The U.S. Department of Education has threatened to withhold funding from the state of Oregon if a bill passes allowing parents to opt out of Common Core testing.
“PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) — The U.S. Department of Education has sent the state of Oregon a letter, threatening to pull federal funding if Oregon lawmakers pass a bill making it easier for parents to opt out their children from standardized tests.
“The state could lose more than $140-million a year if the bill passes, maybe up to $325-million. Representative Lew Frederick is a supporter of the bill. He says losing funding has always been a thought but he tells KOIN 6 News, Oregon isn’t the only state fighting standardized testing.
“The bill doesn’t say get rid of the test.” said Frederick. “The bill says simply, here is a procedure for opting out of the test if parents come forward and want to opt out, that’s all it says.”
This money represents funding for the neediest students in the state.
The only time in the past that the Feds made similar threats was in the 1960s, when districts refused to desegregate, pursuant to federal law and court orders. Who imagined that the day would come when the ED would threaten to cut off funding if a state allowed parents to refuse the tests?
Diane Ravitch's blog 
I’m sorry, I don’t normally like to point out typos (I sure make enough myself), but “Iregon” is perfect. If the feds follow through on their threat, Oregon needs to show its ire in a really big way.
This a probably the start of a large pushback against opt out. What will make it really interesting is that we are heading into election season.
I say “Go ahead, Oregon”. This is the stuff that reaches the Supreme Court.
This signals the end for the Reformers. I’m really excited to witness the crash.
..also…
““The bill doesn’t say get rid of the test.” said Frederick. “The bill says simply, here is a procedure for opting out of the test if parents come forward and want to opt out, that’s all it says.””
If that is all they are going to do why on earth do they need a law ?
That’s my concern with these new “Opt Out” laws that are sweeping the country. It’s a very bad precedent to start passing laws saying that you can do something. This is, supposedly, a free country. The default is that you can do anything unless there’s a law against it. Next thing you know we’re going to be told we can’t, say, sleep in on Saturday because there’s no law that allows it. If we need a law, let’s outlaw testing.
Good point, Dienne
There’s an old saw that says, if it is not expressly prohibited, it is legal.
Or, prohibitions are easier to accept than compulsions.
Don’t step on the grass is more tolerable than you must step on the grass.
As an Oregon parent who opted two kids out of tests this year… The process for opting out is entirely chaotic and mixed up. Many parents in outlying school districts felt their children were punished for their choice to opt out. As it is, my oldest (11th grade) was confronted by the career office because they didn’t know he’d opted out even though the principal approved it.
This bill is hoped to establish process to eliminate that confusion – by ensuring parents know what their rights are. I heard rumors around the state that many schools lied about it even being an option.
It’s sad that this is needed. But I believe it is and have been writing letters in support.
Howard at 58,
Oregon very likely needs a law to protect students who opt out from intimidation by frightened administrators.
In California, there are discussions right this minute among parents and teachers who fear retaliation for merely informing parents or students of the legal right to opt out. We might not need a law that expressly allows teachers to do this, but clearly we need to be better informed about what is not prohibited. The forces to kill the opt out movement are getting stronger.
The bill really is a requirement on districts to not tread on the rights of students and parents. My boss is a chief sponsor. Here is a link to the text of it. https://olis.leg.state.or.us/liz/2015R1/Downloads/MeasureDocument/HB2655
We need a law because of how spineless the Oregon DoE has been when it comes to pushing back. They threatened the school districts who then, as usual, pushed it down to the buildings. In Portland teachers were explicitly told they could not advise parents or kids while at school and parents were excluded from some school grounds when they tried to hand out information flyers. We have a very strong Stand for Children group that claims to care about kids while stories of third graders crying and stressing out multiply. The variation in forcing compliance across the state was huge. Stay tuned.
You forget that SCOTUS has a majority of judges that support the reformers.
What would Hillary do? Bully Oregon?
Let’s ignore Hillary who has not stated a position. Better IMO to focus on Bernie Sanders and Lincoln Chaffee, and ask what they would do.
Forget Lincoln Chafee. He had a Jeb Bush “Chief for Change” when he was governor
And here come the federal lawsuits.
Good job, Arne. Threaten the entire basis of federally mandated accountability in a hissy fit over parental push back on your overreaching policies.
Arne wants this to be a higher court case, imposed before the next election, so if SCOTUS rules on opt out, it will surely be in favor of the Rheeformers.
Sure, go ahead, and with hold Federal Title I funds on the neediest–they do not make up the largest portion of school funding BTW–Stop the free lunch program, and watch the March in Wash., D.C.
It would be the 1960’s all over again. Go for it Arne!
That’s exactly what I am thinking, joan. This really is the debate: is federal funding for equity of access or equal outcomes as reported by test scores? That’s the argument we need to force.
Karen Wolfe, the purpose of ESEA was to provide more resources to poor children and their schools. Bill Clinton triangulated with his 1994 Goals 2000, requiring all states to have standards and tests, then George W. Bush went beyond that to require states to test every child from 3-8 and once in high school, with punishments for those schools that were not on track for 100% proficiency for all children in reading and math. Race to the Top made matters worse with VAM, punishing teachers if kids did not get higher scores every year.
If you recall, Billy Clinton withheld dedicated Federal money from public schools during his term of office.
Thanks Obama/Arne/Gates/Broad/Walton & Co.
The pacts made with the devils offered our children up for sacrifice.
Their jaws are clenched, the grip will not release, the parents pulling them to save their lives, teachers marching and blogging…while Billionaires haul $Z to The Caymon Islands.
Thanks to the AmericanGreed & Sickos who will sell their 1st-born to cash in on ‘Other People’s Children’, while CivilRightsLeaders continue to feed the Billionaires for their own kick-backs.
Where will this end?
What did we miss early on?
Are humans(?) really that lousy?
Here’s a good answer to your question “Where will this end?” from our perspicacious friends at The Onion. 🙂
http://www.theonion.com/article/experts-say-best-option-now-keeping-nation-comfort-50617
Mamie, which country is providing hospice service?
I hope we still have good years ahead of us…if only Billionaires & politicians took a long walk off a short pier.
I do think that our nation appears to be run by dysfunctional adolescents chasing the next buck, even if it’s only earned with dog walking, cutting grass, or pressure washing. We all know how well that usually turns out, or until they have enough for the next date.
Ohm! Ohm! Patience…
I reject the contents of this article. I see creative innovation and social progress most everywhere I go in America. The melting pot of our country is like no other and is working amazingly well. If you travel the country you will have more hope than the author of this article. Take time to talk with the people and visit trade shows. See the inventions!
Yes Mamie… The Onion… really hits the nail on the head!
This is a ploy to use the law to extort parents that want to protect their children against useless testing. Remember we once had laws that protected slave owners, and women were once “property” of their husbands. Laws are always ethical or moral; they often reflect the interests of powerful in the society by whom they are written.
Sorry, I meant to say “Laws are NOT always ethical or moral.”
In my opinion the Feds should not interfere if people choose to refuse testing.
I agree. I see this as federal interference and overreach. The feds should only get involved with issues of equity.
And here, on the issue of Federal interference, we have a basis of joining forces with the Right and the Tea Party to have the numbers to be heard in DC.
The hypocrisy and duplicity of the so-called reformers has no limits.
While they speak about “parent choice” (which translates as “We’ll undermine your public schools and force people into charters”), real parent choice is met with threats when it involves opting out of weaponized high stakes exams.
Michael Fiorillo: you beat me to it.
When is a “choicer” not a “choicer”? When s/he is a rheephormster.
They’re for choice—until they’re not for choice.
Double talk. Double think. Double standards.
Puts a whole new slant on their reflex bigotry towards public schools and the communities they serve:
“Hypocrisy is the homage vice pays to virtue.”
François de la Rochefoucauld, and a lot of old dead Greek guys, will not be on any CCSS-aligned standardized tests.
Wonder why…
😏
There it is – Federal intimidation at its best. You people really think Hilary is any different? Hope springs eternal! It’s time for the states to stand up to this kind of extortion. Let’s hope Oregon has the guts to stand up for State’s rights. And it’s past time for Congress to neuter the Dept. of Education. The fact that Arne Duncan, an un-elected bureaucrat, can even threaten such action is an unconscionable exercise in executive power, and the President must be held accountable.
The law is not necessary. Let the parents protect their children from the administrators.
Hilary is on Youtube record for supporting TCC. I’m sorry to tell you this.
For the past two years, Hillary and her Wall Street claque have paid for the endless and vast PR ads saying clearly that she is the only Dem candidate….the only game in town. Despite all that we know about her dirty dealings at Rose law firm/as Mrs.Prez/as carpetbagger Senator from NY/as Sect. of State, this brain washing has been picked up by the media, and Dem clubs, and they now make it a ‘done deal’ that she will be the candidate for Prez.
If parents and educators who believe in opt out will join in political action to deflect this ‘Billary’ and Wall Street, paid for stunt, we could have a real election including two far better candidates who do not come to the table with filthy hands, Bernie Sanders and Lincoln Chaffee.
I am so discouraged when my intelligent colleagues buy into the Right Wing plutocratic, ogligarchic, Clintons who grew hugely wealthy from Wall Streeters and banksters support, and who, with NO conscience, take money for their Foundation (where they take huge salaries) from the worst despots on earth. The Saudis adore the Clintons.
We must get some backbone to work against the Clintons, or we will see a greater betrayal than that of Obama with Duncan and CC.
Ellen – yes, absolutely. We must not give into Hillary’s version of TINA – There Is No Alternative. There are alternatives – much better ones.
Here’s an interesting article about Hillary’s meeting with the NEA. She carefully walks on the fence to make sure she doesn’t put her foot in her mouth, but she makes no effort to support public schools. Typical lawyer double speak!http://curmudgucation.blogspot.com/2015/06/hillarys-nea-audition.html
Hope everyone reads your link to Peter Greene as Curmudication. He gives facts plus opinion.
Well the Feds should never have gotten to this point of control and hopefully Oregon can be the first state to stand up to them. Maybe they will be the first of many states to take on the Feds if they actually follow through with their threats.
What is Bernie Sander’s view on education?
Bernie will be speaking at a smaller living room meeting in my area of LA next week. I will certainly lean on him to define his perspective on public schools v. charter, CC, testing, and opt out. Sadly, last year at a local Dem club meeting, I did the same with the now retired Congressman, Henry Waxman, who replied that “he knew little about it all,” but that “he loves charter schools.” So much for liberals.
Please share what you learn!
BTW, Bernie will be in LA to troll for some of the big money for his campaign at a wealthy donors home. Fortunately, I learned about this smaller meeting in a politically well known friend’s simpler home, but only this AM, and after complaining that plebian voters like teachers should have a chance to meet and question him. This lower economic level meeting is being held in the home where the husband is a teacher.
If you want in LA want to know more, please email me at
joiningforces4ed@aol.com
Given the chance to think about it, I can’t imagine Bernie being a fan of privatizing public education. He may need some education about the harm high stakes testing is doing, and I wouldn’t be surprised if he is not well informed about Common Core. It will be important to find out who is doing the research on education for him (or if anyone is). He has a lot of information to digest on many topics. Would Susan Ohanian be a good person to contact for suggestions?
So much for the DOE not overshadowing local control. Any pretext of that just evaporated.
Let them pull the funding – how well is that one going to fly? The DOE withholds money from poor and special ed. kids on the basis that local lawmakers want to ensure parents can make decisions about what is best for their children?
Good luck with that Arne. Throw out another one about how those soccer moms don’t want to hear the truth.
If the feds are supposedly trying to help children, then why withhold funds that are meant to help children? Pretty dumb to punish the kids because of the politics behind the situation.
It’s weird that Utah, which passed a law similar to Oregon’s last year, hasn’t been threatened by the feds. Of course, few parents opted out, probably because teachers aren’t allowed to tell parents about opting out. So maybe it doesn’t matter to the feds. With the distrust of the federal government in Utah, a threat to remove federal funding would probably increase opting out, so I almost hope the feds DO threaten Utah’s funding!
The Reformers know they have more of a chance of swaying their own ( liberals) than conservatives. It is kind of like how I have the right to make my child wear an outfit he or she may not like but I have absolutely no right or chance in getting my neighbors child to wear it.
Please, please, please stop with the “liberal” vs. “conservative” false dichotomy. There’s not a hair’s breadth of space between the views of Jeb Bush and Arne Duncan. Rahm Emanuel and Bruce Rauner are best friends. Andrew Cuomo and Scott Walker are two peas in a pod. In fact, most of the politicians genuinetly speaking out against rephorm (mostly lower level state and local representatives like Will Guzzardi in Illinois) are left-leaning. A lot of the conservative pushback to rephorm is just all about the federal over-reach thing. They’ve simply replaced Common Core with some nearly identical re-branded “state standards” and they’ve replaced PARCC with equally bad state-generated tests that have all the same flaws.
I agree with Dienne. In fact, this is a beautiful issue in that it crosses all defined political boundaries. As a democrat, I’m teamed with many conservative republicans who oppose this current education policy. It was originally a nominally conservative policy but once Teddy Kennedy endorsed it found liberal support.
So it crosses all boundaries – both in supporters and opposition.
“The Reformers know they have more of a chance of swaying their own ( liberals) than conservatives.”
The Reformers come from both sides of the aisle. It would be great to be able to determine whether there are more of them on the right than on the left. My money is on there being way more conservatives out there who are trying to bankrupt public education.
YES Dienne…today there is no difference between Dems and Repubs.
Dienne –
I think Chris Christie and Andy make a pair, too. That’d be some presidential ticket!
They ( The Reformers) are poking the sleeping lion with this one! This will create grounds for lawsuits. Are they sure they want to do this? Crazy Reformers.
I bet Arne won’t follow through. By the time the lawsuits catch up to this, he will be somewhere else, possibly working full time for Pearson, Gates, etc. at much more than he can get out of his federal job.
This tells everyone they feel desperate. Who wants to be in the same room as a desperate person? Not I. Lose ground, They will.
Why is it that parents are the supreme experts on what’s best for their children when it comes to school choice but not at all when it comes to testing?
I received an email from Education Week the other day advertising an online event featuring two researchers who’ve studied the Opt-Out movement. The event is funded by the Walton Family Foundation. It’s scheduled for Wednesday, June 17, 2015, 2 to 3 p.m. ET.
I’m not sure about the views of these researchers, but I don’t like Education Week, and Walton involvement isn’t a good sign. The phony reformers are pretty good at co-opting the opposition’s rhetoric and tactics to try to shore up their own baseless arguments and spin their slick PR. (See Marc Tucker.)
At least Ed Week isn’t calling Opt-Out a union movement. Still, I wonder what this webinar is intended to accomplish.
Here’s the email:
Inside the Opt-Out Movement
There has been much press coverage about the current efforts by parents to pull their children out of standardized testing. As the opt-out movement grows, it is clear that parents are not taking their frustrations silently. Long dismissed as isolated incidents or the protests of a few “white suburban moms,” this parent movement shows no signs of relenting.
In this webinar, Michael P. Evans of Miami University in Ohio will discuss his research findings on which parents are opting out, how the movement is galvanizing, and what it means for the future of K-12 policymaking. Jessica K. Beaver of Research for Action will delve into what the building movement might mean for state accountability systems, schools, and teachers. These researchers will draw on emerging data on opt-outs from their respective states. Given their long history with standards-based reform, Ohio and Pennsylvania make for interesting case studies on the movement’s potential significance for K-12 assessment nationwide.
Underwriting for the content of this webinar has been provided by the Walton Family Foundation.
Guests:
Jessica K. Beaver, research associate, Research for Action
Michael P. Evans, associate professor of family, school, and community connections, Miami University
This webinar will be moderated by Elizabeth Rich, Commentary editor, Education Week
I urge all readers to sign up for Education Week’s webinar on the opt out movement. It is funded by the anti-public school Walton Foundation. No leaders of the opt out movement are included. The information appears in a comment on this thread.
Arne Duncan is “bound to lose”
Arne Duncansteiner is turning American Education under the CCP regime–or Japanizing it under the pre-war imperial government of the early 20th century.
Can we dream for a day when the law allows for opting-in and the default is opting-out?
My dream, too. And the same policy ought to apply to the hoovering of data.
Parents in Oregon, as in all states, HAVE the right to opt out under the 14th Amendment and two subsequent US Supreme Court cases have affirmed that right.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/want-your-kids-to-opt-out-of-standardized-tests-the-constitution-may-be-with-you/2015/01/09/bea151b4-973a-11e4-8005-1924ede3e54a_story.html
Current Oregon law states that parents can opt out of state testing for reasons of disability or religion. There have always been people who have opted out of state testing. But since Smarter Balanced was introduced this spring, the number of parents opting their children out has skyrocketed compared to in the past, many using their religion or strong personal beliefs as their reason for opting out. There have been a wide variety of reactions from different schools and districts including, in some cases, the questioning of people’s religious beliefs by school officials. One large district stated that parents had the right only to opt out for “religion” and that their “personal beliefs” did not qualify as religion. That is clearly a violation of the 1st Amendment. No representative of the state should be defining what is and is not a parent’s religious belief nor requiring a parent to explain or justify those beliefs. The purpose of the bill is to CLARIFY that people have the right to opt out FOR ANY REASON and to require the state to provide uniform information to parents of that right and create a uniform process for doing so.
I have no idea on what basis Duncan and the feds believe they would have the right to withhold funding from Oregon should this law pass, but the bullying and fear tactics coming from the US DOE and our own ODE are not going to stop parents from opting out. We all smell something rotten, and it stinks to high heaven. If this law does not pass due to threats from the feds, I believe it will only galvanize the people who have been fighting against corporate education reform. We are fighting for our kids and our public schools. We will not be silenced and we will not stop.
Stand for Children is very active in our state and Toya Fick, their executive director, is frequently quoted by Oregon corporate news outlets spouting the “civil rights” line about why we need these tests. Stand for Children CEO Jonah Edelman lives in Portland, and Stand for Children originated here. Read about their history here:
http://www.rethinkingschools.org/archive/26_01/26_01_sanchez.shtml
I’m sure Edelman has called in all his favors from DC, but if he and Arne Duncan think that they will threaten the parents, students and teachers of Oregon into silent compliance, I think they have a big surprise in store. I hope Oregon’s legislators will continue to show the courage they have so far in working for their constituents, and not bow down to Edelman, Duncan and Bill Gates.
I love how the word “choice” only applies to certain things in the world of the corporate reformers. And how about that whole “state led” thing? Could their lies be any more transparent?
here’s the reason I would give if I were a parent in Oregon
“Religious Freedom”
My religion’s “Optoutism”
Satan is the test
I require a testorcism
To oust unwanted guest
Can the Supreme Court mandate that students try hard on the tests? Intentionally bombing the tests is another way to opt out.
But that harms teachers far more than just opting out.
I agree that intentionally bombing” the test is a bad idea.
On the other hand, opting out could actually help a teacher. If enough students opt out, the point is reached for any teacher evaluation model at which the sample size is simply too small to do “valid’ statistics.
Of course, that will not necessarily stop the fake statisticians in state ed offices from nonetheless “fudging” a teacher rating, as they did with NY teacher Sheri Lederman when her class size was below the minimum requirement. If you are bound and determined to do something, fraud will not stand in your way.
You’re right. However if students made it a coordinated and well-publicized action, the public would know that the scores (and teacher ratings) were invalid.
I have a suspicion that the reason reformista groups keep spouting off about “civil rights” is that the federal government really does not have the authority to be meddling in education otherwise. Certainly their threats to Oregon about clarifying parents rights to opt out of testing has nothing to do with civil rights. Since they can withhold federal funding for programs, they are trying to tie it to civil rights to legitimize their threats. They want their bullying to at least appear legitimate. In this case, they are really stretching.