Eric.ed.gov – Standards Implementation in Ohio: Local Perspectives on Policy, Challenges, Resources, and Instruction

The Center on Standards, Alignment, Instruction, and Learning (C-SAIL) examines how college- and career-readiness (CCR) standards are implemented, if they improve student learning, and what instructional tools measure and support their implementation. The Center studies elementary and high school math and English Language Arts (ELA) standards, and has a special focus on understanding implementation and effects of CCR standards for English Language Learners (ELLs) and students with disabilities. This analysis examines select questions from a spring 2016 survey administered to districts, principals, and teachers in the state of Ohio. We employed a stratified random sampling technique designed to ensure the sample was representative of districts in Ohio. Forty-two Ohio districts completed the survey. In every sampled elementary school, two fifth-grade math teachers, two fourth-grade ELA teachers, one SWD teacher, and one ELL teacher were sampled. In high schools, two ELA teachers and one teacher in each of the following specialties or subjects: SWD, ELL, algebra, algebra 2, and geometry were sampled. The three math subjects were chosen because they are the most common college- and career-ready high school math courses, and so including them maximizes the number of high school target course responses that were obtained. Researchers wanted to identify math classes enrolling students who were likely to be required to take the state mathematics assessment. Forty nine districts were identified. Of those, 42 agreed to participate and completed the survey. This is a 85.7% response rate. In total, 111 principals (or designated staff) out of the 185 eligible principals completed the principal survey in Ohio, for a response rate of 60%; and 417 out of 654 sampled teachers responded, for a response rate of 63.8%.