Pennsylvania standards alignment

• 5.3.12.E

  Covered

  Evaluate the fairness and effectiveness of the United States electoral processes, including the electoral college.

  Covered by

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

  • · Voting & Elections 101, Lesson 4 · The Electoral College: how it works
  • · Voting & Elections 101, Lesson 5 · Why the Electoral College exists
  • · 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
  • · Pennsylvania Civics, Lesson 6 · Elections in Pennsylvania: Act 77 mail-in voting, closed primaries, voter ID

  Note: The Electoral College — which this standard names — is taught in depth (mechanics and original purpose), alongside how registration, primaries, and vote-counting work, and Pennsylvania's own electoral process (Act 77 mail voting, closed primaries) through the flagship.

• 5.3.12.F

  Covered

  Analyze landmark United States Supreme Court interpretations of the Constitution and its Amendments.

  Covered by

  • The Bill of Rights: Know Your Rights
  • US Civics 101: How American Government Works
  • The Supreme Court & the Judicial Branch

  • · Know Your Rights, Lessons 2-5 · speech, religion, press, assembly, including at school and online
  • · Know Your Rights, Lessons 6-8 · the 4th Amendment: searches, stops, and your digital life
  • · US Civics 101, Lesson 4 · The courts and judicial review (Marbury v. Madison)
  • · The Supreme Court & the Judicial Branch, Lesson 5 · Writing the opinion: majority, concurrence, dissent, and precedent
  • · 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

  Note: Landmark cases are taught as rules a student can apply — Marbury (judicial review), Tinker, Brandenburg, Mapp, and how precedent expands rights — alongside the judiciary's structure.

• 5.1.12.D

  Covered

  Evaluate state and federal powers based on significant documents and other critical sources.

  Covered by

  • State vs Federal Power: How American Government Is Divided
  • Pennsylvania Civics: How Your State Government Works

  • · State vs Federal Power, Lesson 2 · Three kinds of power: enumerated, implied, reserved
  • · State vs Federal Power, Lesson 3 · The enumerated powers: Article I, § 8 (the Necessary and Proper Clause)
  • · State vs Federal Power, Lesson 6 · Concurrent powers: what both levels share
  • · State vs Federal Power, Lesson 7 · McCulloch v. Maryland (1819): implied powers and supremacy
  • · State vs Federal Power, Lesson 1 · What is federalism, and why split power at all?
  • · Pennsylvania Civics, Lesson 1 · Pennsylvania's constitution: the 1968 rulebook and a two-session amendment path (Article XI; the Declaration of Rights)

  Note: State and federal powers are taught by name (enumerated/delegated, implied, reserved, concurrent) through McCulloch and the founding documents. The standard's document list names the Pennsylvania Constitution, which the flagship teaches directly.

• 5.1.12.E

  Covered

  Analyze and assess the rights of people as written in the PA Constitution and the US Constitution.

  Covered by

  • The Bill of Rights: Know Your Rights
  • Pennsylvania Civics: How Your State Government Works

  • · The Bill of Rights: Know Your Rights, Lesson 1 · What is the Bill of Rights?
  • · Know Your Rights, Lessons 2-5 · speech, religion, press, assembly, including at school and online
  • · Know Your Rights, Lessons 6-8 · the 4th Amendment: searches, stops, and your digital life
  • · Pennsylvania Civics, Lesson 1 · Pennsylvania's constitution: the 1968 rulebook and a two-session amendment path (Article XI; the Declaration of Rights)

  Note: The federal Bill of Rights is taught as applicable rules with its landmark cases, and the flagship teaches Pennsylvania's own Article I Declaration of Rights — which in places protects more than the federal document (the Environmental Rights Amendment) — exactly the PA-and-US comparison the standard asks for.

• 5.2.12.D

  Covered

  Evaluate and demonstrate what makes competent and responsible citizens.

  Covered by

  • Citizenship & Naturalization Basics
  • How to Help a Campaign: A Practical, Non-Partisan Guide
  • US, State & Local Government: Who Does What
  • Pennsylvania Civics: How Your State Government Works

  • · Citizenship & Naturalization Basics, Lesson 7 · Rights and responsibilities of citizenship
  • · How to Help a Campaign · the whole course (volunteering, donating, canvassing, with the legal guardrails)
  • · US, State & Local Government, Lesson 8 · Where to show up and be heard, at every level
  • · Pennsylvania Civics, Lesson 7 · Get involved where you live in Pennsylvania

  Note: Responsible citizenship is taught as practice — the responsibilities lesson, helping a campaign lawfully, showing up at every level of government, and Pennsylvania's own get-involved lesson (townships and boroughs, because there is no citizen initiative).

• 5.3.12.A

  Partially covered

  Analyze the changes in power and authority among the three branches of government over time.

  Covered by

  • US Constitution 101: The Document That Builds the Government
  • US Civics 101: How American Government Works
  • Pennsylvania Civics: How Your State Government Works

  • · US Constitution 101, Lesson 6 · Separation of powers and checks & balances
  • · US Constitution 101, Lesson 7 · Federalism: state and federal power
  • · US Civics 101, Lesson 1 · Purpose of government and the three branches
  • · Pennsylvania Civics, Lesson 2 · The three branches: the joint-ticket Governor and the biggest legislature in the nation
  • · Pennsylvania Civics, Lesson 3 · Pennsylvania's courts: elected, then retained

  What we do and don't cover: Partial: the three branches and the checks and balances between them are taught directly, federally and (through the flagship) in Pennsylvania's own structure — the largest full-time legislature and its partly-plural executive. The standard's specific focus on how power has SHIFTED among the branches over time is not a course focus.

• 5.1.12.A

  Partially covered

  Analyze the sources, purposes, functions of law, and how the rule of law protects individual rights and promotes the common good.

  Covered by

  • US Constitution 101: The Document That Builds the Government
  • The Bill of Rights: Know Your Rights

  • · US Constitution 101, Lessons 2-9 · the Constitution analyzed article by article
  • · Know Your Rights, Lesson 2 · Freedom of speech: what's protected, and what isn't
  • · Know Your Rights, Lesson 5 · Speech and religion at school, and online
  • · Know Your Rights, Lesson 7 · Police stops, reasonable suspicion, and your privacy

  What we do and don't cover: Partial: the Constitution's purposes (analyzed article by article) and how the rule of law both protects and constitutionally limits rights are taught. The standard's broader jurisprudential sweep (the sources and functions of law generally) is not worked systematically.

• 5.1.12.B

  Partially covered

  Employ historical examples and political philosophy to evaluate the major arguments advanced for the necessity of government.

  Covered by

  • US Civics 101: How American Government Works

  • · US Civics 101, Lesson 1 · Purpose of government and the three branches

  What we do and don't cover: Partial: the purpose of government is taught as the opener of the federal civics course. The standard's political-philosophy method (evaluating competing arguments for government's necessity) is not itself a unit.

• 5.2.12.A

  Partially covered

  Evaluate an individual's civil rights, responsibilities and obligations in various contemporary governments.

  Covered by

  • Citizenship & Naturalization Basics
  • The Bill of Rights: Know Your Rights
  • Jury Duty & the Courts (the citizen's side)

  • · Citizenship & Naturalization Basics, Lesson 7 · Rights and responsibilities of citizenship
  • · Know Your Rights, Lesson 2 · Freedom of speech: what's protected, and what isn't
  • · Know Your Rights, Lesson 5 · Speech and religion at school, and online
  • · Know Your Rights, Lesson 7 · Police stops, reasonable suspicion, and your privacy
  • · Jury Duty & the Courts · the whole course (the citizen's side of the court system)

  What we do and don't cover: Partial: an individual's civil rights, and the obligations that come with them (jury service is an entire course; obeying laws and paying taxes a lesson), are taught for the United States. The comparison across “various contemporary governments” is not.

• 5.3.12.D

  Partially covered

  Evaluate the roles of political parties, interest groups, and mass media in politics and public policy.

  Covered by

  • Voting & Elections 101
  • Spotting Misleading Marketing

  • · 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
  • · Spotting Misleading Marketing, Lesson 3 · Weasel words and what the fine print takes back
  • · Spotting Misleading Marketing, Lesson 5 · Fake reviews, astroturfing, and undisclosed #ads

  What we do and don't cover: Partial: how parties and primaries work is taught, as is reading media for omission and reliability. The standard's focus on interest groups and mass media in shaping public policy specifically is not the courses' angle.

• 5.3.12.H

  Partially covered

  Evaluate the role of mass media in setting public agenda and influencing political life.

  Covered by

  • Spotting Misleading Marketing

  • · Spotting Misleading Marketing, Lesson 3 · Weasel words and what the fine print takes back
  • · Spotting Misleading Marketing, Lesson 5 · Fake reviews, astroturfing, and undisclosed #ads
  • · Ep 15 · Doubt Is Our Product
  • · Ep 19 · Peer Review Versus Press Release
  • · Ep 20 · The Ban Against the Evidence (the UK banning khat against its own scientific advice)

  What we do and don't cover: Partial: critically evaluating media claims — reading for omission, spotting misleading statistics, identifying fallacies — is taught as a consumer skill. The standard's agenda-setting and political-influence framing is not worked directly.

• 6.3.12.D

  Partially covered

  Evaluate the role that governments play in international trade.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Sugar — The Sweet Revolution
  • Mexico: The Protection Contract, and the Trade Deal That Came for It

  • · Ep 4 · The Hidden Costs of Cheap Sugar
  • · Mexico, Lesson 7 · Mexico rewrites its labor law, and the 68-year gap that explains why
  • · Mexico, Lesson 10 · The Rapid Response Mechanism: an international labor rule with teeth
  • · Mexico, Lesson 12 · The limits, honestly: the cases the United States lost

  What we do and don't cover: Partial: government's role in trade is taught through two worked cases — the U.S. sugar program's quotas and tariffs, and NAFTA→USMCA's labor rules and their limits. A general treatment is not attempted.

• 6.3.12.B

  Partially covered

  Assess the government's role in regulating and stabilizing the state and national economy.

  Covered by

  • The History of Unions: America and the World

  • · The History of Unions, Lesson 9 · 1935: the year organizing became a right (the Wagner Act)
  • · The History of Unions, Lesson 10 · The hole in the law: who the Wagner Act left out
  • · The History of Unions, Lesson 4 · Two ideas about who a union is for: the Knights and the AFL
  • · The History of Unions, Lesson 5 · Haymarket, 1886
  • · The History of Unions, Lesson 6 · Homestead, Pullman, and the weapon that actually broke strikes
  • · The History of Unions, Lesson 13 · Taft-Hartley, 1947: what the law took back
  • · The History of Unions, Lesson 14 · PATCO, 1981, and reading the decline honestly

  What we do and don't cover: Partial: one arena of economic regulation — labor law, the Wagner Act and its rollback in Taft-Hartley and PATCO — is taught in depth as government shifting the balance between workers and employers. The wider regulatory and stabilization apparatus is not.

• 6.4.12.A

  Partially covered

  Evaluate the comparative advantage of nations in the production of goods and services.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Coffee — The Daily Global Connection
  • BVC: Tea — The Way of Tea
  • BVC: Chocolate — Food of the Gods
  • BVC: Sugar — The Sweet Revolution
  • BVC: Guayusa & Kola Nut — Forest Wisdom
  • BVC: Kava — The Root of Peace

  • · Ep 1 · Follow the Money: Bean to Cup
  • · Ep 2 · Who Gets Paid, Tea and Coffee Compared
  • · Ep 3 · The Commodity Trap
  • · Ep 12 · The Jimador's Share
  • · Ep 14 · Pattern 3: Labor Captures the Smallest Share (the smile curve)
  • · Ep 21 · The Smile Curve, Confirmed
  • · The Commodity Map itself, every episode pinned at its origin
  • · The Growing Belts map, production regions by latitude band and country
  • · Ep 1 · The Coffee Belt: Where Coffee Grows and Why
  • · Ep 3 · The Cacao Tree and the Narrowest Belt
  • · Ep 6 · Why Volcanic Soil Only

  What we do and don't cover: Partial: where commodities are produced and why, and who is paid what along the value chain (the smile curve), is the Commodity Map's spine. The formal comparative-advantage framework, by name, is not taught.

• 6.4.12.B

  Partially covered

  Assess the growth and impact of international trade around the world.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Coffee — The Daily Global Connection
  • BVC: Tea — The Way of Tea
  • BVC: Chocolate — Food of the Gods
  • BVC: My Daily Altar — Season Synthesis

  • · Ep 1 · Follow the Money: Bean to Cup
  • · Ep 2 · Who Gets Paid, Tea and Coffee Compared
  • · Ep 3 · The Commodity Trap
  • · Ep 12 · The Jimador's Share
  • · Ep 14 · Pattern 3: Labor Captures the Smallest Share (the smile curve)
  • · Ep 21 · The Smile Curve, Confirmed
  • · Ep 7 · Who Captures the Value

  What we do and don't cover: Partial: the impact of commodity trade — who captures the value and why producers stay poor while value accrues downstream — is taught in depth. A general assessment of trade's growth is not.

• 6.2.12.D

  Partially covered

  Predict how changes in supply and demand affect equilibrium price and quantity sold.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Coffee — The Daily Global Connection
  • BVC: Sugar — The Sweet Revolution

  • · Ep 1 · Price Shocks and Why You Keep Buying
  • · Ep 4 · From Luxury to the Cheapest Calorie

  What we do and don't cover: Partial: supply and demand are taught through real commodity markets — a frost in Brazil moving world coffee prices, and why inelastic demand absorbs the spike — not as equilibrium curve-shifting exercises.

• 7.1.12.A

  Partially covered

  Use geographic tools to analyze information about the interaction between people, places, and the environment.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Coffee — The Daily Global Connection
  • BVC: Tea — The Way of Tea
  • BVC: Chocolate — Food of the Gods
  • BVC: Sugar — The Sweet Revolution
  • BVC: Guayusa & Kola Nut — Forest Wisdom
  • BVC: Kava — The Root of Peace

  • · Ep 1 · Assignment, Option A, map the supply chain of 3 items from your morning routine
  • · Ep 1 · Assignment, Option B, Coffee Belt climate report, with maps and data tables
  • · The Commodity Map itself, every episode pinned at its origin
  • · The Growing Belts map, production regions by latitude band and country
  • · Ep 1 · The Coffee Belt: Where Coffee Grows and Why
  • · Ep 3 · The Cacao Tree and the Narrowest Belt
  • · Ep 6 · Why Volcanic Soil Only

  What we do and don't cover: Partial: the Coffee project has students prepare their own maps and data tables, and the Commodity and Growing-Belts maps analyze where commodities grow and why. The standard's full range of geographic tools is not surveyed.

• 7.4.12.A

  Partially covered

  Analyze the global effects of changes in the physical systems.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Coffee — The Daily Global Connection
  • BVC: Chocolate — Food of the Gods
  • BVC: Kava — The Root of Peace

  • · Ep 1 · Climate Change Is Redrawing the Map
  • · Ep 3 · A Two-Degree Threat
  • · Ep 6 · Why Volcanic Soil Only
  • · Ep 10 · Karst Limestone and Bourbon
  • · Ep 1 · Assignment, Option B, assess a producing country's climate viability and defend the assessment
  • · Ep 6 · Islands Under Pressure
  • · Ep 8 · Beer Geography Is Shifting

  What we do and don't cover: Partial: how changes in climate reshape where commodities can grow — and the published forecasts of that shift for coffee, cacao, and kava growers — is taught with the evidence supplied. It is one worked thread through the physical-systems changes the standard names, not a survey of them.

• 8.3.12.D

  Partially covered

  Evaluate how conflict and cooperation among groups and organizations in the U.S. have influenced the growth and development of the world.

  Covered by

  • The History of Unions: America and the World
  • The Great Migration: How Six Million People Remade America

  • · The History of Unions, Lesson 4 · Two ideas about who a union is for: the Knights and the AFL
  • · The History of Unions, Lesson 5 · Haymarket, 1886
  • · The History of Unions, Lesson 6 · Homestead, Pullman, and the weapon that actually broke strikes
  • · The History of Unions, Lesson 16 · The colour bar: unions' own history of exclusion
  • · The History of Unions, Lesson 17 · Randolph to Memphis: the labor half of the civil-rights movement
  • · The Great Migration, Lesson 4 · Routes and railroads: the three streams
  • · The Great Migration, Lesson 5 · Arrival: Chicago, Detroit, New York, and the Pacific Northwest
  • · The Great Migration, Lesson 9 · Faith, family & mutual aid
  • · The Great Migration, Lesson 2 · The Jim Crow South: what people were fleeing
  • · The Great Migration, Lesson 12 · The long shadow, and the return

  What we do and don't cover: Partial: the standard's named content categories include “Working conditions,” “Ethnicity and race,” and “Immigration,” and the catalog teaches all three in depth — the labor movement, the labor half of the civil-rights movement, and the Great Migration out of the Jim Crow South. “Military conflict” and “Economic stability” are not the courses' subject.

• 8.4.12.D

  Partially covered

  Evaluate how conflict and cooperation among groups and organizations have impacted the development of the world today, including its effects on Pennsylvania.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Tea — The Way of Tea
  • BVC: Guayusa & Kola Nut — Forest Wisdom
  • BVC: Kava — The Root of Peace
  • BVC: Sugar — The Sweet Revolution
  • Poland: Solidarność, When a Union Brought Down a State

  • · Ep 2 · Who Grows the Tea (colonial and plantation labour)
  • · Ep 5 · Whose Knowledge Is It
  • · Ep 6 · Kava Governs
  • · Ep 17 · The Opium Wars
  • · Ep 20 · The Ban Against the Evidence
  • · Ep 4 · The Triangular Trade and the Middle Passage
  • · Ep 4 · Resistance and Revolution
  • · Ep 11 · The Maroons
  • · Ep 11 · The Haitian Revolution
  • · Poland: Solidarność, Lesson 3 · A workers' state with a worker problem
  • · Poland: Solidarność, Lesson 7 · 13 December 1981: the state answers (martial law)
  • · Poland: Solidarność, Lesson 8 · 1989: a union negotiates a state out of existence

  What we do and don't cover: Partial: world conflict and cooperation are taught through imperial and colonial systems and the resistance to them, and through the Cold War's end in Poland. The standard's “effects on Pennsylvania” framing is not addressed by these courses.

• 8.3.12.C

  Partially covered

  Evaluate how continuity and change in U.S. history are interrelated with the world.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Coffee — The Daily Global Connection
  • BVC: Tea — The Way of Tea
  • BVC: Chocolate — Food of the Gods
  • The History of Unions: America and the World

  • · Ep 1 · Follow the Money: Bean to Cup
  • · Ep 2 · Who Gets Paid, Tea and Coffee Compared
  • · Ep 3 · The Commodity Trap
  • · Ep 12 · The Jimador's Share
  • · Ep 14 · Pattern 3: Labor Captures the Smallest Share (the smile curve)
  • · Ep 21 · The Smile Curve, Confirmed
  • · The History of Unions, Lesson 4 · Two ideas about who a union is for: the Knights and the AFL
  • · The History of Unions, Lesson 5 · Haymarket, 1886
  • · The History of Unions, Lesson 6 · Homestead, Pullman, and the weapon that actually broke strikes

  What we do and don't cover: Partial: of this standard's named categories, “Commerce and industry” is taught in depth — commodity value chains and the industrial labor movement, both tied to the wider world. The other categories (belief systems, technology, geography, social organizations) are not the focus.

• 8.4.12.C

  Partially covered

  Evaluate how continuity and change have impacted the world today.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Chocolate — Food of the Gods
  • BVC: Sugar — The Sweet Revolution
  • BVC: Guayusa & Kola Nut — Forest Wisdom
  • BVC: My Daily Altar — Season Synthesis

  • · Ep 3 · Conquest and the Great Reversal
  • · Ep 4 · The Triangular Trade and the Middle Passage
  • · Ep 11 · The Triangular Trade
  • · Ep 12 · Burning the Books (the destruction of the Mesoamerican codices)
  • · Ep 15 · From Sacred to Commodity
  • · Ep 5 · How Coca-Cola Got Its Name (biopiracy)
  • · Ep 7 · The Same Story, Six Times
  • · Ep 11 · The Debt of Freedom (the 1825 French indemnity and Haiti's modern poverty)

  What we do and don't cover: Partial: “Commerce and industry” — the Columbian exchange, conquest, and how colonialism persists and evolves in the present — is taught in depth. The standard's other content categories are not covered.

• CC.8.5.11-12.F

  Covered

  Evaluate authors’ differing points of view on the same historical event or issue by assessing the authors’ claims, reasoning, and evidence.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Sugar — The Sweet Revolution
  • BVC: Chocolate — Food of the Gods
  • BVC: Guayusa & Kola Nut — Forest Wisdom

  • · Ep 4 · Whose Voice Tells the Story, Beckford (1790) against Equiano (1789) and Mary Prince (1831) on the same plantation world
  • · Ep 3 · Two Ways of Seeing a Bean
  • · Ep 5 · Two Ways of Knowing
  • · Ep 18 · Whose Voice

  Note: The strongest single ELA alignment. Ep 4 puts a planter's euphemism and passive voice directly against two first-person accounts by formerly enslaved writers, and teaches the student to assess each author's claims and evidence.

• CC.8.5.11-12.I

  Covered

  Integrate information from diverse sources, both primary and secondary, into a coherent understanding of an idea or event, noting discrepancies among sources.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Sugar — The Sweet Revolution

  • · Ep 10 · The Oral History That Survived (recovering Nathan “Nearest” Green's erased role)
  • · Ep 4 · Whose Voice Tells the Story

  Note: “Noting discrepancies among sources” is the whole point of the Nathan Green lesson: the documentary record and the oral record disagree, and the episode teaches why oral history is a legitimate scholarly method for resolving that.

• CC.8.5.11-12.C

  Partially covered

  Evaluate various explanations for actions or events and determine which explanation best accords with textual evidence, acknowledging where the text leaves matters uncertain.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Sugar — The Sweet Revolution
  • BVC: Chocolate — Food of the Gods
  • BVC: Guayusa & Kola Nut — Forest Wisdom

  • · Ep 4 · Whose Voice Tells the Story, Beckford (1790) against Equiano (1789) and Mary Prince (1831) on the same plantation world
  • · Ep 3 · Two Ways of Seeing a Bean
  • · Ep 5 · Two Ways of Knowing
  • · Ep 18 · Whose Voice

  What we do and don't cover: Partial: evaluating competing accounts of the same events against their evidence is the Whose Voice method. The standard's “acknowledging where the text leaves matters uncertain” is not itself a focus of the lessons.

• CC.8.6.11-12.F

  Partially covered

  Conduct short as well as more sustained research projects to answer a question (including a self-generated question) or solve a problem; narrow or broaden the inquiry when appropriate; synthesize multiple sources on the subject, demonstrating understanding of the subject under investigation.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Coffee — The Daily Global Connection

  • · Ep 1 · Assignment, all four options are 2-3 week research projects requiring synthesis across sources

  What we do and don't cover: Partial: only the Coffee episode currently ships a graded research assignment. Where it runs, it meets this standard squarely.

• CC.8.6.11-12.G

  Partially covered

  Gather relevant information from multiple authoritative print and digital sources, using advanced searches effectively; assess the strengths and limitations of each source in terms of the specific task, purpose, and audience; integrate information into the text selectively to maintain the flow of ideas, avoiding plagiarism and overreliance on any one source and following a standard format for citation.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Coffee — The Daily Global Connection

  • · Ep 1 · Assignment, Option B, 3+ peer-reviewed sources and an APA bibliography
  • · Ep 1 · Assignment, Option C, interview ethics: informed consent, right to review

  What we do and don't cover: Partial, same reason as CC.8.6.11-12.F: the Coffee project's Options B and C require gathering authoritative sources with an APA bibliography, but it is the only graded assignment currently shipping.

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 Pennsylvania Core mathematics standard.
• Science — nothing, and here is exactly why. Pennsylvania did NOT adopt the NGSS. Its standards in force are the STEELS standards (Science, Technology & Engineering, Environmental Literacy & Sustainability, effective July 2025), which are Pennsylvania's own — so, unlike California, New York, and D.C., there is no shared NGSS performance expectation to adopt here. This is also not a science course (no lab work, no investigation, no modelling). The catalog's resource-availability and climate-change content is claimed instead under Pennsylvania's Geography standard 7.4.12.A, where it honestly belongs.
• The Pennsylvania Civics flagship's distinctive structure has mostly no code to cite. Pennsylvania Civics: How Your State Government Works teaches the nation's largest full-time state legislature (a 203-member House and 50-member Senate), the elected-then-retained judiciary (partisan election to 10-year terms, then nonpartisan yes/no retention, with the Superior and Commonwealth intermediate courts), how a bill becomes a Pennsylvania law (the three-considerations rule, the two-thirds override, and the Governor's line-item veto on appropriations), and Pennsylvania's 67 counties with their ACTIVE township layer — Pennsylvania does NOT abolish townships — under home-rule and code municipalities. Pennsylvania's 2009 Civics standards reach the Commonwealth's own constitution and rights (5.1.12.D, 5.1.12.E) and general electoral processes (5.3.12.E), which the course backs, but the legislature's size, the elected judiciary, the state lawmaking process, and the township layer have no Pennsylvania-specific code. The gap is in the standards, not the course.
• Act 77 mail-in voting and Pennsylvania's other election specifics. The flagship teaches Act 77 no-excuse mail-in voting (struck down then upheld in McLinko v. Department of State, 2022), closed primaries, first-time-voter ID, and the 15-day registration deadline with no same-day registration. Pennsylvania's Civics standards name only “United States electoral processes” (5.3.12.E), with no Pennsylvania-specific election standard, so we claim Pennsylvania's own rules only through that general standard and the flagship. The specifics have no code.
• The Opium Wars and the Haitian Revolution — Pennsylvania's history standards are too abstract to name them. The catalog teaches both in depth. Pennsylvania's 2009 History standards are analytical standards organized by broad categories (“conflict and cooperation,” “continuity and change”) rather than by specific events, so — unlike Washington, D.C., whose standards name them explicitly — there is no Pennsylvania standard that names the Opium Wars or the Haitian Revolution to cite. We claim the world-history content only through the broad 8.4 categories, and mark those partial.
• Personal finance and most of the Economics framework. Scarcity and opportunity cost as named concepts (6.1), market competition and economic indicators (6.2.A-C, E, F), public goods and taxation policy (6.3.A, C), and the multinational-corporation and technology standards (6.4.C, D) were checked against the Grade 12 Economics framework and are not genuinely taught by these courses. We claim only the economic-systems, government-in-trade, labor-regulation, comparative-advantage, and supply-and-demand standards the catalog actually reaches.
• The general-ELA rhetoric standard, and the science/technical literacy strand. Pennsylvania revised Common Core's RI.11-12.6 (rhetoric) in its general Core ELA (CC.1.2.11-12.D reads differently), so we do not claim it — the catalog's honest, verbatim literacy home is the History/Social-Studies strand (8.5/8.6) mapped above. Pennsylvania's Reading and Writing in Science and Technical Subjects (3.5/3.6) strand is likewise not claimed by this history-and-economics catalog.
• The AI-literacy ladder, the language courses, and Learning How to Learn — deferred, not denied. Pennsylvania's relevant frameworks for these (Business, Computer and Information Technology; World Languages) have not been fetched and verified yet. Our rule is fetch-or-don't-cite, so these courses carry no Pennsylvania claims this pass.