Jessica McNair, a board member of New York State Allies for Public Education–a coalition of fifty parent and educator groups–explained why the opt out movement will not back down this spring. In 2015, about 20% of all eligible students refused the state Common Core tests. That was about 240,000 students. That shook up the state leadership, who have been busily devising ways to appear to placate the angry parents of New York.
Bottom line: Despite promises and threats, nothing has changed for the children. “Shortening” the tests translates into dropping one question. Making the tests untimed for students with disabilities mean these children will be tested even longer than before.
Testing will continue to be the central driving force in the schools.
Opt out will not disappear. It will become the norm, if NYSAPE is successful.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
CBS This Morning ran a promo, today, for Donors Choose. A couple of months ago, charter schools received the favorable treatment.
In 2011, David Rhodes, formerly with Fox and Bloomberg, was appointed President of CBS News, including the morning programming. During his tenure, CBS has become the face of corporate spin. Rhodes’ brother is in the Obama administration.
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Love how public school funding has now been designated a charity.
That’s a great message to send to kids. They can tell how much the US public and government values their education, huh? We’ve turned it over to how many donors they can attract on the internet. They’ll compete for funding to develop grit.
Gosh, I hope our kids come up with appealing pleas for charity and are considered worthy of funding, because obviously none of us have any duty or responsibility to pay for anything we don’t personally support.
It’s always winners and losers with these people. Always.
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“Paying to fund public schools” used to make you a member of the public accepting an ordinary adult duty and paying back what was given to you – no strings attached- by prior generations.
Now it makes you a “hero” and the kids have to compete to be deemed worthy of your generous donations.
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Chiara: you nailed it!
According to the the self-styled “education reform” movement: public school students and staff and parents and their associated communities are to be rendered supplicants competing against each other to see if a few are deemed not-so-unworthy as to be favored with the largesse of their social betters. Translation: few winners and many losers.
Noblesse oblige: what’s old is new again.
Thank you for your comments.
😎
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Jonathan Zittrain made an observation to the effect of “what about taxes” for funding public infrastructure and public goods a while back.
Check out all of the libertarian and venture capitalist class responses to his common sense statement. It would be comic if not for the fact that they are serious and making inroads to privatizing and disrupting important services.
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Google’s largesse, announced this morning, in matching donations to Donor’s Choose, gained good press for Google CEO, Sundar Pichai.
Forbes article title, Aug. 1, 2013, “Google Among Top US Companies Parking Cash Offshore to Reduce Taxes, Study Says.” What a shock, CBS’s morning co-hosts didn’t pose the obvious question.
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Chiara, Donors Choose seems to be an Internet-age version of the PTA bake sale/plant sale/book fair that have been common for decades. It also means that an individual teacher who’s fired up about a project can make it happen when the state funding must cover required items.
Yes, I recall the VietNam War era poster: “It will be a great day when schools have all the money they need and the Air Force has to hold a bake sale to buy a bomber”
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The teachers at (at least) one of Manhattan’s most highly regarded elementary schools recently sent a letter to parents stating that the tests are damaging and encouraging parents to opt out.
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I think the made a mistake selling the Common Core solely on the tests, which surprises me considering how well-funded and really high-level the marketing effort was.
I really would have been open to “improving public schools” particularly because there’s been little or no attention paid to public schools (other than negative attention) in the last 15 years of ed reform in Ohio.
Do they know their entire focus is on “more difficult tests”? This thing is GRIM.
They’ve become “choice and accountability” and since “choice” isn’t relevant to 93% of parents in this state that means the only thing we have to show after 15 years of massive investment in ed reform is new tests. They thought people would be excited?
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When I was working through the mess made by standardized testing in our district, before long I came to see that it is not actually the theory of common standards for a nation which won’t hold water, but the MASSIVE testing/curricula money being tied around its neck. Over and over I hear how people — both on the right and left — have been led to their hatred of the Common Core, but there is very little recognition that it is the testing (and all attached corporate BS) that they really hate. SO: we will simply have leaders who win votes by “hating” the “Common Core,” but who will then continue to push testing, technology and a forced curricula under other names.
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Just trying to understand things:
A few months ago all the talk was about how opt out was going to be even larger for 2016, with lots of people predicting a doubling.
Now the word seems to be “opt outs will continue!!!!!” Very different.
So what’s the deal? Are opt outs going to exceed last years numbers or no?
I ask because anything less than last year or equivalent to last year will be regarded as a win and containment of opt out. A vindication of politicians, etc. efforts to contain opt out.
It matters.
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Diane, please check out this article about privatization efforts by ALEC. Opting out is the best democratic means we have for resisting all these Koch brothers-funded schemes.
http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/35144-cashing-in-on-kids-172-alec-education-bills-push-privatization-in-2015
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Thanks, DL, will do.
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It still amazes me that Arne Duncan expressed absolute, withering contempt for the opt out parents in NY and that was not only encouraged but cheered on by ed reformers.
Strangest marketing effort I have ever seen. It basically consisted of scolding people, telling them over and over their children were mediocre AT BEST and accusing them of “self interest” anytime they expressed even the slightest misgivings. They’re still at it. They intend to harangue people into “supporting” this test, or at least showing up for it.
That the campaign cost tens of millions of dollars and was run by political professionals just adds to the mystery. Bill Gates is due a refund. He was robbed.
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Stiles
March 10, 2016 at 10:17 am
Jonathan Zittrain made an observation to the effect of “what about taxes” for funding public infrastructure and public goods a while back.
Why should I support your schools with my taxes?
Make your pitch for gym equipment and if I like it I’ll give you 3 dollars. Let’s let the market decide if those kids are worthy of a playground ball.
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Just wait until local businesses start sponsoring specific teaching positions they favor in public schools. I am afraid this will happen, if it has not already started.
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My gosh, local companies could “endow” teaching positions. I could be sponsored by a local sand and gravel pit, or by an environmental consulting company.
Lawyers endow social studies teachers, Mexican restaurants endow Spanish teachers.
It would be great! We’d wear clothing with logos and advertising on them like Little League uniforms.
I’m hoping for a pocket polo (in a 2XL) with “Miller’s Weed and Feed” on the back.
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It’s becoming obvious that New York State is on a desperate crusade to $ave their beloved hedgefund backed Rheeform. They’re slapping everything against the wall hoping something will stick. Timing – what timing? Now your kids can have the pleasure of sitting for even more hours trying to decipher a convoluted test which has been preordained to fail a certain percentage. Oh – and did we forget to tell you that it won’t count?? Well, except for teachers (but when it doesn’t). Test prep? No, no, no – we don’t do test prep – the whole curriculum is test prep. Project based learning? What’s that? We spend all of our time getting “text evidence.” This is preparing your kids for “college and career”. Oh – your kids are no longer engaged; well let’s blame the teacher.
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YES. Always and forever, remember to blame the teacher! 🙂
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To whom it may concern:
Dearest all true conscientious veteran educators, parents and students;
This link will enhance the answer to our question for the future of American Public Education System:
Cashing in on Kids: 172 ALEC Education Bills Push Privatization in 2015
Wednesday, 09 March 2016 00:00 By Brendan Fischer and Zachary Peters, PR Watch | News Analysis
http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/35144-cashing-in-on-kids-172-alec-education-bills-push-privatization-in-2015
In summary, here are few important notes that we need to pay attention:
1) The commentary to ALEC’s original 1984 voucher bill states that its purpose is:
*** “to introduce normal market forces” into education, and
*** to “dismantle the control and power of” teachers’ unions by directing money from public institutions to private ones that were less likely to be unionized.
Friedman was more explicit when addressing ALEC’s 2006 meeting. He explained that vouchers are really a step
*** towards “abolishing the public school system.”
2) “How do we get from where we are to where we want to be?” Friedman asked the ALEC crowd.
“Of course, the ideal way would be to abolish the public school system and eliminate all the taxes that pay for it. Then parents would have enough money to pay for private schools, but you’re not gonna do that.”
Instead, Friedman said, the politically feasible way of moving towards an entirely private educational system is through VOUCHERS:
So you have to ask, what are politically feasible ways of solving the problem.
The answer, in my opinion, is CHOICE, that you have to change the way government money is directed. Instead of it being used to finance schools and buildings,
***you should decide how much money you are willing to spend on each child and give that money, provide that money in the form of a VOUCHER to the parents of the children so the parents can choose a school that they regard as best for their child.
Please open the link to read a detail which is documented by the Center for Media and Democracy (CMD).
It is NOT NEW NEWS to most of veteran educators who were forced to be in Teachers’ jail or retired with falsified accusation of wrong doing from corrupted administrators and elected school board members.
The bottom solution is that all concern citizens should join with Dr. Ravitch’s NPE (Network for Public Education) to support the Presidential Election by voting a candidate whose career and action is all about the welfare of America and the well-being of American work-force.
Please remember that glamorized, or entertaining, or empty promise (= no credential in PUBLIC POLICY = democracy + humanity to society) from any candidates will result the sufferance to future generation of young American WORK-FORCE in term of EDUCATION and JOB STABILITY. Back2basic
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You GO NYS Opt-Out! Get this blog info out to major news outlets! Hold Cuomo’s feet to the fire: just because he ‘moratorium’ed’ the 50% test-score to teacher evaluation doesn’t mean the data disappeared– it’s being held as an ‘advisory’, to be used as soon as the heat is off! SPELL OUT for primary-school parents what that hour-a-day for 3 days, then again a few wks later, MEANS in terms of disrupted daily schedules, probably including lack of gym & library, & most importantly– ELIMINATING the spring as time for the year’s curriculum to coalesce into longer-term projects. TRUMPET the news re: untimed tests (I totally relate: 2 out of my 3 NJ kids were IEP: stdzd test-wks were doubly hard on them because they had to spend most of the day instead of part of the day on completing them).
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The moratorium in NYS only covers Common Core math and ELA grades 3 to 8. Every teacher in NYS will still have 50% of their evaluation based on either HS state REGENTS test scores, state SCIENCE (4 and 8) test scores, or LOCAL test scores.
Testing and test-prep did not go away bay any stretch of the imagination. This fact is often misrepresented in the media.
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Speaking purely as a private citizen:
No matter how one feels about opting out (do it/don’t do it), one has to acknowledge that opt-out has become the democratic voice of the populist masses who are not being listened to by the elected officials they vote for and for whose salaries and pensions they pay for with their taxes.
I am self-competitive; if I were a student today in high school or grades 3 through 8, I don’t know that I would be opting out or not. I was always like that as a child and still am as an adult. I don’t think my parents would have been keen on the idea of opt-out for me. Yet, I detest Darwinian, free market solutions as the core of a society’s functioning.
However, opt-out now represents civil protest, civic participation in government, and democracy in action.
If elected officials want to maintain the status quo, they CAN completely can because they are vested with the authority.
But if they want to maintain their jobs, their compensation, and their overall careers, then they had better start listening far more and more closely to their constituents.
Parents count critically . . . . They are here, and they are NOT going away.
As thickly coated in oligarchy and classism as American society is, opt-out is but one aspect of governance (but a powerful one) that proves that our democracy is alive and well and functions healthily.
What’s next?
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My first opt out letter arrived today. As a special educator I feel such relief to know my student will not endure the abuse of NYS Testing. I feel grateful that the letter was addressed to me, my principal and superintendent.
Next week a NYSAPE meeting will be held at our public library. I will be in attendance. One letter, one meeting-it all adds up. I will bring a friend.
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