Archived: The Educational System in the United States: Case Study Findings

particularly in the middle- and high-achieving schools, were geared towards pre-
paring students for entrance to college. Students at the middle- and high-achieving
schools also had more parental support and more financial resources, making
enrollment in a college or university a viable option. However, high-achieving stu-
dents at even the lowest-achieving high schools aspired to college and intended
to pursue this goal if they could obtain a scholarship.
Summary
Standards of education in the United States emanate from a variety of sources
external to the schools as well as from internal policies and regulations that are
more specific to individual schools.
External Influences
Schools in the United States are not governed by a set of mandatory national edu-
cation standards or regulations. However, a set of six national goals known as
Goals 2000, were created in 1989 as a framework for improving student achieve-
ment, and two more goals were added to the list in 1994. While these goals have
helped to raise public awareness of the parts of education that need attention,
action plans for meeting the goals have been left up to state and local initiatives.
States began playing a larger role in the development of comprehensive standards
during the last decade. Prior to this, standards were primarily left up to the
schools and school districts. However, many states have now developed academic

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goals, curriculum guidelines, and minimum competency requirements that they
distribute to schools within their state. While states have generally developed
these goals, guidelines, and requirements independently of one another, they have
all been influenced by the national dialogue surrounding the movement for edu-
cation reform. In addition, the development of voluntary national standards by
nongovernmental organizations, such as The National Council of Teachers of
Mathematics, has helped to shape curriculum guidelines at both the state and the
school levels. Voluntary national standards have been developed in mathematics,
science, and history and are currently being developed in other subject areas as
well.
We found that teachers’ and parents’ attitudes towards voluntary standards, such
as the NCTM standards, were generally positive. In addition, we found that there
was a high awareness of NCTM standards among teachers and an effort on the