Michelle Gundersen, a veteran teacher in the Chicago Public Schools, here describes how the school system is harassing parents and children who try to opt out of unnecessary state testing.
Her own son, without her prompting, said he wanted to opt out of the Illinois Standards Achievement Test (ISAT), a test that will soon be phased out and replaced by a Common Core test.
But it was not so easy for other children to opt out, because their principals quizzed them about who prompted them to do it.
In one case, a child was asked to take a visual survey comprised of emoticons, to explain how she felt about opting out and who urged her to do it.
Funny, isn’t it, that our education policymakers prattle on about “choice,” but the one choice parents are not allowed to make is to say NO to standardized testing, even to totally useless tests.
No choice there.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Hello. I feel the same way. There is no such thing as ‘school choice’. These rubber stamp School Board members talk about choice when there is none. 😦
It’s like a bad episode from ‘1984’. No Choice Means Choice.
I was going to say, it’s like something out of the former East Germany… where children were forced to inform on their parents. The parents were taken to work camps, and the kids “rewarded” by being placed in state orphanages or, at best, with families loyal to the state.
“Vee haff vayz of mecking you tawk.”
Jack – I “like” your comment
(Facebook continues to make its way into my real life)
*the* one choice? Under school “choice”, most choices are ones that parents can’t make. “School choice” means exactly what it says – the school makes the choice.
Parents are also given no choice when the public schools their children attend are closed and then the children have only one choice: to attend the new private sector charter school that took its place or end up traveling longer distances to another public school where the parents have had no involvement, no connection.
We’ve read about public schools in Chicago that were shut down over parent protests, parents who wanted their kids to continue to attend those public schools. When that happened, their choice was taken away by fiat—-and not through a democratic process.
The word “choice” has been hijacked because it is a popular meme in democratic cultures, but in reality the privatization movement has little or nothing to do with choice and everything to do with profits for corporations or to achieve religious and/or political agendas for special interest groups—for instance: libertarians, neo-liberals, no-conservatives or fundamentalist religious groups (both Christan and Islamic).
These groups do not represent a large enough majority by themselves to achieve their goals so they resort to subverting the democratic process through media propaganda campaigns they have waged for decades.
Reminds me of RTW laws. In order to unionize, a majority of workers must agree to a union. Then those who don’t want to join can opt out.
But if a majority doesn’t want a union, there will be no union at all. The minority who want a union cannot opt in.
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CPS is harrassing teachers, because they are afraid, and also because of their pocketbooks. These folks make money by abusing teachers, students, and parents. Follow the $$$$$.
Yes! You are so right. Without ALL the student data, their numbers mean even less than they do now and their re$ources dry up.
This makes me angry to no end!!! People send their children to public school with the hopes that they will receive educational instruction, not to have them interrogated about their parents decisions.
If this keeps up I am going to print up some red NO MEANS NO t-shirts and give them away.
I think this abuse has overstepped the bounds of federal civil rights law. Seriously:
DEPRIVATION OF RIGHTS UNDER COLOR OF LAW
Summary:
Section 242 of Title 18 makes it a crime for a person acting under color of any law to willfully deprive a person of a right or privilege protected by the Constitution or laws of the United States.
For the purpose of Section 242, acts under “color of law” include acts not only done by federal, state, or local officials within the their lawful authority, but also acts done beyond the bounds of that official’s lawful authority, if the acts are done while the official is purporting to or pretending to act in the performance of his/her official duties. Persons acting under color of law within the meaning of this statute include police officers, prisons guards and other law enforcement officials, as well as judges, care providers in public health facilities, and others who are acting as public officials. It is not necessary that the crime be motivated by animus toward the race, color, religion, sex, handicap, familial status or national origin of the victim.
http://www.justice.gov/crt/about/crm/242fin.php
Question: How does opting out count against the school when kids opt out? Is it only about losing government funds?
Question: why are certain 1st grade teachers giving their students Cs and lower for reading development?? Knowing the wide range of 5&6 yr old reading abilities, why would an enlightened teacher ignore child development and the complexities of meaning making and decoding to bring down a child’s esteem. Let’s talk about the culture of testing rather than individual tests.
Did anyone see this article from Slate this week about a visiting professor in Colorado who opted her two daughters out and was pretty much harassed by administration, pleading with her to reconsider. (Including the possibility that her daughters might get picked on for being troublesome by classmates!)
/standardized_testing_i_opted_my_kids_out_the_schools_freaked_out_now_i_know.html
I’m pretty sure had it not been for her background as a tenured educator and lawyer she would gave buckled to the pressures – how many parents who attempt to do the same are so overwhelmed that they end up tired and defeated?
http://www.slate.com/articles/life/family/2014/03