Smart Balanced News Today

If ever a motto expressed pride in state autonomy, it's Iowa's: "Our liberties we prize, and our rights we will maintain." That dedication to local control undergirds the growing opposition to Common Core — the latest effort to centralize education through national standards and tests that will define what is taught in every public school classroom in the Hawkeye State.

After doing away with the SAT and ACT in freshman admissions, the University of California should not develop its own standardized test or use any other standardized exam as an admissions requirement, a key university committee has recommended.  Instead, the committee says UC should explore giving students the option to submit their 11th grade Smarter Balanced exams, the state’s annual standardized tests, for consideration when applying for admission to the system’s nine undergraduate camp...