More than half of parents have not heard much about Common Core State Standards

Standardized tests have support among parents, who view them as a useful way to measure both students' and schools' performances, according to an Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll.


Key findings:

• Sixty-one percent of parents think their children take an appropriate number of standardized tests and 26 percent think their children take too many tests.
• Less than half of parents believe that their local schools are doing a good job preparing students for the workforce or giving them the practical skills they will need as adults. Just over half believe their local schools are doing a good job of preparing students for college and to be good citizens.
• Parents believe evaluation and pay should be based on a balanced approach that includes classroom teacher observations, student test scores, and student input. Three quarters of parents favor making it easier for school districts to fire teachers for poor performance.
• A majority of parents believe standardized tests do a good job of measuring school-wide and individual performance though less than half believe test scores should be the basis for allocating funding.
• More than half of parents have not heard much about Common Core State Standards and about one-third say they don’t know if the Common Core is used in their state. Less than half say implementation of the Common Core will improve the quality of education and 27 percent assert it will have no effect at all.