Hit the books: School standards get tougher

School work is about to get a whole lot harder for Nevada students.

A state panel that has toiled for a year to develop performance standards in mathematics, language arts and science has released several hundred pages of detailed descriptions of what will be expected of state students.

For instance:

Education officials say the standards are supposed to be in place by this fall.

Lawmakers in 1997 created the 9-member Council to Establish Academic Standards and charged the panel with drawing up a set of standards to be used by teachers statewide. Officials say that until now, teachers have followed their own district curriculum guidelines, but learning has varied school-to-school and district-to-district.

"We have something here that we've never had before," standards council chairwoman Debbie Smith said.

The council used three teams of roughly 20 members -- teachers, business people and parents -- who crafted the details of the new standards. The council also relied on a Washington, D.C., consulting firm, Council for Basic Education, to help guide them through the process.

The entire effort, including travel time and consulting fees, cost about $500,000, said Keith Rheault, deputy state superintendent of public instruction.

The result: a document an inch thick that describes not only what types of lessons students need to be given in grades 2, 3, 5, 8 and 12, but what they must be able to perform to prove mastery. The State Board of Education approved the standards in August.

The next step will be putting the complex new standards in the hands of teachers during the next eight months. After that, officials are hoping lawmakers will approve money to test students on the new standards to discover how well the students are performing.

Copies of the new standards are available by calling (702) 687-9224, or can be viewed on the website: http://www.nsn.k12.nv.us/nvdoe.

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