Education

N.A.S. Delays Release of Draft Science Standards

By Peter West — February 23, 1994 1 min read
  • Save to favorites
  • Print

Officials of the National Academy of Sciences here have decided to delay the release, initially scheduled for this month, of the first full draft of national standards for science content, teaching, and assessment.

Although a summary of the draft standards will be released this week at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in San Francisco, the full standards are not now slated to be made public until this summer.

“The standards are going through a review process that’s quite different from what we thought we were going to do,’' Cheryl Greenhouse, an academy spokeswoman, said.

The delay in releasing the first draft of the science standards is only one of several personnel and procedural changes that the project has experienced. Last year, for example, both the head of the content-standards committee and the project’s director of “critique and consensus’’ resigned.

Sources familiar with the project said those and other high-level resignations, fueled by internal dissatisfaction with the process, are primarily responsible for the delays.

“It’s a constant falling back and regrouping,’' one source said.

Officials overseeing the standards project at the academy’s National Research Council initially expected to produce a first draft of the content standards late last year, with standards for science teaching and assessment standards to follow this year.

In a process radically different from the N.R.C.'s usual confidential approach, early drafts of the content standards have undergone a lengthy critique and consensus by thousands of practitioners and scientists in the field.

‘Focus Groups’ To Review

Bruce M. Alberts, who became the president of the academy last summer, decided that “focus groups’’ of scientific professionals should review the draft before being released to the public.

Mr. Alberts, a nationally known biochemist, has publicly committed the academy to an active role in science-education reform. (See Education Week, Nov. 24, 1993.)

Meanwhile, James D. Ebert, a former vice president of the academy, has stepped down as the chairman of the science-standards project.

Mr. Ebert has been replaced by Richard D. Klausner, an academy member and the chief of the cell-biology and metabolism branch of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.

A version of this article appeared in the February 23, 1994 edition of Education Week as N.A.S. Delays Release of Draft Science Standards

Events

Jobs Virtual Career Fair for Teachers and K-12 Staff
Find teaching jobs and other jobs in K-12 education at the EdWeek Top School Jobs virtual career fair.
Ed-Tech Policy Webinar Artificial Intelligence in Practice: Building a Roadmap for AI Use in Schools
AI in education: game-changer or classroom chaos? Join our webinar & learn how to navigate this evolving tech responsibly.
Education Webinar Developing and Executing Impactful Research Campaigns to Fuel Your Ed Marketing Strategy 
Develop impactful research campaigns to fuel your marketing. Join the EdWeek Research Center for a webinar with actionable take-aways for companies who sell to K-12 districts.

EdWeek Top School Jobs

Teacher Jobs
Search over ten thousand teaching jobs nationwide — elementary, middle, high school and more.
View Jobs
Principal Jobs
Find hundreds of jobs for principals, assistant principals, and other school leadership roles.
View Jobs
Administrator Jobs
Over a thousand district-level jobs: superintendents, directors, more.
View Jobs
Support Staff Jobs
Search thousands of jobs, from paraprofessionals to counselors and more.
View Jobs

Read Next

Education Briefly Stated: February 21, 2024
Here's a look at some recent Education Week articles you may have missed.
8 min read
Education Briefly Stated: February 7, 2024
Here's a look at some recent Education Week articles you may have missed.
8 min read
Education Briefly Stated: January 31, 2024
Here's a look at some recent Education Week articles you may have missed.
9 min read
Education Briefly Stated: January 17, 2024
Here's a look at some recent Education Week articles you may have missed.
9 min read