governors. She worked as an elementary and
secondary teacher, and she has been director
of Special Projects/Intercultural Education for
the Glendale Unified School District.
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233
Appointed By Name Biography
Governor Pete
Wilson
Lawrence Siskind Mr. Siskind earned a Bachelor’s Degree in
American History and a Juris Doctorate
Degree. He is a partner at Cooper, White and
Cooper, a law firm in San Francisco. He
heads the firm’s Intellectual Property Law
Group. In 1987 he was appointed by
President Reagan as special council for
immigration-related unfair employment
practices and held the appointment under
President Bush until 1989
Governor Pete
Wilson
La Tanya Wright Ms. Wright earned an Associate of Arts
Degree in Human Resources. She writes
education columns for the local newspaper
and a national magazine. She is a home
maker and she home-schools her three
children.
Superintendent
Delaine Eastin
Robert Calfee Dr. Calfee earned his Doctorate Degree
and he is a cognitive psychologist, with
interests in the effect of schooling on the
intellectual potential of groups and of
individuals. His interests lie in the areas
of assessment of beginning literacy skills
to the school as a literate environment.
He was the Vice Chair of the Standards
Commission.
Superintendent
Delaine Eastin
Judy Codding Dr. Codding was principal of Pasadena
(California) High School and also principal
of Bronxville High School (New York).
She was also an Associate in Education at
Harvard in the Graduate School of
Education. She is now Director of the
National Alliance or Restructuring
Education.
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234
Appointed By Name Biography
Superintendent
Delaine Eastin
Linda Davis Ms. Davis earned her Bachelor’s Degree
and a Master’s Degree. She holds Lifetime
Credentials in General Elementary Standard
Supervision, and General Administration.
Ms. Davis is currently the Deputy
Superintendent for the San Francisco Unified
School District.
Superintendent
Delaine Eastin
Andrew Galef Mr. Galef is a graduate with a Bachelor’s
Degree and a Master’s Degree. He is the
Chairman of the Spectrum Group, Inc. and
has been its principal partner since it’s
formation in 1978. From 1965 to 1978 he
was founding principal of a company that
provided interim general management
services to companies with serious
financial and operation problems. Mr.
Galef resigned from the Commission in
October 1997.
Superintendent
Delaine Eastin
Raymund Parades Dr. Paredes received his Bachelor’s
Degree in English and a Ph.D. in American
Civilization. His particular area of research is
Mexican American literature and culture. He
also has served as a consultant in several
areas— English usage, matters of cultural
diversity and film projects. Dr Paredes is a
professor of English and Associate Vice
Chancellor, Academic Development at
UCLA.
Superintendent
Delaine Eastin
Larry Stupski Mr. Stupski received a Bachelor’s Degree and
his Juris Doctorate Degree. He is the
Vice Chairman of The Charles Schwab
Corporation. Prior to that he worked for
several financial services subsidiaries.
His civic focus is K-12 education, school-to-
career technology in schools in the Bay area.
Mr. Stupski resigned in October 1997.
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235
Appointed By Name Biography
Senate
Appointee
Kathleen Simpson
Assembly
Appointee
Ex Officio
Frank Ury
Delaine Eastin
Ms. Simpson is a sixth grade teacher at
Sutterville School, in the Sacramento City
Unified School District. She is a member of
the National Science Teachers Association,
the National Council of Teachers of
Mathematics, the California Council for the
Social Studies, the California Association for
the gifted, and the Sacramento City Teachers.
Mr. Ury received his Master’s Degree in
Electrical Engineering and an MBA. He
is an engineering director for the Intel
Corporation.
Ms. Eastin received a Master’s Degree in
Political Science. Her position as State
Superintendent of Public Instruction is an
elected four-year term. Before she was
elected to this position she served four terms
in the State Assembly. Being the State
Superintendent is the highest-
ranking official in California’s public
school system and Eastin is also the first
women to be elected to the position.
(iCommission for the Establishment of
Academic Content and Performance
Standards, August 18-19,1997, A124,
M44, V.19) (Appendix B)
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236
Appointed By Name Biography
Mark Ortiz No biography was listed in the original draft.
He is seventh-grade science teacher at Kings
Canyon Middle School in Fresno, California.
Ellen Moratti Executive Director of the Commission. She
previously served as chief consultant and
budget director for the Assembly Budget and
Appropriations Committees in1996.
Jerilyn Harris* Jerilyn Harris is former executive director of
the Employers Council of Mendocino County
and former chair of the Commission on
Teacher Credentialing. She taught science in
the Ukiah Unified School District for more
than 20 vears. http://www.calstrs.com
Michael Aiello* Michael Aiello works for the California
Teacher Credentialing Commission. He
has also been working on the Steering
Committee for the California Teacher
Leadership Forum. This is a project for
the Future of Teaching and Learning,
which is based in Santa Cruz. In addition, he
is Chair of San Luis Obispo High School's
Digital High School Grant
and works on the Management Team
for the school, http://www.mff.org/me
*It is assumed that both Jerilyn Harris and Michael Aiello were the replacements for
Galef and Stupski who left in October 1997, but there is nothing in the minutes or any
information from any of the interviewees that can verify this. But Harris and Aiello were
the two who stayed on the Commission until the end.
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APPENDIX F
Request for Proposals
for consulting work on
History-Social Science (Science)
The Commission for the Establishment of
Academic Content and Performance Standards
Send proposals to :
Paul J. Thallner
Commission for die Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards
[ 801 K St.. Suite 91211211 St.. Suite 600
Sacramento, CA 96814
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2 3 8
Key Information for Prospective Bidders
Notice of intent to bid
Those who plan to submit a proposal in response to this request for proposal (RFP) are
encouraged to submit a Notice of Intent to Bid (Appendix A) to the Commission by October j
l A pril 16, 1997, This notice should be submitted with any questions you might have about the j
request for proposal or contract (See below). The purpose of this notice is solely to inform die
Commission of the identity of those that plan to participate in the competitive bidding
process, and so any subsequent correspondence related to the bidding process can be
appropriately distributed. Submission of a Notice of Intent to Bid in no way obligates you to
subm it a proposal, nor does lack of a Notice of Intent to Bid prevent you from submitting a
proposal.
Asking RFP or contract questions
Questions about the request for proposal or die contract must be submitted In writing or by fax
accompanied by the name, address, and telephone number of the person submitting the
questions. To ensure that all prospective bidders have fair and equal access to information, no
substantive questions related to the request for proposals or the contract will be answered over
the telephone. Questions received by the deadline of October l April 16.1997 will be compiled, |
and w ritten responses to them will be provided to all those who have submitted a Notice of
Intent to Bid. Written responses to questions will be faxed, if possible, and mailed from the
Commission's office on or before October 12April 18, 1997. [
Questions should be dear and should include a reference to a page number in the request for
proposal where information related to the question is located. Prospective bidders are
encouraged to submit both the Notice of Intent to Bid and questions, via fax transmission, if
possible, to:
The Commission for the Establishment of Academic
Content and Performance Standards
801 KStreet. Suite 9)^1121 L St:, Suite 600 |
Sacramento, CA 95814
Attn.: Paul J. Thallner
fax. 916-324-6439
tel. 916-323-8013 (non-substantive questions only)
Ten copies of the proposal and one copy marked "master" m ust be delivered to the Commission
for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards no later than October
21May4> 1997 at 3:00 p.m. at the address given above.
Disposition of proposals
Proposals submitted in response to this RFP will not be returned to die submitters. In accordance
w ith the Public Records Act, all proposals and evaluation and scoring sheets will be made
available for public inspection at the conclusion of the scoring process.
Dgfinirifms: As used in this RFP "must" and "shall" will be considered mandatory; "may" and
"should " will be considered optional.
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Timeline & Table of Contents
TIMELINE
September IS, 1997 RFP Notice posted in California Contracts Register
October 1,1997 Notices of Intent to Bid and questions about the RFP are due
October 12,1997 Responses to bidders' questions go out
October 31,1997 Proposals due
November 15,1997 Interview date
Key information for prospective bidders.......................................................................... 2
Timeline and Table of Contents..................................................................................................................3
Part I About the Commission & Background Information......................................................4
Part II Commission's Workplan & Scope of Contractor's W ork............................................. 7
Part III Contractor Experience...................................................................................................... 10
Part IV Proposal Requirements....................................................................................................12
Part V Proposal Review Process & Selection of a Contractor..................................... 14
Part VI Proposal Evaluation C riteria...................... 17
Part VII Sample Contract................................................................................ ..19
Appendices
A. Notice of Intent to Bid..................... 30
B. Cost Sheet ...................... 31
C. Available Resources ........................................... 32
D . Schedule of Commission and Committee meetings...................................................................33
E. Relevant Sections of the California Education Code and Statutes.....................................35
Xhg„ £sim im w j ^ e m $J hg..n ght to chang? th? datt> $ an4 um^9-
The Commission reserves the right to refect any and off bids.
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PARTI
ABOUT THE COMMISSION &
BACKGROUND INFORMATION
This section of the RFP provides background information about the formation and structure of
Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards, and the
context within which the requested work will take place.
ABOUT THE COMMISSION
The Commission:
"shall develop academically rigorous content standards and performance standardsto be used in
public schools maintaining kindergarten and grades 1-12, inclusive...
O n or before October 1,1997, die commission shall have developed and submitted the
academically rigorous content standards and performance standards for all core curriculum
areas for all grade levels to the State Board of Education for approval by the board." (Section
4 of Chapter 975, Statutes of 1995, as amended by Chapter 69, Statutes of 1996, and Chapter
920, Statutes of 1996)
The Commission will first develop content and performance standards in the areas of reading,
writing and mathematics. In his moot recent State of the State address, moreover, -the-Govcmor
has requested that "reading and language standards for elementary grades" be complcted- by
this aummer. lt ioihc-mtenfrofthc Commission to present content and pctformanec standards for
K 12-iiv- km guagc Arts for submission to the State-B oard-of Education in-Qetobcr/1997. The
Commissio n therefore expects that Bio work requested here will be complcted-by-Qetober 1,
1997.— The Commission may present standards in each curriculum area to the State Board for
adoption as they are completed:
"...No later than January, 1998, the State Board of Education shall adopt statewide
academically rigorous content and performance standards, pursuant to die recommendations of
the Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards, in all
core curriculum areas to serve as die basis for assessing the academic achievement of individual
pupils and schools, school districts, and die California education system. The Board may
modify any proposed content standards or performance standards prior to adoption and may
adopt content and performance standards in individual core curriculum areas as those standards
are submitted to the Board by the Commission " (California Education Code, Section 60605)
NOTE: Include Governor's M ay Revise language which includes the deadline for history-social
science and science.
Although the law only calls for development of standards at the benchmark grades (4,8, and
10), the Commission has adopted criteria to establish standards for all grades.
Structure of the Commission
The Commission comprises 21 members as follows:
12 members appointed by Governor Pete Wilson.
6 members appointed by die Superintendent of Public Instruction.
The Superintendent of Public Instruction (SPI), or his or her designee.
1 m ember appointed by die Senate Rules Committee.
1 m ember appointed by the Speaker of the Assembly.
The Commission first convened in September, 1996, and meets at least monthly.
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241
The Commission's Content Area Committees
There is a committee lor each of the four core curriculum areas for which content and
performance standards must, according to the law, be developed: reading & writing,
| mathematics, History-Social Sciencehistory/soeial science. and science. Currently, content
area committees are scheduled to meet for one to one and a half days around the monthly full
Commission meetings. As drafts of standards are developed, committees may meet more often
and for longer periods of time.
Highlights of Commission Responsibilities
The Commission's primary responsibility is to develop academically rigorous content and
performance standards for all core curriculum areas, to be used in public schools maintaining
kindergarten and grades 1 through 12.
The Commission is also required to hold at least six public hearings throughout the state to
j solicit public input. Public hearings arc tentatively scheduled for June and September?
For the purpose of clarity and consistency in work proposed by bidders, the following statutory
definitions of critical terms are herein restated:
" 'Content standards' means the specific academic knowledge, skills and abilities that all
public schools in this state are expected to teach and all pupils expected to learn in each of the
core curriculum areas, at eaeh grade level tested..." (California Education Code §60603 (d ))
"... * Performance standards' are standards that define various levels of competence at each
grade level in each of the curriculum areas for which content standards are established.
Performance standards gauge the degree to which the student has m et the content standards
and the degree to which a school or school district has m et the content standards." (California
Education Code §60603 (h))
"...The performance standards shall be established against specific grade level benchmarks of
academic achievement for each subject area tested and shall be based on the knowledge and
skills that pupils will need in order to succeed in the information-based, global economy of the
21st century." (California Education Code §60605 (a))
BACKGROUND
The Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards
(Commission) is an important component in a comprehensive K-12 education reform effort in
California.
Following the demise of the California Learning Assessment System (CLA5) in 1994, the
legislature amended the California Education Code and replaced CLAS with a new assessment
system. Assembly Bill 265 (Chapter 975, Statutes of 1995), signed into law in October 1995, later
modified by Senate Bill 430 (Chapter 69, Statutes of 1996) in June 1996 and by Assembly Bill
2105 (Chapter 975, Statutes of 1995) in September 1996, created the California Assessment of
Academic Achievement (CAAA). The Commission is charged to create standards which will
become the basis of the CAAA. The relevant passages from the current California Education
Code along with the relevant sections of the State law can be found in Appendix E. It is
included here to offer bidders a comprehensive understanding of the current standards-based
reform initiatives and subsequent assessment development in California.
| California "Rcadirre Initiative"
j Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards Page 5936
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242
Bidders-should be aware of other important aspects of recent California education policy
initiatives. In addition to die Reading Toolelforecreport/- £ r a ^ -GhUd■ - A -Reader-(1995) and the
subsequen t Reading Program Advisory; - Teaching Reading! — A Balanced, Comprehensive
Approach to Teaching Reading in Prckindcrgartcn Theougk -Grade-Three (1096), q major
legislative commitment-has culminated in a $1 billion oomprehcnaivc- atrategy-io reform
rcading-instruction in GflBfem ia's public school# class sige reduction, adoption of core reading
instruetienal materuds/prs viaion of inscrviee training for-practicing teaehcro, preparation of
new teachers in research- based instructional practices/provision- of-highquQlity reading
material for eve r y child; and leadership training for school board members,, teachers? and
adm inistrators?
In addition; a new Language- Arte-eurrieulumframcwork, which must ultimately align with the
content- and performance otandards-thc State Board of Education is slated to a dopt late in 1097,
is oiso being dcvclopcdr-Thcncw curriculum framework-wili provide guidance to school
districts as they design ee tirses, curricula; and delivery systems.- (See Appendix - Cr^'- Available
Resources" for mere information)
When draftingthc eontcnt and performance standards for History-Social Science
(Science!*coding & ■ writing, bidders must lakeinto account Teaching Reading;—/I Balanced,
Comprehensive Approach to Teaching ■ Resdmg-m Prckindcrgarten Through Grade Three {1906)
(this document will-bc sent to prospectivebiddersra s - they request it). This policy document
was devefoped-b y th e State Supcrintcndcnt- ofPublic Instruction; the Stotc-B oard-of-Edueation;
and die California Commission on Teacher Crcdentialing.- It was adopted-by-thc Commission
os a policy guideline en-Febfuary 12,1907.
Bidders1 must also take into account the poiiey- dircction and guidance set forth in- recent
9tatutcfr/- including - the following!
* Assembly Bill 170 (Chapter 765rStattttes of - 1995) and Assembly Bill 1501 (Chapter
764; Statutes of - 1995),-known - as-the— ABC bills/' rcquife-the-State- Board of Education
to ensure - that adopted reading inatruetionaFmaierials are based on fundamental
reading skills;-inektding systematic-explicit phonics and spelling,-and thot' adopted
language arts mstructional-materials include- opellmg instruction;
* Assembly BiH 3182 (Chaptcr l96/ Statutes o H 9% )- provtdes funds to districts for- (l)
traming practicing K 3-tcaehcrs in the eiemcnts-of an effective, comprehensive,
research based reading program and (2) the purehase-ef- a complete set of core reading
materials for every student in- grades K 3. -Sueh training - and-matcrials - must-be - based
on the fundamentabskills requiredin- reading/including- systematic; explicit phonies
and spcllmg;-and phonemic awareness.
* Assembly BiH-3Q 75 (Chapter 921, Statutes of 19%) requires intensive training in
beginning reading as a rcquirement-for earning a teaching credential.
* ■ Assembly-BiB4- 17B (Chapter 919/Statutcs of-1096) requires- teacher candidatea to
pass a reading instruetfoncompetenec assessment (currently under devclopmcnfrby-the
Commission on Teacher Credontialing) prior to receiving-their Multiple 6ubjcct
Teaching Credentials:
* Senate Bill 1568-(€haptCf 4068, Statutes - of 1996) requires -the Commission-on - Teaeher
Crcdentialing to establish standards for a -rcstfieted-reading-certificate and-would
authorize the commission to isoue-a restricted-reading certificate to holders of a
teaching eredcntktiwho roeei- tirc-eommigsten's s t andards.
Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards Page 6934 J
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PART II
COMMISSION'S WORK TO DATE AND SCOPE OF CONTRACTOR'S
WORK
The Commission has determined that its best approach to developing rigorous content and
performance standards is by building on the growing body of standards documents from around
the country as well as the curriculum and standards in other high-achieving countries. The
Commission's first step was to adopt a set of criteria for judging standards (see page 9). The
Commission then asked consultants to facilitate an exercise to help the Commission's
committee members team how to critically review standards. The Comirassien-thcn hired
standards specialists-to-judge several sets of extant 12th-grade (orhigh-sehool-exit) standards
against the Commission's criteria. The resulting docum ent is a matrix 'analysis that identifies
strengths weaknesses of these standards. The Commissioners reviewed them with flu;
eonfraetofs in order to - Ieam how to appreciate and evaluate those strengths an d-wcaknesses.
Currently; the Commission's Reading & Writing Committee, with the assistance of a
consultant, is reviewing various sets of K 12 language-arto 'Standards, evaluating them against
the Commission's criteria, dio cussing the merits and shortcomings ef - each one, and, establishing
a "basem odcl.".
The Commission has decided to enlist the help of a qualified contractor to assist the
I
committees with the important work of drafting content and performance standards in H istory-
Social Science (Sciescelrcading-fe-writmg. The competitive bidding process this RFP initiates
represents the Commission's intent to find the most qualified standards specialist to perform
the work described herein. The following sections will describe the scope of work the
contractor, if chosen, would be expected to perform and the information the bidders will need to
submit in order to be considered for this contract
The w ork the contractor will be expected to perform can be divided into three components:
facilitation, consultation, and drafting which will occur simultaneously for the duration of the
contract. We envision three phases of the project, reviewed below:
Phase I:
I
The goal of phase one is to have a draft set of K-12 content standards - as-quickly as possible.
The contractor will work efficiently under the pressures of time with the committee's direction
to produce first a draft set content standards for every grade, K through 12. The contractor shall
facilitate work sessions during which Commissioners will select, edit, and discuss content
standards. The contractor will focus the Commissioners in thinking about how standards meet
the Commission's criteria and help them evaluate and rewrite standards to develop their own
| docum ent The contractor will attend Commission and History-Social Science fSrienceM teading
j fe-Wfiting-Committee meetings to assist the Commissioners in thinking about how standards
being discussed meet the Commission's criteria.
Later, the contractor m ust work with the committee to develop performance standards as
directed by the committee.in a similar manner as described above;
NOTE: Commission decisions regarding performance standards/levels on August 19
will clarify the necessary language here. ___________________________________
The contractor will take policy guidance from the Commission and Committee and write the
standards, and include them in a regular report (at least one week prior to each meeting) to the
Executive Director to be distributed to the Commissioners.
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2 4 4
Because some preliminary analysis of-existin g 12th - grade (or-school leaving) otandardo and the
developm ent of-the "base modcl^-have-already-becn dene-for the Commiooion/biddets will
necd-tedraw from ; and build upon that work.- (Thio lofge doeum ent wtH- bc provided to
prospective bidders, as-thcy request it.)
Phase II:
The goal of phase two is to consider and incorporate thoughts and suggestions (with direction
from the Commission and the History-Social Science (Science)Rcading & Writing Committee) |
from teachers, parents, students, interest groups, Commission staff, and others. Once the
Commission begins to work with its own set of standards, it will release drafts for public
comment. The Commission expects the contractor's role to expand, but not be limited to
attending public hearings, consolidating public reaction to the standards, rewriting standards,
and advising Commissioners and staff as they prepare to present the drafts to various
organizations and content areareadmg/wgtting experts. |
So they m ay capture the essence of the discussions, bidders m ust be available for all of the
scheduled History-Social Science (ScieneelReading & Writing committee and full Commission |
meetings (See Appendix D for a schedule of meetings), for the duration of the contract. Bidders
shall be available for regular, periodic consultation via telephone a n d /o r facsimile with the
Commission's Chair, the Commission's staff, and committee chairs. The Commission estimates
that the contractor will work about ten daya of each of the months May-through September,
19977-in Sacramento, California, as follows:
• to meet with Commission staff on each of the days before and after Commission meetings
• to attend each of the committee meetings as well as Commission meetings in order to
incorporate Commissioners' input into subsequent drafts.
• to attend public hearings (dates to be established)
• to attend the State Board of Education meeting scheduled for-October, 1997
The contractor will deliver tegular progress reports and work product as directed by the Project
Manager. Progress reports will summarize and explain any changes made to previous drafts.
The contractor will produce a final draft of content and performance standards and a final
narrative report of the project
Phase III.
The goal of phase three is to complete the final draft of standards and present it to the State
Board of Education.
The bidder will produce a final draft of the content and performance standards document,
incorporating all suggestions approved by the History-Social Science (Science)Reodmg &
Writin g Committee, and to deliver copies of the final drafts directed by the Project Manager by
the date specified in the contract to the Commission. If the Commission makes subsequent
revisions, the contractor will need to revise the final draft to reflect those changes prior to
submission to the State Board of Education.
The contractor will submit with the final draft a report that summarizes the contractor's work
and makes recommendations for implementation of the standards. The report will contain a
comprehensive description of the operational features of the standards and any suggestions the
contractor may have as to how the standards can be utilized by the State in preparation for
assessment development. The report will also describe how the committees arrived at a
consensus on the standards contained in the final draft and other items required by the Project
Manager.
Commission fo r the Establishment o f Academic Content and Performance Standards Page 8
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2 4 5
Criteria for Standards: •
The following criteria, forjudging the efficacy of the standards to be developed, were formally
approved and adopted by the Commission. Therefore, any draft standards developed for this
proposal m ust meet those criteria.
CRITERIA ADOPTED ON DECEMBER 12,1996
as amended on February 12,1997
1. Standards should define measurable academic content knowledge and skills.
2. Standards should be high for all students and reflect academically rigorous
content and performance necessary for California's pupils to be comparable to
fee best in the world.
3. Standards should be useful, developing what is needed for employment,
citizenship, and lifelong learning.
4. Standards should specify a common academic core for all students at every
grade level
5. Standards should be clearly written, and understandable by teachers, parents,
students, and fee general public.
6. Standards should be specific and focused on w hat is most essential for what
students are to learn and manageable for schools given the constraints of time.
7. Standards must be linked to m ultiple performance levels with fee clear goal
feat all students will meet high standards.
8. Standards should include assessment items and examples of student work to
illustrate performance levels - "how good is good enough."_________________
Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards Page 9
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2 4 6
PART III
CONTRACTOR EXPERIENCE
O verall Experience
components of the project shall demonstrate each have had at leaffrfottf-gonflegufevcyears of
recent professional-prior experience in developing, writing, critiquing, a n d /or implementing
content and performance standards for communities, cities, an d /o r states. Contractor is defined
as die project director and other personnel, including subcontractors, responsible for key
The extent and appropriateness of such experience must be described by the bidder in thethei*
response. The evaluation team will not review proposals by bidders who do not meet this
m inimum criterisna-.
Content Area Expertise
Members of the project team must h ave significant knowledge of History-Social Science
(Science). Bidders must explain how fam iliar each team member is with each specific
area/discipline of of H istory-Social Science (Science) Conversely, bidders must describe how
they plan on providing expertise in any areas of ofHistory-Social Science/Science) w ith
which team members are less fam iliar,-Expertise, a relative term, is defined as teaching
experience, study of the subject fmcluding degrees earned), work experience in which of
History-Social Science (Science) was a component of the job, etc.
Standards Analysis an d /o r Writing Experience
Bidders m ust describe their experience analyzing and/or writing academic content and
performance standards. All such experience should be described regardless of the occupational
field for which the work was performed. Analysis of academic content and performance
standards against given criteria should be highlighted. A summary of each relevant project
shall be provided, and m ust include:
• examples of standards analyses an d /o r standards the bidder has written;
• the name and the current position, address, and telephone number of the contact
organization's project manager or other key project officers) who can provide specific
and objective information about the bidder's performance and work products; and
• where applicable, the names of any members of die bidder's proposed management
team, andproject-staff staff-who werc- mvolvcd in the project, and subcontractors who
were involved in die project as well as a description of their roles and responsibilities
in die project.
C o n s e n s u s F a c ilita to r :
The Commission is particularly interested in selecting a contractor who can demonstrate
I with state and local groups on reaching
As stated above, the Commission expects the
contractor to facilitate consensus ina+work sessions at which Commissioners wiU developseteet.
discuss, and edit content and performance standards. Bidders m ust describe relevant experience
they a n d /o r their subcontractors have with working group meetings at which reaching
consensus on standards-was the goal. Bidders will highlight such stteeesoful meetings and
illustrate lessons learned from-challenges that they may1 have encountered.
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2 4 7
Constituent Relations:
Bidders m ust describe experience they and/or any subcontractors have had in working with
commissions, public committees, school boards, community groups, government agencies, school
districts, groups of parents, groups of students or any other bodies in the process of setting
academic standards. Bidders' propooab-shall^provide-no-morc than five examples of bidder's
successful leadership in shaping/focusing the standards centered debate, countering
mtseoneeptiono - about standards and-thc standards setting proeess, -*etaying the message of
standards to the above mentioned groups:
Management and Staffing Plan
The bidder m ust present a plan in the proposal for managing and staffing all project work. This
m ust include work to be performed by the bidder as well as work that would be performed by
any subcontractors. The management and staffing plan m ust include:
• a paragraph on each of fe t-of the kev~project personnel which mcludesan d their
areas of responsibility and what their precise roles will be.
• the percent of full-time equivalency for each position
• verification o f the qualifications of each projoet staff person v w -refltgnco and brief
narratives linking cxpcrtisc (including subject area expertise,-where-apphcablc) and
prior experience to corresponding project taoka
• an organization chart for the project showing the relationships and lines of authority
among the bidder, its employees, and proposed subcontractors (if any )^-and-among
projccfrmanagemcntand staff
• a description of how subcontracted work, if any, would be, monitored, and evaluated;
and
• If the bidder proposes any subcontractors; the bidder m ust include verification of each
staff person and the-subcontractors' qualifications via resumes and brief narratives
linking theix subcontractors'- expertise (including subject area expertise, where
applicable) and experience to corresponding project tasks. A letter of commitment to
be included in the proposal, as well as a discussion of how and w hy the
subcontractor(s) was selected.
The M /W /DVBE participation goals will not be applied to this contract.
j Commission for the Establishment o f Academic Content and Performance Standards Page IJ934
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2 4 8
PART IV
PROPOSAL REQUIREMENTS
Ten copies of a proposal and one copy marked "master" m ust be delivered by 3:00 p.m. on October J
2iM*y4> 1997, to: |
The Commission for the Establishment of Academic
Content and Performance Standards
1121L St., Suite 600
Sacramento,, CA 95814
Attn.: Paul J. Thallner
A proposal m ust be organized as described below. Proposals that are not organized as described
will be deemed non-responsive and will not be evaluated. These format specifications are
intended to facilitate the evaluation of proposals. Bidders should provide the information
required in a concise manner, without superfluous elaboration or redundancy. Sufficient detail
should be included, however, to indicate (a) that the bidder understands the issues associated
with the services and products to be provided and (b) how fee bidder plans to accomplish each
project task.
NOTE:
• Do not attach pamphlets, letters of support (except from any proposed subcontractor) or other
items which are not specifically requested.
• Prospective bidders must submit their proposals on standard 8 1 /2 " x 11" white paper using 12
point font (preferably Courier).
• Proposals shall be bound (clear, vinyl, or heavy stock covers are optional) so feat, when
opened, fee proposals Ue flat.
1. A Cover Page that includes fee name of fee bidder and a reference that the proposal is
in response toRFP#97LA01. An appropriate signature on the cover page m ust show that |
the person signing the proposal is authorized to bind fee vendor.
2. A Table of Contents must outline the sections of fee proposal, and should indicate by
page number fee location of each section.
3. An Introduction must demonstrate fee bidder's understanding of fee context of the work
to be performed as described in Parts I and II of this RFP and substantial understanding
of the nuances of education reform, particularly standards-setting in fee United States.
4. A Staffing Plan section of the proposal m ust provide the information requested in Part
III of this RFP
5. A Contractor Experience section of fee proposal m ust provide fee information related to
experience requested in Part HI of this RFP.
6- A SEALED BID containing a budget sectionBudgct section. Bidders will submit fee |
following information to the Commission on fee enclosed Cost Sheet (appendix B):
• fee total estimated number of consulting days needed to complete fee consulting
component of fee work to be performed. Include also, fee cost per consulting day. A
consulting day is defined as one eight hour period of work directly related to fee
project performed by an individual.
• fee total estimated number of consulting days needed to complete fee drafting
component of fee work to be performed. Include also, fee cost per consulting day.
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2 4 9
• the total estimated num ber of consulting days needed to complete the facilitation
component of the work to be performed. Include also, the cost per consulting day.
Example
Description of Work Estimated Number of
Consulting Days
Cost per Consulting
D ay
Total
Consultation 10 500 5,000
Drafting 10 500 5,000
Facilitation 25 500 12,500
Total 22,500
7. A Technical Information section should include the following:
• the names, addresses, and telephone numbers of individuals who are authorized to
discuss the terms of the contract for the bidder.
■ a statement, initialed by-the-bidderrsfatm g the following!
“[vendor name] agrees to take into account the policy direction and guidance set forth
in Tcaching-Readingi A Balanced/ Comprchettsive-Approack -te -Teaching ' Reading in
Prckindergarten-Zhrottgh-Grade- Three (1096)“
• on statement, initiolcd-by the bidder - stating the following*
^{vender - name] agfee»to -take mto g K ^ u M -thepeUcy-directionand - guidonce setforth
in reeent-statutcs including those listed on page 6 of RFP #97LAQ1."
NOTE: Invoices for work performed and costs incurred in the performance of the contract can be
submitted as frequently as monthly. Payments to the contractor will not be m ade in advance of
services rendered. As required by State Administrative Regulations, die Commission shall
withhold 10 percent of the amount of any invoice pending satisfactory completion of the entire
contract. The invoicing schedule m ust include a final invoice which will include the amounts
withheld from previous invoices.
NOTE: A Small Business Preference is available to any bidder that is a qualified small
business with an approved certification form (OSMB 11) on file with the California
Department of General Services, Office of Small and Minority Business (OSMB) as of the date
of the release of this RFP. Any bidder who wishes to claim the small business preference must,
in the Budget section of the proposal, (a) state that the bidder is a qualified small business and
is claiming the small business preference, and (b) include a copy of the certification approval
letter from the OSMB.
} Commission for the Establishment o f Academic Content and Performance Standards Page 139M
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2 5 0
PART V
PROPOSAL REVIEW PROCESS AND SELECTION OF A CONTRACTOR
Each proposal will be evaluated to determine its responsiveness to the needs erf the Commission
as described in this RFP. The Commission reserves the right to reject any or all proposals. The
Commission is not required to award a contract i t in the judgment of die Commission, no
acceptable proposals have been submitted. Proposals received after October 31May-4- 1997,
will be rejected. If any contract is awarded, it will be the result of a vote by the Commission
and w ill be awarded to the most responsive bidder with lowest cost.the 'highest-total pnmtn.
TheProposal Review Process
The Commission will use the prim ary or two-tiersccondarv or-pomi count method for
evaluating proposals and awarding a contract as described in die Public Contract Code Section
10377(c)'and the State Contracting Manual. After the time and date shown on the timeline, the
proposals will be evaluated as follows:
Commission staff will determine the compliance of each proposal with the Compliance with
Proposal Requirements (page 16). Proposals that do not comply with all of these criteria will
be eliminated from further consideration.
Each remaining proposal will be independently reviewed and rated by the Evaluation Team on
the basis of the Proposal Evaluation Criteria (pages 17-18). Evaluation Team members will be
from California state agencies. Members of die Evaluation Team will meet for an orientation
and training session to review the evaluation criteria and agree on how to apply them
consistently during the evaluation process. Each proposal will be independently read and
Evaluation Team. The Evaluation Team
will discuss the strengths and weaknesses of each proposal, scoringw eighing each part of the
proposal according toag am st the corresponding evaluation criteria.
Proposals which receive 81 percent or more of the total possible points will be invited to
participate in an oral interview w ith the evaluation team.. The interview will be worth 10
points. Bidders who receive 91 percent or more points will have their sealed bids opened on
All bidders will be notified of their score and-w hether thcif-proposal received the highest
overall score. A representative from the Evaluation Team will recommend to the Commission
at its May-meeting in Sacramento that a contract be awarded to the bidder whose responsive
proposal best meets the evaluation criteria. The Commission will decide w hether or not to
aw ard a contract. (The Commission has authorized staff to release this RFP and expects to
aw ard a contract as described in this RFP.)
Announcement of Recommended Contractor and Protest Procedures
An announcement of the bidder to be recommended for the contract as a result of the proposal
review process will be posted for five full business days beginning the next business day after
Commission meeting at which the vote took place, at:
The Commission for the Establishment of Academic
Content and Performance Standards
801 K St.. Suite 9 l2H 3i-k - St: Suite 600
Sacramento, CA 95814
The Commission expects to decide on the award of a contract at its-May 7,1997, meeting, but the
Commission's vote, if any, shall not be considered official notification to any bidder that a
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contract has been awarded. If, prior to the award of the contract, any bidder files a protest
w ith the Department of General Services against the award of the contract, the contract shall
not be awarded until either the protest has been withdrawn or the Department o f General
Services has decided the matter. Within five days after filing a protest, the protesting bidder
m ust file with the Department of General Services a full and complete w ritten statement
specifying the grounds for the protest.
Departm ent of General Services - Office of Legal Services
1325 J Street, 19th floor
Sacramento, CA 95814
fax. 916-327-3918
The Commission for the Establishment of Academic Content and Performance Standards
| 801 K St.. Suite 9121 -151 L Street. Suite 600
Sacramento, CA 95814
fax. 916-324-6439
| Commission for the Establishment o f Academic Content and Performance Standards Page 1593-6
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Compliance with Proposal Requirements
The Commission staff will verify whether or not each of the following criteria is met by
checking "yes" or "no" in the appropriate space. Proposals lacking one or more of the following .
requirements will not be evaluated further.
VENDOR NAME:
Ves
Yes
Yes No An appropriate signature on the cover page shows that the
The
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Commission for the Establishment o f Academic Content and Performance Standards Page 16934 |
person signing h e proposal is authorized to bind the vendor
proposal has h e following required elements as described in Part IV of h e RFP:
N o Cover page
No _____ Table of Contents
No _____ Introduction
No _____ Staffing Plan
No _____ Contractor Experience Section
N o _____ Budget Section
No ___ Technical information
N o Proposal was received cm or before 3:00 p.m. on October 31.1997
May 1,1097, at h e offices of the Commission for h e
Establishment of Academic Content and Performance
K tandais^ J F ■ ■ 1
irorflal and
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PART VI
Proposal evaluation criteria
Total Possible Points: 10035
Overall experience (Pass/Fail);
The prospective contractor's project direeter-and other personnel responsible for key analytical
eomponentoef the projcet-shall-eaeh have had ot leost four eonsceutive-yearo of recent
professional experience in developing, writogrevaluating; or implementing content and
performance standards'for eommunitiea, cities, an d /o r atatc»r:R w Evaluation- Tcam will not
consider bidders whohavcTcss than four conoceutivc years of experience as mentioned above.
Biddero agree to take into account Tcaching--Reading:- A-Balaneed,-Comprehensive' Approach to
Teaching-Reading in PrekindergartcH Through Grade Three (1996) ond have- jftitialed a
statement to that effect - in -their proposals.
Bidders agree-to take into aecetm t- the-poliey - direction and guidance sct-forth-inrF eccnt statutes
including those listed on page 6 of thio-RFP-and - have initialed a - statement to that effect in
1. Introduction (53-Points maximum)
Proposals will include a clearly written introduction that demonstrates the bidder's
understanding ot the central issues in die scope of work and which summarizes why the bidder
believes die Commission should award iLh im /h cr the contract. The Evaluation Team will
award points to bidders who understand-the-eentext- of-the- work to be performed as described in
Parte-l-artd H of this RFP and who clearly demonstrate their knowledge and expertise, as well
as the innovative ways they might approach the work as described in parts I and II of this
RFP. demonstrate substantial understanding of the political and practical issues in the
nuanced world of education reform; parliculariy-etandards-scttin g in - the United States.-
| 2. Contractor Experience (50t8-points maximum; total of the following fourth ree subcategories)
The Evaluation Team will judge contractor experience in the following categories:
• Content Area Expertise (15 points maximum)
Proposals must include explanations of how familiar each team member is with each
specific area/discipline of Science (Historv-Social Science) as described in Part III of this
RPP. Conversely, proposals must include descriptions of how the bidder intends to provide
expertise in any area/discipline of Science (History-Social Science) with which team
memberfsV areiess familiar.
* Standards analysis and/ot w riting: Q59-Points maximum)
Proposals m ust include summaries (approximately 500 words or about 2 typed pages) for
each of the bidder's experiences analyzing an d /o r writing academic content and
performance standards. The summaries m ust include any relevant information that would
describe the context in which the standards were analyzed a n d /o r written. The summaries
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2 5 4
shall include the information requested in Section El of this RFP. If applicable, the bidder
will demonstrate that a set of criteria was used in the evaluation/writing of the standards.
The bidder will include examples of standards analyses an d /o r standards the bidder has
written. The Evaluation Team will consider the quality of the standards/ analysis based
on the criteria the bidder used or the Commission's criteria, whichever is more rigorous.
Constituent Relations: (!Q4rPoints maximum)
Proposals must include n o-morc than five examples of the bidder's a n d /o r subcontractors'
experience working with commissions, public committees, school boards, government
agencies, school districts, groups of parents, groups of students, or any other entities in the
process of setting academic standards. The Evaluation Team will award more points to
experience with a variety of the above mentioned groups^-by p roviding evidence of
leadership in shaping/foeusing the standards centereddebate, countering misconceptions
about otandardo-and-the standards setting-process; and relaying-the meogage- of ■ standards to
the above- mentioned groups.
• Consensus facilitation: (IflS-Points maximum) |
Proposals m ust include descriptions of the bidder's experience facilitating workgroup
meetings as described in Part HI of this RFP. The Evaluation Team will award the most
points to the bidder who has the most experience successfully facilitating consensus at
workgroup meeting&.-at which- agreement on-standards was the goal. |
3. Staffing Plan (3g-3-Points maximum) |
Proposals m ust include the information specified in Part III of this RFP. The proposal m ust
include resumes of current staff and subcontractors who will be working on this project and a
description of each person's specific role in the prefect including subject area expertise, where I
ap p licab le If subcontractors are to be used, a letter from each subcontractor stating his or her |
intent to work on this project shall be included in the proposal. The Evaluation Team will
award more points to the bidder whose staffing plan most logically and efficiently allocates
the most qualified and capable personnel resources to the Commission's project.
4. Budget; (11 Points maxumanh-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Preposals- must-inelude a budget seetion-as deseribed -in Part IV of this RFP. -The-Evaluaiion
Team-wili award the maximum points to the proposal w ith the lowest cosh -Other biddcfs-w*H
receive points in accordance w ith'the following model!
{Lowes t- Cos t Ri d » - Current Bid Coat) x Maximum Points - Points
Example:
Maximum of 10 points
Vendor A proposcs-thc k>wesfreosf r - at$4000
Vendor B- propeses-a-eost-ef-^lSO O
Vendor G proposes & cost of $1100
In this example; each vendor will receive the following points;
($4009~ < - $100Q )- - x -lQ - 10 points_____________________
Commission fo r the Establishment o f Academic Content and Performance Standards Page \
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
Vendof-ft-
($1000 I SI500) X 10 - f e .67 points
Vendor C:
($1000 ' $1406)-x-10 —7d4 points
Commission for the Establishment o f Academic Content and Performance Standards Page 1 9 £34
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
Part VII
SAMPLE CONTRACT
The contract that will be awarded follows this page.
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APPENDIX G
2 5 7
STATEMENTS from NATIONAL SCIENTIFIC SOCIETIES, THEIR
OFFICERS, OR THEIR COMMITTEE CHAIRS
on
PROPOSED CALIFORNIA SCIENCE CONTENT STANDARDS
• American Chemical Society. Official policy statement o f the society from
the President.
• American Physical Society. Statement o f the President.
• American Association for the Advancement of Science — a society with 300
affiliated organizations. Statement from Director ofProject 2061, carrying
the authority o f the President.
• National Academy of Sciences. Statement o f the President.
• American Astronomical Society. Statement o f Chair ofAstronomy
Education Board.
• American Geological Institute — a federation of 32 professional and
scientific societies. Statement ofDirector ofEducation at direction o f CEO.
• American Society for Cell Biology. Statement o f the President, the Chair o f
the Education Committee, and the Chair o f the Public Policy Committee.
• American Vacuum Society. Statement o f the President.
• Acoustical Society of America. Statement o f the President.
• Microscopy Society of America. Statement o f the Chair o f the Public
Policy Committee, written on authorization o f the President
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2 5 8
THE PROPOSED CALIFORNIA SCIENCE CONTENT STANDARDS
Statement by Andrew M. Sessler, President of the American Physical Society
The American Physical Society, as one of die leading scientific societies in the nation, with more
than 40,000 members, has followed the evolution of the California Science Content Standards
with great interest, and has expressed its concern about the path this evolution has taken.
Notwithstanding the assertion that the proposed standards are "world class", my colleagues and I
view these standards as currently written to be seriously flawed and in need of major revision.
This revision is absolutely necessary in our view and in the view of more than 10 major scientific
societies representing the scientific community, if science education in California is to achieve
its goal of preparing students for the next century.
We do not call lightly for a major revision at this relatively late date. I have expressed our
concerns about previous drafts of the standards, but there is no evidence that our concerns were
addressed. If anything, the document as it evolved moved even further in a direction that we
consider to be ill-suited to the needs of students. Moreover, it is incumbent upon us to state our
objections publicly because the opinions of a few scientists who have strongly backed this
document have been portrayed as the views of the scientific community. They are not.
The proposed standards are overstuffed. There is a strong bent toward including every aspect of
a subject, often in a level of factual detail well in excess of either the needs or the interests of
students. This is likely to dampen students' enthusiasm for and appreciation of science - a
serious problem for a document that is intended to guide science education for all students in
grades K-12. Whereas some students might pursue some science topics to the level of detail
proposed by the standards, there simply is not enough time for even the best students to meet all
of the standards unless the subject matter is covered in only a superficial manner. We believe
that high quality science education should allow students to gain important scientific concepts
along with an appropriate amount of factual knowledge.
Two national consensus documents have been at the core of science education reform for the past
few years. These documents - Benchmarks fo r Science Literacy, developed by the AAAS, and
National Science Education Standards, developed under the leadership of the National Research
Council -- represent years of work by thousands of leading scientists and educators. Both
documents demand that the understanding of scientific concepts, not the simple recall of facts, be
the goal. Both documents make a very conscious effort to reduce the total amount of content in
order that students have time to develop mastery of the most important concepts. The
importance of this approach has been reinforced by the results of the Third International
Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS), a massive study of science education in more than 40
countries. This study found that science and mathematics courses in the US cover far more
topics with fir less time per topic than curricula in other countries, and that the achievement of
US students in these subjects is comparatively very weak.
This draft of the California Science Content Standards moves in exactly the opposite direction
from the national consensus represented by those documents. More content has been added since
the previous draft, which itself was overloaded. The high-schoo! chemistry standards are a
painful example. Reading through the eleven major headings, one is appalled at the thought that
this huge breadth of material will be the minimum course coverage for a single year. A course
covering this much material would be far more appropriate for science majors at research
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universities.
The amount of detail is only one part of the issue. The larger problem is that these proposed
standards place too much stress on just knowing facts, and leave little or no time for
understanding concepts and acquiring scientific habits of thinking. Of course, one must know
facts in order to gain understanding, because otherwise there is nothing to understand. But both
common sense and modem educational theory tell us that students, when asked to memorize
disconnected facts without truly understanding them, quickly lose interest in the subject If these
standards are adopted, they may turn a whole generation of California students away from
careers or even an interest in science.
These standards also ignore the needs of the much larger numbers of students who will not
pursue careers in science, yet who must become scientifically literate in order to function
effectively in modem society. Children who are trained just to accept and memorize facts tend to
grow up without the ability to question and analyze what, as adults, they read or are told. Also,
these standards fail to recognize that all students need to learn how to relate science and
technology to other aspects of the world in which they live and to issues on which they will be
required to vote. Nowhere in these standards can one find any mention of scientific issues in
society or the history of science. Once again, the big picture suffers because of the focus on
details.
The proposed standards also ignore what is known about the cognitive development of children.
For example, the atomic nature of matter and the periodic table are introduced in the third grade.
These concepts involve significant abstractions well beyond the recognized cognitive abilities of
such young children. Content that is widely regarded by the cognitive research community as
developmentally inappropriate has been included in lower grades in a false pursuit of rigor and
high expectations. It is especially ironic that in a document that is intended to be a guide to
exemplary instruction in science, an important body of scientific knowledge seems to play no
role.
For all of these reasons, and for others that are too lengthy to discuss here, I and my colleagues at
the American Physical Society view the proposed standards as counteiproductive to science
education in California and the counby as a whole. Thus we join with our fellow scientific
societies in calling for a major revision of the standards.
Specifically, we propose that the revision be coordinated by a group of eminent California-based
scientists to be known as the Scientists' Standards Panel. This group, whose names and
credentials we have attached, could lead a revision that would remedy the defects of the proposed
standards and be ready in time for the November deadline set by the legislature. This group
would fairly represent the views of the scientific community, and would produce a document that
could indeed serve as a model for the nation.
Attachments:
1) Detailed Critique of Proposed California Science Content Standards
2) Synopsis of Plan for Revising the California Science Content Standards
Submitted to California State Board o f Education, September S, 1998
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.260
3 - 8 - 3 8 : 3-10AM :
301 209 0863:* 2/ 3
SENT BV:
Am e r ic a n a s s o c ia t io n f o r t h e
A d v a n c e m e n t o f Sc ie n c e
1333 H Street. NW
R 0 . B m 3 4 4 4 6
Washington. 0C 20005
PROJECT 20S 1
SCIENCE LITERACY FOR A CHANGING FUTURE
To 1:202 326 6666
fax: 202 642 5196
in te r n a l: e ro ject2 0 6 ieM a 3 .o rg
September 3,1998
Mrs. Yvonne Larsen
President
California State Board of Education
721 Capitol M all
P.O. Box 944272
Sacramento, CA 94244-2720
Dear Mrs. Larsen:
For erne hundred and fifty years the American Association for the Advancement of Science has
worked to advance science. Beginning with 461 founding members, AAAS now enrolls over 300
affiliated organizations and 140,000 scientists, engineers, science educators, policymakers, and
others interested in science and technology who live and work in the United States and in many
other countries throughout the world. The goals of the organization encompass foe purposes of
“...furthering the work of scientists, facilitating cooperation among them, fostering scientific
freedom and responsibility, improving the effectiveness of science in foe promotion of human
welfare, advancing education in science, and increasing foe public understanding and
appreciation of the methods of science in human progress."
AAAS has been continually engaged in elementary and secondary education since 1955. Starting
in foe Sputnik era, foe Association has developed a large array of publications and projects to
advance science literacy in foe nation. In 19*5, Project 2061 was initiated by foe AAAS Board of
Directors as a long-term effort to reform science education, with foe goal that someday every
student who graduates from high school will be science literate-foat is, know a core of facts and
principles and be able to apply them. Project 2061 is developing an integrated set of tools for
educators to use in improving curriculum materials, assessments, teaching, and.other components
of the education system. The first two fools are most relevant to foe Issue at hand, the
development of foe California Science Standards. Science for Alt Americans (1989) defines adult
literacy in natural and social science, mathematics, and technology. Benchmarks for Science
Literacy (1993) suggests a coherent set of specific learning goals for students as they progress
towards science literacy. (The content standards in foe National Research Council's National
Science Education Standards are consistent with the scope, level and intent of foe Benchmarks.)
The most recent description of all foe tools in foe current set can be found in the enclosed
information packet.
With that background, we would like to comment briefly on the latest proposed California
Science Standards. Our intern is to provide constructive criticism, fully recognizing that the
ultimate responsibility for education of young people in California is yours. Our common goal is
foe best science education that can be provided for all Californians. The comments will reflect our
input on the first two drafts, which 1 believe you have seen. In general, we consider the current
version a scant improvement over the previous document. Two specific points are made below.
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SENT BY:
9 - 8-98 : 9 : 11A M
301 209 0865'.s 3> 3
1. The proposed standards sailer from excesses. Based on a comparison of the standards
addressing the structure of matter with Benchmarks, half of die proposed standards are beyond
the scope of basic literacy, many because they hide the basic concept behind unnecessary
scientific vocabulary. Concentrating on vocabulary disconnected from concepts carries die risk of
leading both students and teachers to mistake fluency with terms and definitions for
understanding how die world works. A good vocabulary is the result of real learning, but just as a
suntan from a tanning salon is not proof of a healthy outdoor lifestyle, a scientific vocabulary is
not conclusive evidence for understanding science. The comparison of standards to Benchmarks
also shows that roughly one-fourth of the standards are ideas that lead to literacy, but are placed
at grade levels where cognitive research shows that meet students are not yet ready to loam them.
At least one standard is just wrong (Grade 9-12, Physics, Motion and Forces 1 .f "a force on an
object perpendicular to the direction of motion causes it to change direction, but not speed”) As
anyone who has served a tennis ball can tell you, the ball goes faster after it is hit You could add
”...in die original direction of m otion* if you think it is appropriate.
2. The proposed standards suffer from deficiencies. The California Standards as they exist are not
a coherent set of learning goals, a set that will make sense to students and lead them to literacy.
First, there are many ideas missing that will be necessary for students to learn the important ideas
that are there. For example, in high school students are expected to "know chemical bonds
between atoms in molecules such as H2, CH4, NH3, H2CCH2, N2, C 12 and many large
molecules are covalent."(Grade 9-12, Chemical Bonds 2.b), but they are not expected to know the
fundamental idea that electrical forces hold atoms and molecules together and thus are involved
in all chemical reactions. Second, there is no connection to the rich history of scientific progress
that can provide a context for appreciating the past and thriving in the present There is no
connection to technology or mathematics, their mutual dependence on science and their
increasing impact on our lives.
We recognize that the state of California wishes to improve the science literacy of its students and
laud your efforts. However, in our opinion, the proposed set of standards falls short of providing
the foundation for a fundamental restructuring of science education that will be necessary to
achieve your ambitious goals. Rather, it may perpetuate the current vocabulary-intense, content-
shallow curriculum found in today's popular textbooks and taught in today's classrooms. Given
the huge influence of California on the rest of the nation, the proposed standards could negatively
impact the long-term prospects for achieving the goal of science literacy for all students.
The AAAS would be happy to assist die state of California in revising their science standards by
participating in the process. Please let us know if we can be of assistance.
Sincerely,
George D. Nelson
Director, Project 2061
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2 6 2
08/09/98 11:54 ©2023341647 NAS PRES.OFFICE
National Academy of S ciences
XiOl CONSTITUTION AVENUE. N w WASHINGTON. o . C . 2 0 A Ig
O /E tC C o r THE NRCSlOCNT
September 9,1998
California State Board of Education
721 Capitol Mall, Room 532
Sacramento, CA 95814
FAX: 916-653-7016
Pear Board Members:
I write as the president of the National Academy of Sciences, a private organization
founded in 1863 under a Congressional charter signed by Abraham Lincoln, and directed
to help bring the benefits of science and technology to the American government and die
American public. I am a long-term resident of California. My four children attended the
San Francisco public schools, and my two grandchildren are students there now. Before I
left for my current position in Washington, DC, I helped to start an on-going, very
effective partnership between my university, the University of California, San Francisco
(UCSF), and die San Francisco Unified School District lids partnership continues to
play a major role in science education and the professional development of teachers in
San Francisco.
In 1991, the Academy through its operating arm the National Research Council, was
asked to lead a coalition of scientific societies and national teacher organizations to
prepare the first-ever National Science Education Standards for the United States. The
development process proceeded through a semes of public drafts, which were widely
disseminated to over 30,000 individuals and reviewed at yearly intervals. The final
Standards document of250 pages was published in 1996 and offered as a guide for states,
school districts, teachers, and parents; it has been acclaimed around the world. Forty
members of the National Academy of Sciences contributed their efforts to this document,
along with many hundreds of others around the nation. The four-year process succeeded
in combining the expertise of scientists, professional science educators and science
teachers -- and we all learned a great deal from each other. Most importantly, the
outcome was a national consensus document designed to set a direction and define
expectations for the science learning of all students.
The National Science Education Standards are consistent with similar documents that
have been prepared by the American Association for the Advancement of Science in
emphasizing the critical importance of active learning. These documents are based on the
@ 002
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2 6 3
0 9 / 0 9 /9 8 1 1 :5 5 © 2 0 1 3 1 1 1 5 1 7 NAS PRES.O FFICE ® C 03
Page 2
view that student! benefit from engaging in carefully structured scientific, investigations
in which they also team howto m ales observations, pose questions, malte predictions,
propose explanations, and communicate results - as part of the process of learning
science. Acquiring critical flunking skills through SUCh scientific inquiry is a crucial
component of science teaching awl learning, and it will prepare the type of citizens that
California needs if our state is to prosper in die yean ahead.
The current California State Science Education Standards apparently have been drafted
with a very different altitude towards science in mind. The press has reported that they
were drafted by a grotqi of Nobel Prize winners; in feet, except for Glenn Seaborg, die
much-advertised Nobel Prize winners were not involved, indie interest of making
science education more “rigorous." die authors of the. draft standards have pushed down
the teaching of abstract concepts such as atoms end molecules to fifth, end even third
grade. We know that it will be nearly impossible for children at this age to do more than
memorize terminology about these concepts. Throughout, acquiring knowledge through
rate learning is overemphasized, and understanding is underemphasized; in fact,
knowledge with understanding is what matters. Finally, the draft standards have
neglected the strong recommendation in the National Science Education Standards that a
major effort be made to tie school science to the science that students hear about on
televirion and experience in their lives.
The science standards that are adopted for California will influence textbooks, teaching,
and testing across the nation for many years. I fear that they will have a direct and
detrimental effect on millions of children who are likely to view the science facta that
they are being asked to memorize as unrelated to their lives, These student) will leave
school W ith the same feeling about science that most adults now have: that science is
something mysterious and incomprehensible, accessible only to on elite few. This is not
good for science, and it is not good for Califomia. Moreover, to the degree that
California provides leadership for other states, I fear foot these standards have the
potential of diminishing our national progress in science education in the years ahead.
For these reasons, 1 urge the members of the Board to refrain from implementing the
current draft of the California State Science Standards until they hove been revised to be
in closer alignment with the National Science Education Standards.
Sincerely yours,
Bmce Alberts
President
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APPENDIX H
2 6 4
SYNOPSIS OF PLAN FOR REVISING THE CALIFORNIA SCIENCE
CONTENT STANDARDS - THE SCIENTISTS'STANDARDS PROJECT
The American Physical Society, in concert with other learned scientific societies and scientific
organizations, proposes a substantial revision to the California Science Content Standards. This
revision is absolutely necessary in the view of the scientific community if science education in
California is to achieve its goal of preparing students for the next century.
The current draft of the standards, while motivated by the desire to set high standards for all
students, has evolved into a seriously overstaffed document The sheer amount of detailed
knowledge that would be required of students is breathtaking. Such an emphasis on facts will
leave little time to examine the grand unifying themes of science, and it will serve to perpetuate
poor achievement in and dislike of science by students. Moreover, the current draft of the
standards has deviated significantly from recommendations made by the American Association
for the Advancement of Science and the National Academy of Sciences— recommendations that
should not be discarded lightly. We who represent the scientific community want high standards
for students, too, but for us high standards means the ability o f students to understand concepts,
not just the ability to repeat facts.
We propose that a panel of eminent scientists, the Scientists' Standards Panel whose members are
named below, be appointed to oversee this revision. We have confidence that these distinguished
scientists are representative of the general opinions of the scientific community, and that they
also have the required knowledge of science education to guide the revision. The Panel will select
a group of scientists and educators to revise the standards document, and provide careful review
of the final product before delivering it to the California State Board of Education this fall in order
to meet the deadline for approval.
If the California State Board of Education agrees to this proposal, the Panel will convene and
begin the revision process. Leading scientists from a number of societies have already expressed
their interest in assisting California. We are certain that by embracing this proposal the California
State Board of Education will move quickly to produce a set of science education standards that
will be a model for the country.
MEMBERS OF SCIENTISTS'STANDARDS PANEL
Dr. Bruce Alberts. Eminent molecular and cell biologist, on leave from UC San Francisco;
President of the National Academy of Sciences; founder of the Science and Health Education
Partnership between UCSF and the San Francisco Public Schools.
Dr. Orville L. Chapman. Professor of Chemistry at UC Los Angeles; member of the National
Academy of Sciences.
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2 6 5
Dr. Donald Kennedy. Bing Professor of Environmental Science and former president of
Stanford University; chair of the Advisory Board of the Center for Science, Mathematics, and
Engineering Education of the National Research Council; former Director of the U.S. Food and
Drug Administration; member of the National Academy of Sciences.
Dr. Eldridge Moores. Professor of Geology at UC Davis; recent President of the Geological
Society of America.
Dr. Sally Ride. Professor of Physics and Director of California Space Institute at UC San
Diego; first American woman astronaut
Dr. Andrew M. Sessler. President of the American Physical Society (which, through its
Campaign for Physics, operates a multi-million dollar program to support K-12 science
education); distinguished senior staff scientist and former director of the Lawrence Berkeley
National Laboratory at UC Berkeley; member of the National Academy of Sciences.
One or two more scientists may be added to this panel by early September.
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APPENDIX I
2006 Science Primary Adoption Timeline
£VENT(S) DATE(S)
State Board of Education (SBE) adopts evaluation
criteria - at least 30 months before adoption
May 2004
Publishers’ briefing on criteria June 2004
Commission approves final timeline September 2004
Recruit IMAP/CRP members
February-
September 7,2005
Commission recommends IMAP/CRP members to
SBE
September-December 2005
SBE action on IMAP/CRP members November 2005-January 2006
Invitation to Submit Meeting January 10,2006
Deadline for submission information March 1, 2006
IMAP/CRP Training March 27-30,2006
Samples submitted to reviewers and LRDCs April 13, 2006
Price quote distribution to publishers April 14,2006
Price quote receipt deadline June 14,2006
Legal and Social Compliance (LC) Review June 14-16,2006
Publisher withdrawal deadline (7 working days before
deliberations)
June 27,2006
Legal and Social Compliance citation notices sent to
publishers
June 30,2006
Deliberations July 10-13,2006
Publisher response to Legal and Social Compliance
citations
July 31,2006
Science Subject Matter Committee and Curriculum
Commission action on recommendations
September 2006
Public display period (30 days) October 2006
State Board Hearing/Action on Adoption November 2006
Post-Adoption Publishers’ Briefing December 2006
Final printed resources submitted January 2007
Approved by the Curriculum Commission, September 30,2004, State Board of
Education approved January 12,2005.
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Asset Metadata

Creator Stassi, Frederica Jost (author)

Core Title A history of the development of the California Science Content Standards: 1990--2005

School Rossier School of Education

Degree Doctor of Education

Degree Program Education

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag Education, administration,education, curriculum and instruction,OAI-PMH Harvest

Language English

Contributor Digitized by ProQuest (provenance)

Advisor McComas, William (committee chair), Colbert, Joel (committee member), Kaplan, Sandra (committee member)

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-c16-590360

Unique identifier UC11342306

Identifier 3236553.pdf (filename),usctheses-c16-590360 (legacy record id)

Legacy Identifier 3236553.pdf

Dmrecord 590360

Document Type Dissertation

Rights Stassi, Frederica Jost

Type texts

Source University of Southern California (contributing entity), University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses (collection)

Access Conditions The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the au...

Repository Name University of Southern California Digital Library

Repository Location USC Digital Library, University of Southern California, University Park Campus, Los Angeles, California 90089, USA