Arizona Capitol Times Your Inside Source for Arizona Government, Politics and Business

The state’s largest school district has been preparing to teach the Common Core standards in much the same way that smaller districts have – with several consecutive years of teacher training, millions of dollars in technology upgrades and parent education. However, despite a successful 2012 bond election, money is still tight.

With one wary eye cast down the road at PARCC testing, Cave Creek Unified School District tested its ability a couple of years ago to have a massive amount of students using its computer network all at the same time. And the result was a failure.

As a small charter school without the ability to ask voters for bond overrides, Arizona College Prep Academy has to be judicious with its spending decisions. But like every other Arizona school, it still has to train its teachers to implement the state’s Common Core standards and eventually test students on them.

Public school superintendents aren’t expecting much money from the Legislature for putting Common Core into effect, but the cost of the test to measure new learning standards is going to be a hot topic of the 2014 Legislature.

New set of school standards searches for success

Topock, an Arizona town on the far western edge of the state, doesn’t even have a stoplight. But its school district has scrambled to prepare for the new standards and get the Internet capacity and computers necessary for the 2015 debut of the accompanying test.

University officials today pressed the business community and the state for more engagement in creating a robust college education system, even as they acknowledged that schools are adapting to technology-driven changes in higher education.

Gov. Jan Brewer, two state lawmakers and a long-time education advocate were honored Aug. 6 by the Arizona Association of County School Superintendents for their efforts on behalf of K-12 public education.

A federal judge has dismissed a student advocacy group's lawsuit against the state university system.

Among Gov. Jan Brewer's big three priorities for the 2013 legislative session, performance funding for K-12 schools was the one that got left behind.

A group of charter schools is suing the Arizona Department of Education, alleging it is illegally reducing voter-approved funds for teacher pay raises and the classroom.