United Opt Out sent a letter to Senator Lamar Alexander, who chairs the HELP (Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions) Committee in the Senate. Senator Alexander intends to rewrite No Child Left Behind (NCLB), which was originally called the Elementary and Secondary Education Act when it was first passed in 1965. At that time, the law was passed to send federal aid to poor districts. It said nothing about testing and accountability. But NCLB turned the federal law into a high-stakes testing mandate. Senator Alexander conducted his first hearing on January 21 and plans another hearing on January 27. Senator Alexander proposed two options in his draft legislation: option 1 was to replace annual testing with grade span testing; option 2 was to keep annual high-stakes testing (the status quo). UOO is opposed to high-stakes testing in the federal law, period. (So am I.)
Here is UOO’s letter:
United Opt Out Public Letter to Senator Alexander
January 22, 2015
Dear Senator Alexander,
There is a great deal of discussion about where education leaders and organizations “stand” when it comes to the latest revision for ESEA titled Every Child Ready for College or Career Act of 2015. In response, the organizers of United Opt Out (UOO) find that we stand between Scylla and Charybdis, between the proverbial rock and a hard place.
In your bill you pose the question of support for Option 1, a reduction in testing to grade span, or Option 2, which continues the current testing nightmare; we support neither. We find many items in the 400 page document too egregious and insupportable even though we do accept the notion of “grade span testing,” preferably via random sampling, as an alternative to what is in place now.
While we understand why many of our respected colleagues have shown support for Option 1 in your bill, we cannot endorse either. This is because both options are tucked neatly inside a larger bill that promotes the expansion of charters and other policies destructive overall to the well-being of students, public schools, and communities. Another reason we are reluctant, no matter what enticing promises are included therein, is due to those who lobbied for this bill in 2013: The National Alliance for Public Charter Schools, Alliance for Excellent Education and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which has immense ties to ALEC.
While we are inclined to support H.R. 4172 – Student Testing Improvement and Accountability Act sponsored by Rep. Chris Gibson and Rep. Kyrsten Sinema, which also calls for grade span testing, we would like to see additional safeguards included against possible punitive (i.e. high stakes) state policies. Also, as stated above, we prefer random sampling. In our assessment, H.R.4172 does not go far enough to protect children, educators, and communities against state policies that are damaging in nature in spite of good intent. To elaborate, this bill requires those tests be administered at least once during: (1) grades 3 through 5, (2) grades 6 through 9, and (3) grades 10 through 12. However, “under H.R. 4172, the states would retain the ability to exceed federal testing requirements if they seek to do so.” In other words, students could be tested just as much as they are now if states choose to do so. The bill is not a guaranteed protection against over-testing and its punitive consequences; it’s just a hope. We believe that hope alone is not sufficient.
Make no mistake, Senator Alexander, we understand fully that you are a supporter of the privatization of public schools. Despite that fact, your bill and Gibson’s may be preferable to some who are against the privatization of public schools because they contain the possibility of being better than the existing federal and state policies. However, they are not appealing to many, in particular states that have suffered the negative impact of high stakes testing. Furthermore, we can’t see how either of the current bills proposed are the “solution” to problems such as equity in funding, re-segregation, compromised pedagogy, data mining, or the intrusion of corporate interests – to cite from a list of many – that continue to fester in public education.
We agree that education decisions should be decided in state legislative and local district bodies, but safeguards should be in place to ensure horrific policies such as over testing and attaching results to student, teacher, school, and community worthiness are not pushed through state and district legislative bodies. Your bill and Gibson’s include no such safeguards for polices that have been detrimental to the non-white, special needs, immigrant, and impoverished communities.
UOO and most other human rights organizations will vigorously oppose ANY state level measures that sanction the following:
Increase standardized testing even if it’s under “state control”
Support using high stakes to make decisions about students, educators, school buildings, or communities
Use of sanctions such as “shuts downs” or “turn overs” based on test data of any kind
Display favoritism toward increased charters and state voucher programs
Facilitate data mining and collection of private student information
Engage in sweet insider deals between state policy makers and corporations or testing companies using tax-payer dollars and at the expense of safety, quality and equity in public education
Therefore, we demand greater safety, equity and quality for ALL schools and that includes the elimination of ALL standardized -paper based or computer adaptive testing – that redirects tax-based funding for public education to corporations and is punitive or damaging to children, teachers, schools, and communities.
We will not accept ANY bill until the following criteria are included:
Increased resources for the inclusion of local, quality curricular adoptions devoid of “teaching to the test”
Quality, creative, authentic, and appropriate assessment measures for general students, special needs, and English language learners that are sustainable and classroom teacher-created
Smaller teacher/student ratios
Wrap-around social programs, arts, physical education programs, and creative play recess
Career-focused magnet programs
Additionally, we demand legislation that supports a broad and deep system-wide examination of the power structures that perpetuate poverty-level existence for millions of Americans.
To conclude, we find ourselves having to choose between being shot in the head and being shot in the foot. For now, we choose neither. Instead we call for continued revisions of current legislation to include the items and protections outlined in this letter. We thank you for this opportunity to share our sentiments and our voice.
Sincerely,
United Opt Out Administrators:
Rosemarie Jensen
Denisha Jones
Morna McDermott
Peggy Robertson
Ruth Rodriquez
Tim Slekar
Ceresta Smith
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Sorry, but I cannot find the connection to send a letter to Senator Alexander about NCLB. Someone please send the link. Thanks.
Very well reasoned. Couldn’t be much more different than what we read about Jeb Bush in The New Yorker article.
Opt Out Palm Beach! I respectfully request the School Board of Palm Beach County, Florida to opt out of all standardized testing immediately. These standardized tests will devastate a whole generation of our children. Having attended the national United Opt Out conference last weekend in Ft. Lauderdale, FL, I am applying the activism I learned in giving a talk to our school board:
Good letter.
Compare and contrast 🙂
“DAVOS, Switzerland — Private equity investor Stephen Schwarzmann is generally a believer in the power of money, a trait that has netted him billions of dollars worth of that useful commodity. But when it comes to education, Schwarzman says more money is not necessarily a fix for ailing American public schools.”
Here’s my favorite part:
“I’ve always wondered, what you do in a society with people who just retire,” he told conference attendees. “If you could get those people, like a board, [to be an] unpaid workforce, pay them next to nothing or nothing, and have them go into the school system to be mentors to kids, and be an example of a certain type of success that you would get dramatically different outcomes. If you can get unemployed people that cost nothing, that can have this dramatic difference, that costs nothing. I love things that cost nothing that have great results. Imagine if you laid on technology and other types of things, you could really set the world on fire with this type of stuff.”
ww.ibtimes.com/blackstone-groups-stephen-schwarzman-says-more-money-wont-improve-public-education-1792794#.VMJ5NRkMDNs.twitter
Beautiful. Stephen S, is eloquent, isn’t he?
“UOO is opposed to high-stakes testing in the federal law, period. (So am I.)”
Boy, that did not come through at all in your letter urging Sen. Alexander to enact his “option A,” with federally required grade-span testing.
FLERP!
I am opposed to any federal role in testing.
But if asked to choose between annual testing and grade span testing, I support the latter.
Then the fight can move to the states, where parents might be heard.
Diane — What is your take on the fact that Alexander’s draft bill (including both Options 1 and 2) would eliminate the requirement that teachers of core subjects must be “Highly Qualified”?
FLERP, the highly qualified is a joke. It includes TFA. I would prefer real standards, not no standards or fake standards.
Diane, tell me again why you are “asked to choose between annual testing and grade span testing”? Who made the law that we can’t choose neither of these baseless corporate-wrecker demands?
So, will it be better if our children only face mandated reaping in their eighth, eleventh, and fourteenth year? Would that mean that only those years would be given over to maniacal test-prep, and the other years could be spent in slow, patient build-up for the Big Test?
Of course we’d need continuous formative test-aligned monitoring during the off-years, to make sure they were on-track to score in the coveted top 40%.
ChemTchr,
Senator Alexander offered two choices and only two choices: grade span testing or status quo. No test is not an option. He is writing the bill.
It is preferable to oppose standardized testing in its entirety rather than offer to compromise with Gates and Pearson. They do not have the best interests of American children at heart.
Proceeding step by step is darn frustrating, but I think it’s necessary to make as many people satisfied at the end as possible.
Using the Dark Side’s terminology, we have to proceed “strategically”.
Education policy making is not much more democratic at the State level than at the federal level, so we cannot just stop at moving decision making down to states’ level.
What do you think the eventual educational (not political) goal regarding testing? Get rid of all testing (including ACT)?
Reblogged this on Exceptional Delaware and commented:
And this is why the situation in D.C. is so very tricky for folks to understand. There are far too many charter school supporters involved to make any permanent changes. This is why ALL parents need to OPT OUT NOW. If you don’t turn the key, the car will never start. This needs to happen NOW!!!
United Opt Out should be called to testify. They and the other anti-testing activists are the only reason we’re having a real debate about this. They earned it.
Chiara, I agree. UOO should be invited to testify.
Democrats have finally released some more vague goals:
“First, I am going to do everything I can to make sure schools get the investments they need to provide all of their students with a high-quality education. If teachers and principals don’t have the training, resources and support they need to advance their skills and help their students succeed, then very little else we do will matter.
Second, I’ll be fighting to expand access to early childhood education. Seattle and Washington state have led the way on this front, and it’s time the federal government pitches in so more kids in our state and across the country can start kindergarten on strong footing.”
I’d like some better analysis on pre-k funding. It’d be really easy for politicians to just shift K-12 funding to pre-k and call it a win. Democrats in particular have not shown much interest in the less fashionable public sector schools, so it would be line with that if they shifted money from the K-12 schools they don’t support to their new preschool programs.
Duncan runs around saying 28 states have increased preschool funding, but since 30 states have decreased k-12 funding, that’s a net loss for public schools.
http://seattletimes.com/html/opinion/2025523644_murrayopednochildleftbehind23xml.html
Everything said above is true. Further proof: Senator Alexander is a keynote speaker for a Brookings Institute Event on February 4th. The Brookings Institute advocates for the rapid expansion of charters. In fact, one of the Brookings trustees is Meryl Tisch’ s brother in law. Brookings loves the new bill.
Reblogged this on Network Schools – Wayne Gersen and commented:
This letter to Senator Alexander makes every point that needs to be made. Alexander is doing a bait-and-switch, trying to find allies among those who oppose testing to support a change to the law that will give STATES the option to test as much as they want and use the tests any way they want… If this passes as Alexander wishes it will metastasize the privatization movement rapidly.
“trying to find allies among those who oppose testing to support a change to the law that will give STATES the option to test as much as they want and use the tests any way they want”
When you say “the option to test as much as they want,” do you mean (1) the freedom to administer as few or as many tests as states see fit, or (2) the power to administer even more testing than they do now?
If the latter, how does Alexander’s draft bill give states the power to administer more testing than they currently have under NCLB? I don’t understand this point, as I understand NCLB to establish minimum requirements, not maximum limits.