Leonie Haimson is a national treasure. She founded a group called Class Size Matters, which advocates for reduced class size. She is an unpaid worker for kids in Néw York and across the nation. She is also an expert on data-mining and student privacy. Through her research and testimony, she informed parents in seven states about the $100 million committed by the Gates Foundation and the Carnegie Corporation to create inBloom, a vast data mining plan. Once exposed, arents protested, state after state withdrew and inBloom collapsed.
Here is a public letter from a parent to Leonie Haimson:
The California parent wrote:
Leonie Haimson’s Opt Out Message Rang Out Loud and Clear on the West Coast
—What a small but mighty group can do—
—RestorePVEducation —
We had the privilege of hearing Leonie Haimson speak on April 12th in Rancho Palos Verdes, CA
Leonie spoke to the privacy issues, data mining and high stakes testing.
Parents heard loud and clear.
Today it was confirmed that 200 students out of a class of 464 Opted Out at Palos Verdes High School’s 11th grade class. Only approximately 40% are taking the SBAC.
Palos Verdes High School has a 98% rate of students going on to college.
We are already ‘College Ready’.
If Smarter Balanced thinks that CA parents have already been dumbed-down, think again.
Parents and community are waking up to the Smarter Balanced profiteering scenario and they don’t like what they are finding out.
Parents here questioned “Where is the Smarter Balanced Privacy Policy?” only to find out from Leonie that there is none. Absolutely no Privacy Policy to be found. How reassuring
Parents are questioning why Smarter Balanced has ‘locked out’ the public, school boards, administrators, parents and community from any information regarding the Smarter Balanced Executive Committee, its’ elections, decisions, agendas, minutes, etc.
There is no way to access the SB website for any of this type of information since September 1, 2014.
Yet Smarter Balanced is dictating policy decisions, lessons and testing to 17 states who have paid them with public funds.
Any decisions made by Smarter Balanced are done in secret, while Smarter Balanced functions on public funds.
Housed along with the CRESST center on the UCLA campus, parents fear, and rightly so, that the Hewlitt Foundation CRESST center is accessing our children’s data.
Why? And who else gets to see and use it?
Third party vendors are having a field day with our CA children’s data. We get the Big Data, Big Money Scheme. We don’t want that here.
While our local Palos Verdes Peninsula School District has been pouring funds to meet the unfunded mandates for technology, parents have stormed the Board room questioning why their children are in huge classes or combo classes.
Teachers have only seen a 2% raise over an 8 year period. There is no money for anything but technology to take the SBAC tests.
When asked parents will tell you that 1 teacher is worth a million computers to their child. We don’t need more tech to teach children–we need more teachers.
By 2012, 77 Palos Verdes teachers had lost their jobs, and have not been replaced.
What has come in instead is more computers and software.
Parents get it and will not stand for it any longer.
Thanks Leonie Haimson for bringing your message to CA. We are starting our chapter of Parents Across America.
Watch out Smarter Balanced–here we come!
Diane Ravitch's blog 
As someone who spent some time in Palos Verdes High School this is both heart warming and heart breaking to hear. I am so glad they are standing up for what is best. Years ago, PVHS had some of the best teachers I ever had the pleasure to work with.
No doubt one of the reasons the Opt Out movement has been slow in California is because Governor Jerry Brown and State Superintendent Tom Torlakson have fought against Duncan’s mandates, including waiting two years for tests to “count”. But it is also due to the lack of information getting to parents. In a report published last week, over half of California public school parents have never heard of online SBAC tests. Maybe that is why 3 out of 4 California parents think we have the right amount of testing! http://www.scpr.org/news/2015/04/23/51202/survey-finds-many-parents-know-nothing-about-new-c/
Like other parts of the country, getting the word out about these tests is going to have to be done by parents. Thank you to Leonie Haimson for bringing some of that New York Opt Out energy to the west coast, and bravo to these Palos Verdes parents for getting organized!
I should add that while attending the fantastic NPE conference last weekend, I talked with many of the New York educators who worked closely with parents to set up panel discussions all over the state. They were able to explain to parents what these tests were doing to their own classrooms. We cannot rely on schools, school districts or major newspapers to inform the public. We each must take it upon ourselves to find allies and start spreading the word.
It is very true. California parents do not know very much about how the publishing corporations have influence over the new education agenda. I’m amazed by how many parents in California are totally passive about this issue. I suspect because we are a very liberal state that many feel if they protest they are somehow betraying their party. Californians need to know that several liberals are against The Common Core. Yes I would love for anti-Common Core teams from NY to bring their some of their moxie to the west coast. I think if Californians knew that this is not a strictly conservative movement that they too would join the protest. They would be shocked to find out about the data mining and the developmentally inappropriate nature of the test. They would be horrified by the attempts of Pearson and other corporate entities to data mine information about our children.
The movement needs steroids in California. More visits from Diane might help 😉
Pearson is a bad word in many states, but others feel the same way about Smarter Balanced–and for good reasons and many of the same reasons.
A skunk is a skunk by any other name, & both tests are CCRAP!
Now, now, rbmtk, please don’t denigrate skunks by associating them with the SBAC and PARCC.
p.s. Again thanks for being a generous host!
Wow, I’m seeing this post on more California facebook groups and blogs by the hour. California is so big, we needed a visit from a New Yorker to introduce us to each other.
Perhaps it’s because we have Silicon Valley here and they are making billions selling their ‘wares’ to school districts.
Even Electronic Arts is making Common Core games for schools, such as Sim City.
Some folks are salivating at creating Charter Schools run by wealthy developers in large districts such as LAUSD.
Parents have to voice their opinions to their local and state representatives to stop Common Core and educate parents on their right to Opt Out of high stakes testing.
Diane, Is there a link available for that presentation regarding testing/data collection and SBAC privacy? Thanks! Cheryl
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Good for you, California parent! My husband’s family lived in RPV, but only the youngest brother (the other 2 kids were already in college when they moved there) attended RPV schools–which is, in part, why my in-laws moved there–excellent schools. Parents in excellent school districts here, in ILL-Annoy, have begun to protest & opt out, as well, as they are hearing from their kids about the tests & test preps, cutting into everything else, such as art, P.E. & recess. It’s a national disgrace, & Leonie is, indeed, a national treasure–hope RPV was just a stop, & that this is the Leonie Haimson traveling tour!
Excellent article! If you live in Los Angeles, please vote for Lydia Gutierrez for LAUSD on May 19th. LAUSD is the largest school district in California and we NEED her in this crucial position to represent the rights of parents and teachers.
While I see a reason to bring attention to testing through opting out as a protest in individual states, why don’t we see a stronger push in going to state legislatures to get the whole Common Core initiative out. I do not see how legislating a method for protest is focusing on getting rid of Common Core. It seems that most states are worried about the consequences of opting out and substituting bills dealing with the opt out movement over those dealing with getting us out of Common Core.
Jillian,
Public education belongs to the public. The best use of Common Core is as a resource, not a mandate, detached from all stakes for kids, educators, and schools. You have more voice in your state legislature than in Congress.
there was an article about LA schools told Apple they didn’t want anymore Ipads or notebooks loaded with Pearson material…and they want their money back!