Colorado standards alignment

• SS.HS.4.1.b

  Covered

  Evaluate how individuals and groups can effectively use the structure and functions of various levels of government to shape policy.

  Covered by

  • Colorado Civics: How Your State Government Works
  • US, State & Local Government: Who Does What

  • · Colorado Civics, Lesson 1 · Colorado's Constitution of 1876 and its direct democracy
  • · Colorado Civics, Lesson 4 · TABOR: the Taxpayer's Bill of Rights (Colorado's signature rule)
  • · Colorado Civics, Lesson 5 · How a bill becomes a Colorado law
  • · US, State & Local Government, Lesson 8 · Where to show up and be heard, at every level

  Note: This is the flagship's home for Colorado's direct democracy: the initiative and referendum (and TABOR, passed by citizen initiative) are exactly individuals and groups using the structure of government to shape policy — Colorado citizens are themselves a lawmaking body.

• SS.HS.4.1.d

  Covered

  Identify which level of government is appropriate for various policies and demonstrate an ability to appropriately engage individually and/or in groups with that level of government.

  Covered by

  • Colorado Civics: How Your State Government Works
  • US, State & Local Government: Who Does What

  • · Colorado Civics, Lesson 6 · Elections, local government, and how to take part
  • · US, State & Local Government, Lesson 5 · What LOCAL government handles (and why it VARIES)
  • · US, State & Local Government, Lesson 7 · The governments you forget: special districts & boards
  • · US, State & Local Government, Lesson 8 · Where to show up and be heard, at every level

  Note: Which level of government handles what (Colorado's 64 counties, home-rule and consolidated city-counties, and special districts) and how to engage that level are taught directly.

• SS.HS.4.2.b

  Covered

  Identify the structure, function, and roles of current members of American government and their relationship to democratic values.

  Covered by

  • Colorado Civics: How Your State Government Works
  • US Civics 101: How American Government Works

  • · Colorado Civics, Lesson 2 · The three branches of Colorado government
  • · Colorado Civics, Lesson 5 · How a bill becomes a Colorado law
  • · US Civics 101, Lesson 1 · Purpose of government and the three branches

  Note: Colorado's own three branches (the 35/65 General Assembly under GAVEL and term limits, the plural executive) are taught beside the three federal branches — the structure, function, and roles of the members of government.

• SS.HS.4.3.a

  Covered

  Assess how members of a civil society can impact public policy on local, state, tribal, national, or international issues. For example: voting, participation in primaries and general elections, and contact with elected officials.

  Covered by

  • Colorado Civics: How Your State Government Works
  • Voting & Elections 101

  • · Colorado Civics, Lesson 6 · Elections, local government, and how to take part
  • · Voting & Elections 101, Lessons 1-3 · registration, primaries and caucuses, how you vote
  • · Voting & Elections 101, Lesson 7 · Counting, canvassing, and certifying the vote
  • · Voting & Elections 101, Lesson 8 · Verify your own registration and rules

  Note: The named channels — voting, primaries and general elections, and contact with elected officials — are taught both generally and as Colorado's own (the all-mail ballot, same-day and automatic registration, and contacting your Denver legislators).

• SS.HS.4.1.c

  Partially covered

  Explain the roles and influence of individuals, groups, and the press as checks on governmental practices. For example: direct contact with elected officials, participation in civic organizations, use of social media, and attendance at local governance meetings.

  Covered by

  • Colorado Civics: How Your State Government Works
  • US, State & Local Government: Who Does What

  • · Colorado Civics, Lesson 6 · Elections, local government, and how to take part
  • · US, State & Local Government, Lesson 8 · Where to show up and be heard, at every level

  What we do and don't cover: The example behaviors — direct contact with elected officials and attendance at local governance meetings (county commissions, city councils, school boards) — are taught as practice; the outcome's separate emphasis on “the press” as a check is not a focus of the course, so this is partial.

• SS.HS.4.2.e

  Partially covered

  Understand the role of the American judicial system and evaluate the effectiveness of the justice system in protecting life, liberty, and property for all persons in the United States.

  Covered by

  • Colorado Civics: How Your State Government Works
  • The Supreme Court & the Judicial Branch

  • · Colorado Civics, Lesson 3 · How Colorado chooses its judges (merit selection + retention)
  • · The Supreme Court & the Judicial Branch, Lesson 1 · The federal judiciary: from district courts to the Supreme Court
  • · The Supreme Court & the Judicial Branch, Lesson 7 · Checks on the Court

  What we do and don't cover: The role and structure of the federal judiciary and of Colorado's own courts (merit selection plus retention) are taught; the course does not run the outcome's full evaluation of “the effectiveness of the justice system in protecting life, liberty, and property for all persons,” so this is partial.

What we don't claim

A standards page is only worth reading if the omissions are honest too. We looked at these and left them out:

• Mathematics — nothing. This catalog does no mathematics instruction, so it meets no Colorado Academic Standards mathematics expectation.
• Science — Colorado's OWN standards (NGSS-influenced, not adopted verbatim): deferred, not denied. Colorado's 2020 science standards are Colorado's own — influenced by the NGSS framework but written under Colorado's own codes, NOT the NGSS performance expectations adopted verbatim — so the shared NGSS mapping this catalog uses in true NGSS-adopting states (Maryland, Michigan) does NOT apply in Colorado, and we do not blind-alias to it. The catalog's one honest science touch (resource availability and climate shaping human activity) would find an analog in Colorado's Earth-systems evidence outcomes, but this pass mapped only the High School Civics standard; Colorado's science standards are deferred (verbatim-or-nothing), not claimed unverified.
• English/Language Arts — Colorado's OWN Reading, Writing, and Communicating standards: deferred. Colorado writes its own Reading, Writing, and Communicating (RWC) standards under Colorado-specific codes, NOT the Common Core (contrast Maryland, which adopted the CC as the MCCRS). The catalog's ELA-literacy strengths — evaluating an author's point of view and evidence, analyzing rhetoric, and sustained research with citation, which we map VERBATIM to the Common Core RH/RI/WHST strands in states that adopted them — would map to Colorado's own high-school RWC reading and writing expectations, but transcribing and verifying those verbatim is deferred this pass and published here rather than claimed unverified.
• Colorado's signature feature, TABOR, has no code of its own. The Colorado flagship's headline fact is the Taxpayer's Bill of Rights (TABOR): voters must approve any tax increase, and revenue above a cap is refunded. Colorado's concept-based civics standard names no TABOR-specific outcome; it is claimed here only through SS.HS.4.1.b (individuals and groups using the structure of government to shape policy), which it fits squarely as Colorado's most consequential use of direct democracy, rather than as a standard of its own.
• The concept-based civics outcomes we checked and rejected. SS.HS.4.1.a (engage in civil discourse as a named skill), SS.HS.4.2.c (the inherent competition among democratic values), SS.HS.4.2.f (how current global issues impact American foreign policy), SS.HS.4.2.g (compare other systems of government — authoritarian/parliamentary), SS.HS.4.3.b (parties, interest groups, suffrage, and social movements), SS.HS.4.3.c (PACs, campaign finance, and the Federal Election Commission), and SS.HS.4.3.e (participation in other systems of government) — the courses do not genuinely teach these, or teach them too thinly to claim, so we do not claim them.
• Colorado's History, Geography, and Economics standards — deferred. Colorado's High School Social Studies has four standards; we mapped Standard 4 (Civics) this pass. The catalog's commodity, colonial, labor, and civil-rights history, its commodity geography, and its commodity economics WOULD map to Colorado's High School Standard 1 (History), Standard 2 (Geography), and Standard 3 (Economics) evidence outcomes, as they do in other states, but we defer those (verbatim-or-nothing) rather than cite text we have not transcribed and verified this pass.