Teachers' Understanding of and Ability to Apply High Standards

School reform incorporates a multitude of activities. The goals of the reform movement include setting standards for development of curriculum instructional materials that offer a high level of challenge, evaluating students more fully and appropriately, and incorporating teaching methods and techniques to foster a higher level of achievement for all students. An important part of the school reform effort is that teachers should understand and teach to new higher standards for student achievement. Therefore, the survey asked sampled teachers how well they understood the concept of new higher standards and how well equipped they felt to set or apply them. In response, almost all teachers reported having some understanding of the concept of new higher standards and almost all felt at least somewhat equipped to set or apply new higher standards. Less than half (42 percent) reported understanding the concept very well, while 35 percent felt very well equipped to set or apply new higher standards (Figure 1 and appendix Table B-1).

About one-fourth of teachers in schools with less than 6 percent minority enrollment reported understanding the concept of new higher standards very well compared with about half of teachers in schools with larger minority enrollment (Table B-1).

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