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The Council of Chief State School Officers’ Resources for Secondary School Redesign

The Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) comprises the officials who head the state departments of education, including the District of Columbia, the Department of Defense Education Activity, and five extra-state jurisdictions. A nonpartisan organization, the CCSSO works to create member consensus on the issues, and it undertakes a number of projects providing advocacy, technical assistance, and resources to the states. It publishes research reports and issue briefs on pertinent topics to inform on state efforts at education reform.

Initially funded through the U.S. Department of Education in 2004, the CCSSO’s project on Secondary School Redesign offers states resources and tools for topics in high school reform that states have designated as high priority. The Council encourages states to network, collaborate in the redesign of their policies, and communicate regularly through the Web forum, newsletter, and national meetings. It also identifies and disseminates best practices by providing policy reports and briefs from external organizations, and the Council works with technical assistance providers and national organizations to support state-level efforts.

Some of CCSSO’s secondary school reform initiatives include the following:

Thirty-six state teams have partnered with CCSSO to produce cross-state networking partnerships related to the following topics:

  • Adolescent Literacy: Arizona, Illinois, Louisiana, Nevada, New York, Rhode Island, Virginia
  • Postsecondary Education Options: Minnesota, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Texas
  • Leadership: Georgia, Hawaii, Kansas, Missouri, Montana, Vermont, Washington, Wyoming
  • Transforming Instruction: Alabama, Arkansas, Connecticut, District of Columbia, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Maine, New Jersey, New Mexico, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, West Virginia, Wisconsin

In addition, The Council and the Public Consulting Group’s Center for Resource Management have developed an Adolescent Literacy Toolkit for English/Language Arts, Mathematics, Science and Social Studies as a part of the Secondary School Redesign project. The Toolkit includes a Professional Development Module to assist the states in teacher professional development in this area, as well as a Content Area Lesson Rubric, and a Literacy Self-Assessment Rubric for teachers to evaluate themselves on their inclusion of literacy in daily lessons.