Abstract
Academic achievement in the United States is low, with students graduating high school unprepared for college and the workforce. To remedy this issue, 42 states fully adopted the Common Core State Standards (CCSS). The CCSS outlines what students should know in English Language Arts (ELA) and math at the end of each grade -kindergarten through 12th grade. The overall goal of the CCSS is to prepare students for colleges and careers by developing their critical-thinking, problem-solving, and analytical skills. In 2013, California fully implemented the standards. To understand the implementation activities in high schools, this exploratory thesis utilized data from a larger qualitative study conducted by the Education Insights Center. I used 24 high school educator interview transcripts from two different schools in one northern California school district. I focused on three themes I believed provided the best insights about implementation activities-teacher preparedness, schools' relationship with postsecondary institutions, and how the cess relates to college and career readiness. Overall educators were optimistic about the CCSS. However, most educators stated they wanted more time and money to implement the CCSS and some wanted more direction from the state as they were unsure if they were implementing it correctly. Even with wanting more time and money, teachers found being student-centered and "flipping" their classrooms helped students learn and engage more with the lessons. Educators were also concerned about what postsecondary institutions were expecting of incoming students and what admissions changes they were making in light of the CCSS, as they did not have that information. Lastly, educators were confident they could prepare students for college, but they were unsure about preparing them for the workforce. I provided key implications from my findings to help improve the CCSS implementation, including needing more guidance from the state, having better coordination between high schools and postsecondary institutions, ensuring teachers have the content knowledge to teach subjects at a deeper level, receiving business input on schools' CTE offerings, and reconsidering the public CCSS messaging. I concluded with suggestions for future research.