Teachers align Spaces, tools, and activities to standards. If your district has adopted a specific standards authority, Preferred Standards let you make sure that's what teachers reach for — either by putting it first, or by making it the only option.
Looking for AI behavior guidance instead? See "Set Custom Instructions for Your District"
Who can set this up
A change here affects everyone in your organization, so access is deliberately limited to your district’s administrators.
Setup is part of your back-to-school kickoff with your CSM, who will help you identify the right person and walk you through your first configuration. Custom Instructions is part of Scale — your CSM can confirm what your organization has.
Where to find it: Click your avatar in the bottom-left corner and select “Organization” from the menu. “Standards” is the first section on that page.
How to set your preferred standards
Open “Organization” settings and find Standards — "Choose your organization's preferred academic standards."
Click “Browse standards” to open the Add standards picker.
Choose a Region (the standards authority). Search is unavailable until you pick one. Then narrow by Grade, Subject, or Strand if you only want part of it.
Select the standards you want and click Add. If you've filtered within a region, SchoolAI asks "Do you want the whole region, or just the standards listed here?" — choose “Whole region” or “Just these.”
Decide whether to turn on “Restrict to preferred standards only.”
You'll see a “Standards regions saved” confirmation and a summary of what's in effect (for example, "2 preferred authorities · 11391 standards") with each authority listed alongside the subjects it covers.
Before you've chosen anything, the section reads "No preferred standards yet. Choose the standards authorities your organization prefers."
Preferred mode (restrict toggle off)
Your district's standards appear at the top of every standards picker:
A banner reads "Your district's preferred standards — [your organization] keeps these at the top. You can still browse and add any standard."
Results are grouped under “Preferred by your district,” with a Preferred badge on your picks
A “Preferred only” toggle lets a teacher narrow to your set or open it back up
Teachers can still browse everything. Use this when you want to guide without constraining.
Restricted mode (restrict toggle on)
Turning on Restrict to preferred standards only means "Organization members can pick only from your preferred standards."
The banner changes to "[your organization] limits standards to these. Only these can be added." The “Preferred only” toggle disappears, there's no browse-everything option, and the Region dropdown offers only your chosen authorities.
Use this when alignment to your adopted standards is a requirement rather than a preference.
Tip: Start in preferred mode for a term before you restrict. Preferred mode tells you whether teachers actually reach for the district's standards when those standards are first in the list — useful information before you remove the alternative.
Where teachers see this
Everywhere standards get picked: creating a Space, working in the Spaces chat, and building a tool, as well as in organization settings itself. It's consistent across all of them.
Inheritance
Standards preferences inherit down your organization hierarchy. A school that hasn't set its own preferences uses the district's.
What Preferred Standards can help you do
Point teachers at your adopted standards instead of whatever a search surfaces first
Require alignment to your approved standards for a curriculum initiative
Give a new teacher a platform that already matches district expectations on their first day
Keep standards alignment consistent as your district scales
Frequently asked questions
Who can edit these settings? Organization administrators. Access is deliberately limited because a change here affects everyone in your organization. Your CSM will help you identify the right person.
Do my settings apply to my schools automatically? Yes. Standards preferences inherit down your organization hierarchy.
Can a school's settings override the district's? A school can be stricter than the district, never looser.
If I restrict standards, what happens to Spaces already aligned to a standard outside my approved set? Existing alignments aren't removed. Restriction governs what teachers can select going forward.
Can teachers see what standards are preferred? Yes. Teachers see your preferred standards clearly labeled in the standards picker, with a Preferred badge on your district's picks.
Is this available on my plan? Preferred Standards is part of the SchoolAI Scale plan. Your CSM can confirm what your organization has.
Does this cover every region or jurisdiction? Availability depends on standards data existing for a given region. This doesn't replace the broader standards catalog work — it's a layer on top of whatever standards data is already available to your organization.