Researchers and experts increasingly agree about the role of curriculum materials in improving teaching and learning. With evidence that implementation of content standards in the classroom is less than desired (e.g., Kaufman et al., 2018b; Opfer et al., 2018, Polikoff, 2021), and given the complexity of the newest generation of college- and career-ready standards, there has been growing attention to curriculum materials in both policy and research. For instance, organizations like EdReports have sprung up to rate the quality and alignment of curriculum materials, and states have conducted their own curriculum materials reviews and have incentivized the adoption of better-rated materials. Perhaps the most prominent example of this trend is in the so-called “Science of Reading” movement—40 states have enacted laws that attempt to bring about improved reading instruction, and these policies generally emphasize the adoption of science-of-reading-aligned materials (Schwartz, 2025).
California has its own history with curriculum materials. The state has periodically evaluated curriculum materials in the core subjects and has put out lists of approved materials. The California Department of Education currently lists adopted materials in seven subjects. These lists are currently advisory, unlike some states that either mandate or heavily incentivize the adoption of approved materials. The state’s curriculum history also includes a prominent court case—Williams v. California, in which students sued the state for inadequate resources in their public schools (among them, curriculum materials). As a result of the Williams settlement, California established reporting requirements and audit processes that are intended to ensure that all children have access to sufficient curriculum materials (see Hutt & Polikoff, 2020, for more on the history and implementation of the Williams settlement).
Of course, it is not enough for schools and districts to adopt high-quality materials; if these materials are not used by teachers, they will not meaningfully drive instruction. There is some evidence from other states about strategies that states and districts can pursue to improve curriculum implementation—for instance, through state-provided or state-certified curriculum-aligned professional learning; improved alignment of pre-service teacher education with high-quality curriculum materials; and district adoption processes that cultivate teacher buy-in and authority (e.g., Kaufman et al., 2018a).
Given this context, and with new curriculum policies being implemented on the horizon (for instance, with the state’s recent passage of AB 1454 to bring “Science of Reading” reforms to the Golden State, as well as the 2025 state adoption of new mathematics materials), it is important to understand the current state of curriculum materials adoption and implementation in California. This analysis can offer potentially useful insights to state leaders and policymakers to guide better implementation in California schools and districts. To that end, this study examines the current state of curriculum adoption and implementation in California schools, drawing on three distinct data sources (described below). We address three primary research questions:
- What curriculum materials are currently adopted in math and ELA in California schools, and to what extent are these materials rated as “high quality” by EdReports?
- What do California district leaders report are the expectations for teacher curriculum use and differentiation of adopted curriculum materials?
- How do California teachers describe their curriculum implementation, supplementation, and differentiation?
To address the first question, we rely on publicly available textbook adoption data from California’s School Accountability Report Cards (SARCs), which have been collected and cleaned by the Center for Education Market Dynamics (CEMD). As a result of the Williams settlement and legislation, all California public schools are required to document textbook sufficiency on their SARCs each year (though not all districts actually fulfill this obligation, see Hutt & Polikoff, 2020, for a discussion of these issues). Typically they report the current textbook in use in each of their core subjects by grade span, as well as the adoption year. The CEMD collects and cleans these data, and they provided us with the most recent data available, representing the textbooks in use in the 2024-25 school year.
To address the second question, we rely on data from Getting Down to Facts interviews with 94 California school district leaders. Districts were chosen to vary on size (21 small districts, 52 medium districts (an oversample), and 21 large districts) and region (15-23 from each of five different regions around the state). The interviews covered a range of topics, but we extract only those data related to curriculum materials adoption and implementation. For more details on the sampling approach and the sample representativeness to California districts, see Gallagher et al. (2026); their paper provides compelling evidence that the sample is broadly representative of the state on observable district characteristics.
To address the third question, we rely on descriptive analysis of survey data from RAND’s 2024 American Instructional Resources Survey. More detail on that survey and its sampling and representativeness can be found in Doan et al. (2024). To conclude, the paper makes recommendations for policies that could get better materials adopted and more widely used in California’s schools.
