Both of these departments provide education standards; one provides standards for the federal level, and one provides standards for the state level. Although these departments provide standards for education, they do not provide an official "blueprint" for core course curriculum revision. However, the Pennsylvania Department of Education provides recommended curriculum revision practices. In order to compare North Allegheny's practices, the information provided by the Pennsylvania Department of Education was examined. They provided little, but useful, information, when it came to curriculum development. They state that the curriculum should align with the basic education standards for the core courses. Curriculums should also meet local, state, and federal education guidelines. In order to create an efficient curriculum, the Pennsylvania Department of Education states that schools should not only look at guidelines and standards, but also individual student needs. Given that the information provided by the Pennsylvania Department of Education was so brief and general, the curriculum revision processes for three different school districts was also examined.
The first school district in my review was Webster Groves School District in Missouri. They do their curriculum development and revision in phases. During each curriculum development/revision, one content area receives priority. When deciding if a curriculum needs to be revised, they look at student assessments (ACT, SAT, state tests, etc.). Student achievement is extremely important for an efficient curriculum. Once they decide that a new curriculum is needed, they look at education standards on every level, along with student needs when developing the new curriculum. Once the curriculum is developed, they decide if there are any new materials needed. If so, they select and purchase the new materials. Finally, the new curriculum is implemented.
