The standards are copyrighted by NGA Center for Best Practices (NGA Center) and the CCSSO, which controls use of and licenses the standards.[9] The NGA Center and CCSSO do this by offering a public license which is used by State Departments of Education.[10] The license states that use of the standards must be "in support" of the Common Core State Standards Initiative. It also requires attribution and a copyright notice, except when a state or territory has adopted the standards "in whole".