Office of Teaching and Learning

The Office of Teaching and Learning is proud to announce the approval of the 2024 North Carolina Standard Course of Study for K-12 Arts Education. The newly approved K-12 Arts standards aim to provide a Comprehensive Arts Education while developing students as artists in the fields of Dance, Music, Theatre, and Visual Arts.

Key features of the 2024 North Carolina Standard Course of Study for K-12 Arts:

• ALL four arts disciplines are now aligned to the National Arts Standards strands of Connect, Create, Present, and Respond
• Continuous Throughlines ensuring vertical alignment of K-12 objectives
• To remove confusion about the “Proficient” level of the proficiency based standards and align with the National Standards this level has been renamed “Accomplished”
• In Theatre Arts, Technical Theatre Courses have been added in both non-honors and honors levels
• K-8 General Music standards are extended into high school in both non-honors and honors levels 
• Five proficiency levels of Vocal and Instrumental Music have been created for students exploring band, choir, orchestra, piano, ukulele, guitar, or other instruments and ensembles 

Note: The current 2010 Arts Standard Course of Study will remain in place for classroom instruction and assessment for the 2024-2025 school year. 

Please see the Arts Crosswalks for Dance, Music, Theatre, and Visual Arts located on the Arts Education resource hub for a general comparison of the current and newly adopted Standard Course of Study. They provide initial insight into similarities and differences between these sets of standards.  

Public School Units (PSUs) are expected to implement the 2024 North Carolina Standard Course of Study for Arts starting in the 2025-2026 school year. Professional learning and resources to support PSU implementation will begin to be shared in fall 2024. 

The NCDPI Arts Team expresses their gratitude to the educators, language experts, and community members who contributed to the development of these standards. Their collaboration and expertise have been crucial to ensure the standards set expectations that will allow students to be innovative thinkers.

For resources and more information about K-12 arts, please visit the NCDPI Arts Education webpage and resource hub or contact Brandon Roeder or Dr. Laura Stauderman, Arts Education Consultants. 

Draft 2

Draft 2 of the proposed 2025 ELA Standard Course of Study, as well as the general survey for public review and feedback, are now open. 

Draft 1 survey data was compiled by a third party for analysis by the English Language Arts Data Review Committee (DRC).  The DRC reconvened on February 4, 2025 to review the quantitative and qualitative findings and trends indicated by responses to each survey. The DRC's Data Report for Draft 1, with their recommendations, informed further revisions to the proposed standards for Draft 2. The ELA Standards Writing Team (SWT) reconvened on March 10, 2025 to continue revision to Draft 2, which is now available. 

State Board of Education policy specifies that the NC Department of Public Instruction will formally collect feedback on the draft revised standards from educators, administrators, parents, students, institutions of higher education, business/industry representatives, and other education agencies.The purpose of the Draft 2 General Survey is to obtain input from educators and stakeholders familiar with the English Language Arts (ELA) Standard Course of Study in order to inform further revision decisions. As such, the ELA team requests your thoughtful input and comments on the draft revised academic standards for ELA to inform the revision process.

The Survey Companion Document provides context for revisions made to Drafts 1 and 2 of the Proposed 2025 ELA SCOS. To support completion of the general survey, the Survey Companion Document has been updated to explain in detail key changes and updates made within Draft 2 of the Proposed 2025 ELA SCOS. Based on data compiled and analyzed from standard-by-standard surveys for Draft 1, the ELA DRC made the following suggestions for revisions:

• Provide more specificity within the standards and objectives and clarify terminology where possible;
• Create supporting resources to clarify expectations and provide guidance, especially for fluency with secondary grades;
• Confirm developmental and grade-appropriateness of skills;
• Confirm vertical progression of skills across grade-bands;
• Clarify mentioning of the Holocaust/genocide in secondary grade-bands; and
• Revisit grade banding for high school.

The Draft 2 General Survey is estimated to take about 10 to 20 minutes to complete. The ELA Team thanks you for your time and input. Your feedback is extremely valuable to the ELA standards revision process.To view draft two and information about Draft 2, use the links below.

• Draft 2 (Released March 2025)
• Companion Document
• Draft 2 General Survey (Closes April 18, 2025)

To stay updated on ELA Standards revision, please subscribe to our listserv.

In March 2024, the Office of Teaching and Learning announced the review phase kick-off for the K-12 Mathematics Standards.  Per the Internal Procedures Manual, the review phase consists of data collection and analysis, as well as research.  The team has begun preparing the various surveys, planning focus groups and interviews, conducting research on other state, national and international standards, reviewing current legislation and policies, and creating consistent communication with stakeholders.

The Math Standards review phase will follow the process outlined in the Internal Procedures Manual. All K-12 math standards will be reviewed during this process.

The North Carolina Department of Public Instruction's K-12 Math Standards team is excited to announce the start of the review process for the current K-12 Math standards. Per the NC State Board of Education's Manual for the Review and Revision of Standards, the team is seeking feedback and input on the current standards from all stakeholders including educators, administrators, parents, students, institutions of higher education, business/industry representatives from across the state, national organizations, and other education agencies.

Updates to the current K-12 Math Standards may include clarifications, additions,
deletions, or replacements to the current standards.

     1) To support our stakeholders in this process two surveys are being shared. Everyone is encouraged to fill out one or both of the surveys.
     The first option is an overview of the K-12 Math standards asking general questions about the standards as a whole. In addition, this survey includes a question seeking input on what math skills and concepts every North Carolina graduate should know. The second option is more detailed, allowing participants to provide specific feedback on each standard for every grade or course.
     Links to both surveys are below. Again, all stakeholders are encouraged to fill out one or both surveys. The feedback is extremely valuable to the K-12 Math standards review
process. Both surveys will remain open until 8am EST on Monday, November 4th, 2024.
.                                                K-12 Math Overview Survey for All-Stakeholders
                                                 K-12 Math Standard-by-Standard Survey for All-Stakeholders

     2) The K-12 Math team has just released applications for the K-12 Math Standards Data Review Committee. Details can be found in the K-12 Math Data Review Committee Announcement.

     3) The K-12 Math team has completed in-person focus groups for all 8 State Board of Education regions and one virtual focus group for charter schools. 
 

In August 2022, the North Carolina State Board of Education granted permission for NCDPI to move forward with the review and revision of the K-12 NC Guidance Essential Standards, per SCOS-012.

The Office of Teaching and Learning is excited to announce that new standards were approved by the State Board of Education at their December 7, 2023 meeting—the adoption of the American School Counselor Association (ASCA) Student Standards: Mindsets and Behaviors.   The new name of the standards will be the North Carolina Student Success Standards.   The work was completed by processes and protocols outlined in the NC Standard Course of Study Manual.  The process included feedback from focus groups from each state board region, one to one interviews, and surveys distributed to the field.  A variety of professional educators from across NC districts and institutions of higher education helped review the response data for the standards process.  Thank you to everyone who participated in the review.

The adoption of the new NC Student Success Standards will begin its first stage-the installation stage in the 2024-2025 school year.   The initial implementation stage will be the next stage in the 2025-2026 school year.   The full implementation stage will be in the 2026-2027 school year.   Over the remaining 2023-2024 school year, NCDPI will be working alongside with leaders from PSUs to ensure all stakeholders are aware of the new standards and prepare for the new standards to be installed at the beginning of the 2024-2025 school year.  Please the note the current NC Guidance Essential Standards, will remain in place until the 2025-2026 academic school year.

Please be on the lookout for more information and details in the near future.   Be sure to join the school counseling listserv to receive updates.

The Office of Teaching and Learning’s World Languages Team is proud to announce the approval of the 2024 North Carolina Standard Course of Study for World Languages. The newly approved standards are intended to cultivate proficiency and intercultural competence in a classical, heritage, or modern language and help develop globally collaborative students.

Key features of the 2024 North Carolina Standard Course of Study for World Languages include:

• Objectives organized by proficiency level using the ACTFL proficiency scale
• Streamlined strand structure and objectives, including a new Intercultural and Communities Connections (ICC) strand
• Reordered standards emphasizing target language input and output
• Inclusion of the Advanced High proficiency level increasing the rigor of student outcomes 

Note: The current 2010 World Languages Standard Course of Study will remain in place for classroom instruction and assessment for the 2024-2025 school year. 

Please see the World Languages Crosswalk for a general comparison of the 2010 World Languages Standard Course of Study and the 2024 World Languages Standard Course of Study. It provides initial insight into similarities and differences between these two sets of standards.  

Public School Units (PSUs) are expected to implement the 2024 North Carolina Standard Course of Study for World Languages starting in the 2025-2026 school year. Professional learning and resources to support PSU implementation will begin to be shared in fall 2024, with the finalized Proficiency Outcomes Document coming soon.  See the World Languages’ Installation Timeline for more information.

The NCDPI World Languages Team expresses their gratitude to the educators, language experts, and community members who contributed to the development of these standards. Their collaboration and expertise have been crucial to ensure the standards set expectations that will allow students to be competitive in post-secondary pursuits-- college, career, or military-- and throughout their lives.

For resources and more information about World Languages, please visit the NCDPI World Languages webpage and resources hub or contact Dr. Ann Marie Gunter, World Languages Consultant.