NBPTS AYA Social Studies-History case studies
NBPTS AYA Social Studies-History · Put your knowledge to work in context.
National Board certification in Adolescent and Young Adult (AYA) Social Studies-History is a performance-based credential for teachers of roughly ages 11–18 who want to demonstrate accomplished practice against the National Board's professional standards. It is not a licensure test and it is not run by your state; it is a voluntary advanced certification earned through a component-based process rather than a single sitting. The NBPTS AYA Social Studies-History case studies are 5 cases and about 4,578 words.
1Four Sources, Six Reading Levels, Eleven Minutes Left
History runs 52 minutes with 32 sophomores. Six read at roughly a fourth-grade level, four are newcomer multilingual learners at WIDA levels 1–2, and three have IEPs for reading comprehension.
962 words, about 5 min2“Keep It Balanced”: A Parent, a Principal, and the 1898 Coup
An eleventh-grade U.S. History department of five teachers has adopted a new textbook whose Reconstruction chapter closes with a section called “Redemption,” describing the Compromise of 1877 as a return of “home rule” to the South.
978 words, about 5 min3Forty-Eight Minutes Is Not a City Council Hearing
Twelfth-grade Participation in Government meets in 48-minute periods. A six-day unit on local government culminates in a 90-minute mock city council hearing: a developer proposes 240 housing units, 48 of them below market rate, on the site of a former strip mall.
703 words, about 4 min4The Rubric Everyone Passed
Ninth-grade World History runs three sections of 30. The common document-based question asks students to explain how Roman roads and aqueducts supported imperial expansion, using five documents.
915 words, about 5 min5The Walkout, the Bill, and the Student Who Cannot Be Visible
Government, 28 students, in a district where a pending state bill would restrict how teachers address “divisive concepts.” A student group asks the teacher to sponsor a walkout during third period to protest the bill. A parent has emailed that politics has no place in a government class and that her daughter “will not be participating in anything political.” One student has told the teacher privately that she is undocumented and is afraid of drawing any attention.
1,020 words, about 5 min