Full canonical language

This section contains the authoritative draft policy language of the Minnesota Learning Project. Where a plain-language summary differs from the numbered standard, the numbered standard controls. This framework is not adopted Minnesota law.

MLP-POL-01 • PURPOSE OF PUBLIC EDUCATION • DRAFT 1.1

Purpose of Public Education

Requirement. Minnesota public education should have as its primary purpose the development of students who can read with understanding, communicate clearly, use mathematics confidently, reason from evidence, understand scientific and civic institutions, apply practical knowledge, continue learning independently, and function competently as adults.

The state may establish additional educational objectives only when those objectives do not materially displace the time, resources, or instructional priority necessary to achieve foundational academic and practical competencies.

Implementation. State standards, graduation requirements, assessment systems, and statewide instructional mandates should be reviewed for consistency with this purpose.

MLP-POL-02 • FOUNDATIONAL ACADEMIC PRIORITY • DRAFT 1.1

Foundational Academic Priority

Requirement. State academic standards should establish clear, cumulative, grade-appropriate mastery expectations in literacy, writing and communication, mathematics and quantitative reasoning, science and engineering, broad historical and geographic knowledge, and logic, research, and information evaluation.

Foundational deficiencies should trigger targeted additional instruction, materials, and time. Advancement through grades should not be treated as evidence of mastery when objective evidence demonstrates that essential prerequisite competencies remain unfinished. The default response is support while the student continues forward, not automatic retention.

Implementation. Major mastery checks should occur at the end of Grade 5, before high school, and near graduation, with written support plans for students who are not yet ready.

MLP-POL-03 • STANDARDS AND MASTERY • DRAFT 1.1

Academic Standards and Mastery

Requirement. State academic standards should specify measurable knowledge and skills students are expected to demonstrate and distinguish required student outcomes from recommended instructional methods, curriculum materials, pedagogical philosophies, and interpretive frameworks.

Assessment should evaluate knowledge, skill, application, explanation, reasoning, and creation where appropriate. A student’s academic evaluation should not depend on agreement with a prescribed political, ideological, religious, philosophical, or moral conclusion except where the task is to accurately describe, compare, analyze, or defend that position as an object of study.

Implementation. Standards should use a stable coding structure of Grade.Strand.Anchor.Benchmark and identify mastery expectations sufficient for statewide comparability.

MLP-POL-04 • DEVELOPMENTAL APPROPRIATENESS • DRAFT 1.1

Developmental Appropriateness

Requirement. Required instructional content should be evaluated for cognitive readiness, emotional burden, academic necessity, availability of less-burdensome alternatives, instructional opportunity cost, and assessment neutrality under the Age-Appropriate Standards.

Elementary education should give substantial priority to literacy, numeracy, curiosity, reading enjoyment, imagination, broad knowledge, scientific exploration, play, art, music, movement, creativity, and the satisfaction of mastery. Difficult historical subjects should be taught accurately and proportionately as students develop sufficient background knowledge and maturity to understand them.

Implementation. The authority proposing a new statewide content mandate bears the burden of documenting the competency, developmental rationale, evidence for grade placement, instructional time, foreseeable burden, available alternatives, assessment method, and displaced instruction. Missing documentation is a reason to delay statewide imposition.

MLP-POL-05 • LOCAL CURRICULUM AUTHORITY • DRAFT 1.1

Local Curriculum Authority

Requirement. The state should establish statewide academic competency standards specifying measurable knowledge and skills students are expected to demonstrate.

Except where expressly authorized by law, the state should not require a school district to adopt a specified instructional philosophy, curriculum vendor, literary work, political framework, pedagogical method, or interpretive methodology as a condition of compliance with statewide academic standards.

A school district may select instructional materials, lesson sequences, projects, and methods consistent with locally adopted curriculum policy provided students are afforded instruction sufficient to achieve statewide competency standards.

Implementation. State guidance should clearly distinguish mandatory student outcomes from optional instructional resources.

MLP-POL-06 • STATEWIDE MANDATE ACCOUNTABILITY • DRAFT 1.1

Statewide Mandate Accountability

Requirement. A new statewide instructional mandate should not take effect unless the proposing authority publicly identifies the student competency the requirement is intended to improve; evidence supporting the requirement; grades affected; estimated instructional time; teacher training and administrative requirements; state and local fiscal impact; method for evaluating outcomes; and existing instructional activity reasonably expected to be displaced.

A statewide requirement imposing material implementation cost on districts should include an identified state funding mechanism sufficient to support the required implementation.

Implementation. Use the Instructional Mandate Review. Each mandate should receive a periodic continuation review based on measured educational value and opportunity cost.

MLP-POL-07 • GRADUATION COMPETENCY • DRAFT 1.1

Graduation Competency

Requirement. A Minnesota high-school diploma should represent demonstrated academic and applied competence in reading, writing, quantitative reasoning, evidence evaluation, science, personal economics, household management, health and emergency readiness, employment preparation, civic navigation, technology, and continued independent learning.

Applied demonstrations may be used to test whether students can integrate multiple competencies in realistic scenarios, but no single pilot assessment should become a high-stakes diploma condition until it has been specified, piloted, evaluated for reliability and accessibility, and formally adopted through an appropriate public process.

Implementation. Run Your Life is a pilot adult-life capstone model. It is not the diploma and is not currently a required graduation condition.

MLP-POL-08 • MEASUREMENT AND PUBLIC REPORTING • DRAFT 1.1

Measurement and Public Reporting

Requirement. Minnesota should maintain a public education performance system that reports whether students are acquiring the competencies established in state standards and graduation requirements.

Measures should include, where valid and privacy-protective: literacy; mathematics; writing; science; reasoning and information evaluation; attendance and engagement; practical-competence pilot results; postsecondary and workforce outcomes; per-pupil expenditures; and instructional-time allocation.

Performance reporting should distinguish student outcomes from program implementation. Completion of a program, training, curriculum adoption, or compliance activity should not by itself be reported as evidence of improved student learning.

Implementation. See Measurement & Accountability.

MLP-POL-09 • STUDENT INTELLECTUAL FREEDOM • DRAFT 1.1

Student Intellectual Freedom

Requirement. Public schools may require students to accurately describe, compare, analyze, criticize, defend, and evaluate political, economic, religious, social, moral, and philosophical ideas. Academic credit should not depend on a student’s personal affirmation or renunciation of a contested belief, ideological self-identification, participation in political organizing or advocacy, or unnecessary disclosure of sensitive personal beliefs or identity information.

Neutral simulations of civic processes may be required when they measure legitimate competencies. Real-world political participation should remain voluntary.

Implementation. See Student Intellectual Freedom. The rule applies symmetrically across viewpoints and does not prevent rigorous comparative study of controversial ideas.

MLP-POL-10 • CURRICULUM TRANSPARENCY AND REVIEW • DRAFT 1.1

Curriculum Transparency and Review

Requirement. Families and local boards should have reasonable access to required standards, major texts and media, recurring outside instructional materials, required student tasks, grading rubrics, and policies governing advocacy, organizing, or sensitive personal disclosure.

Districts should maintain a defined process for parents, students, teachers, and residents to raise a curriculum concern under the project’s academic, developmental, intellectual-freedom, or local-authority standards. Review should focus on whether the requirement complies with the governing standard rather than whether a complainant agrees with the viewpoint being studied.

Implementation. The preferred remedy is correction, clarification, a compliant alternative assignment where appropriate, or revised materials—not automatic punishment of teachers or removal of legitimate historical content.