Leverage the opportunity created by the Common Core

In one sense, the Common Core State Standards create considerable opportunities for the kind of improvement in teaching we seek: they provide clear incentives for existing teachers to make their teaching practice more ambitious.  But everything we know about past reforms suggests that unless teachers lead and own this effort, it will end up being seen as yet another top-down reform with uneven results, at best Relatedly, the scale of the challenge is such that it will require significant unlearning for many teachers; making progress will entail building the space, support, and models that such a qualitative shift in practice requires.