Science Education; *State Standards IDENTIFIERS *Florida

Despite most U.S. states developing new mathematics standards to serve as the cornerstone of their education reform efforts, little is known how standards are conceptualized, developed, and debated within political contexts. This paper provides a synopsis of a two-year case study on the development of Florida's mathematics standards. Florida first developed standards in 1994 where the writing team, consisting entirely of mathematics educators, strategically wrote the standards to convey their goals for reform in mathematics education. However, due to changes in the political context, these standards underwent major revisions from 1995-1996. This paper provides insight into Florida's political struggle to develop mathematics standards. (Author) Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the ori inal document