On the Common Core and career readiness

One of the key goals of implementing the Common Core State Standards, especially in high schools, is to make sure students as a whole are well-prepared when they leave grade school for what comes next. For some, this means having the appropriate knowledge and skills to succeed in college courses. For others, it means being prepared to enter the workforce and thrive in any entry-level position. But how exactly do the Standards ensure career readiness? Read on for how the CCSS instills career-readiness skills:

What is career readiness?
It's pretty easy to define both the subject-specific hard skills and general soft skills needed for students to be successful in college. For instance, students should be at a specific reading and writing level for them to score well in a college composition class. However, when it comes to career readiness, it's not as easy to figure out the exact skills students should know. That's because different careers may call for completely separate sets of abilities. In general, to be considered career ready, students must have core subject skills (such as in math, reading and writing), soft skills that will allow them to succeed in any workplace (like written and spoken communication, quick thinking, problem solving, etc.), and finally, job-specific technical skills.

English/language arts
When it comes to the core subject skills mentioned above, students are expected to be at a certain reading, writing and language level by the time they leave 12th grade. To be considered ready for a career, students must be able to read, understand and synthesize complex texts, both fiction and nonfiction. They should also be able to research and write convincing explanatory and informative texts using well-thought-out reasoning.

Math
Math career readiness skills are a little different. Whereas in most careers, people will have to read, comprehend and/or write texts, advanced math may not be as commonly used. To that end, while elementary and middle school State Standards focus on teaching students core concepts, such as basic computing, ratios, decimals, angles and more, high school Standards emphasize teaching them how to apply those concepts to problems they may find in the real world.

Basic skills
Another set of skills should be developed through the CCSS: These are known as 21st century skills. 21st century skills include abilities that will be valuable in any career, including knowing how to collaborate and communicate, think critically and use technology.

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