House of Representatives STATE OF OKLAHOMA July 23, 2014 (Corrected version’) Oklahoma State Board of Education 2500 N. Lincoln Blvd, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma 73105 Dear Board members: It has come to our attention that the State Board of Education may choose during its meeting today to delay establishing and initiating the process to develop the new mathematics and English language arts standards called for in House Bill 3399. We write to encourage the Board to immediately begin these efforts in earnest. This legislation included an emergency clause that caused the entire measure to be in full force and effect upon the Governor's signature. The Legislature could have made the repeal of Common Core effective immediately while delaying the start of the process for developing the new standards to a later date. The Legislature chose not to do this. This law gives sole responsibility for the development of the new standards to the State Board of Education. While the law does include other individuals and entities in the development process, the Board is the entity responsible for animating the process and it must not delay exercising its responsibility. All three branches of state government have now affirmed the Board's role and responsibilities. The Legislature is counting on the Board to establish the strongest possible process that incorporates the most academically qualified and experienced scholars and teachers in the critical task of Grafting the standards. It is important that the Board not abrogate its responsibility at this time by Unjustifiably delaying the establishment of the standards development process. The law requires the State to continue under the Priority Academic Student Skills standards (PASS) for an additional two years while new standards are being developed. Practically, the Board only hhas a year-and-a-half until the start of the 2016 legislative session when the new standards must be ready for legislative review. The Board delaying its work would be inconsistent with the expressed intent of the law at best and raises the possibility of a scenario where we would be forced to stay under the PASS standards beyond August 2016 at worst. Pack v. State was perceived by some as an attempt to force full implementation of Common Core in Oklahoma in spite of HB3399 rather than develop a set of new, superior standards, Delaying what will likely be a long and challenging process could be perceived by some as running-out-the-clock resulting in a disappointing compromise. While we are not unaware of the pending changes in the office of state superintendent and director of Career and Technology Education, " Letter corrected to include language omitted due 1 technical error. Previously omitted language is found at lines 1-2, p.2delay for these reasons would seem to indicate that political considerations may interfere with the faithful execution of the law. None of these scenarios would be acceptable. We look for the Board to develop academic content standards, that are not warmed-over versions of PASS or Common Core but, that are truly superior to both. In HB3399 we chose not to prescribe a detailed process to develop the standards nor the specific qualifications for those who will participate in the process, but rather to allow the Board to exercise its discretion. At this point we do wish to respectfully submit @ few suggestions that reflect our aspirations in calling for the creation of new standards. Itis our conviction that academic content experts in mathematics and English be at the heart of the standards writing process and that every effort be made to identify and include such experts. Academic content standards are aspirational in nature and should reflect the highest level of academic expectations for students. They deserve no less. We believe the actual drafting of the standards should be carried out by these experts and scholars in the same or related academic fields in higher education. We believe strongly these individuals, at a minimum, should have degrees in the relevant content areas. Further, these individuals should be current classroom teachers in the relevant content area and have a proven track record as an experienced and effective classroom teacher in the relevant content area. Individuals from higher education should come from colleges and departments in related content areas -- not from teacher colleges. Lastly, we understand some membership organizations have requested to be incorporated into the standards development process in some official capacity. We believe this would not be appropriate. If we had intended for these groups to be included in a formal way it would be reflected in HB3399. We believe that if the Board incorporates these suggestions into its plans it will avoid arriving at a set of standards that fall short of expectations. We stand ready to assist and support the Board in any way possible, Very respectfully yours, Dg beh Jeffrey W. Hickman Speaker of the House Jason Nelson State Representative JG Brecheen State Senator Ce: Joel Robison, Okla. State Dept. of Ed. Chief of Staff