Archives for the month of: April, 2018
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Oklahoma: Must-See Video of Teachers Chanting “Where’s My Car?”LINK ADDED

By dianeravitch
April 5, 2018 //
16

 

Oklahoma Governor Mary Fallin mocked striking teachers by saying they were just like “teenagers who want a better car. “

This video shows teachers rattling their car keys at the Governor and chanting “Where’s my car?”

If you read the thread, you will see that the teacher who took the video, Dawn Brockman, has been besieged by media outlets asking for her permission to air it.

@DawnBrockman

 

“Must see video: OK Teachers chant “where’s my car”& rattle their car keys in response to @GovMaryFallin who said striking teachers are like teenagers who just want a new car washingtonpost.com/news/education… twitter.com/dawnbrockman/s…

Categories Oklahoma, Resistance, Teachers

GAO Reports That Black Students Receive Disproportionate Discipline

By dianeravitch
April 5, 2018 //
29

 

 

This was posted by Politico Morning Education.

I don’t know which outrages me more:

1) the administration’s efforts to link the massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School to the Obama guidelines that sought to reduce disparate punishment based on race. As Politico points out, there is no evidence to connect the Obama guidelines with the shooting.

2) the statement that Betsy DeVos opened every meeting yesterday with an acknowledgement of the anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King’s assassination, and the suggestion that she was engaged in fulfilling his life’s work. What Chutzpah! She has been trying to slash the budget of the Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights and appointed a woman to run it who is opposed to its mission.

Politico writes:

KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM THE GAO’S SCHOOL DISCIPLINE REPORT: The GAO released fresh evidence Wednesday that black students, boys and students with disabilities are all disproportionately disciplined in the nation’s public schools. The report, based on data from the 2013-14 school year, comes as Education Secretary Betsy DeVos mulls a repeal of Obama-era discipline guidance aimed at curbing such disparities. The numbers in the report are jarring. Black students by far bear the brunt of every type of discipline – from in-school suspensions to expulsions and school-related arrests. For example: While black students accounted for 15.5 percent of all public school students, they represented about 39 percent of students suspended from school. Here are some of the key takeaways:

– Boys overall were more often disciplined than girls, but the pattern of disproportionate discipline affected both black boys and black girls – the only racial group for which both sexes were disproportionately disciplined in every way: In-school and out-of-school suspensions, expulsion, corporal punishment, referral to law enforcement and school-related arrests.

– Minority students with disabilities are hit especially hard. Nearly a quarter – 23 percent – of black students with disabilities were suspended from school. More than 20 percent of American Indian and Alaskan Native students with disabilities were suspended from school. More than 25 percent of students who identify as two or more races and have disabilities were suspended.

– Poverty is a factor: The GAO found that when there were greater percentages of low-income students in a school, there were generally significantly higher rates of all types of discipline. But black students, boys and students with disabilities were still disciplined disproportionately, regardless of the level of school poverty. And, as was the case in every type of school, black students bore the brunt of it. In high-poverty schools, they were overrepresented by nearly 25 percentage points in suspensions from school, according to the report.

– The disparities can be a drag on the economy . The GAO report notes that research has shown that students who are suspended from school are less likely to graduate on time and more likely to drop out and become involved in the juvenile justice system. “The effects of certain discipline events, such as dropping out, can linger throughout an individual’s lifetime and lead to individual and societal costs,” the report said. It pointed to one study of California youth that estimated that students who dropped out of high school because of suspensions would cost the state about $2.7 billion. Another study the GAO referenced estimated that Florida high school students who drop out earn about $200,000 less over their lifetimes.

MEANWHILE AT ED: DeVos is considering scrapping Obama-era school discipline guidance meant to curb racial disparities. The secretary on Wednesday heard from both supporters and opponents of the guidance, according to meeting participants from two separate closed-press listening sessions. Nathan Bailey, a department spokesman, said that no policy decision has been made on the guidance. He added that the department has held 11 other listening sessions on the topic. Wednesday’s discussions were the first in which DeVos has taken part, Bailey said.

– DeVos opened each of the meetings by noting the 50th anniversary of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and highlighting the continued need to achieve the full realization of his life’s work, the department said. “She discussed the clear problem, revealed both in the data and in the stories told, of disparate treatment in discipline,” according to a department readout. “She welcomed the participants to share their perspectives on how to best protect all students’ civil rights and promote positive school climates, and asked how the current approach is helping or hurting those efforts.” Mel Leonor has the full story.

– View details about the meeting and participants here. In a statement after the meeting, the department said: “At the request of many of the participants, the sessions were closed to the press to protect the identities of participants who fear retaliation, are in active litigation or shared deeply personal stories involving family members and/or minors. Each session took place in the Secretary’s Conference Room to foster a candid exchange between the Secretary and stakeholders who presented varying perspectives on how school discipline policies should or should not change.”

– Repeal of the guidance has been under consideration for months, but interest in it was renewed following the Feb. 14 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., that left 17 dead. Some congressional Republicans have said the Obama-era school discipline policies contributed to law enforcement’s failure to identify and stop the school shooter. The White House targeted the guidance for repeal in its school safety plan – making it a key focus of the school safety commission created by President Donald Trump and chaired by DeVos. But as POLITICO reported last month, there’s no evidence to suggest that those policies had anything to do with the massacre in Parkland.

– The GAO report provides evidence that the guidance should remain in place, said Rep. Bobby Scott (D-Va.), the ranking member of the House Education and the Workforce Committee. Scott and Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.), the ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee, requested the GAO investigate school discipline. The report “dispels claims that racially disproportionate rates of discipline are based solely on income,” Scott said in a statement. “This report underscores the need to combat these gross disparities by strengthening, not rescinding, the 2014 Discipline Guidance Package, which recommends specific strategies to reduce the disparities without jeopardizing school safety.”

Categories Betsy DeVos, Civil Rights, Discipline and Suspensions

Do You Want to Opt Out of State Testing? Here is Help

By dianeravitch
April 5, 2018 //
1

State and local officials are trying to break the Opt Out Movement. Nothing so terrifies the testocracy as parent refusals of tests.

If you want help in opting out, go to this site.

Opt out is the  most powerful tool available to parents. Don’t let them take it away.

Categories Opt Out, Parents, Resistance, Standardized Testing, Students

John Thompson: A First-Hand Report from the Front Lines in Oklahoma

By dianeravitch
April 5, 2018 //
10

John Thompson, teacher and historian in Oklahoma, just sent this update on the wildcat walkout:


Oklahoma Governor Mary Fallin told CBS News that the state’s teachers who walked out in protest against a decade of extreme budget cuts are “kind of like a teenager wanting a better car.”

When her words prompted a widespread backlash, the Republican governor, who presided over the tax cuts which starved Oklahoma schools and thus precipitated this week’s work stoppage, changed the subject, claiming “Antifa is here.”

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/oklahoma-teachers-fight-for-increased-funding-were-doing-this-for-our-kids/

http://www.news9.com/story/37876428/gov-fallin-faces-backlash-after-comments-to-cbs-news

Fallin isn’t the only Republican who is attacking teachers by pretending that their protests have attracted “outside” groups to the state Capitol. Rep. Kevin McDugle, R-Broken Arrow, said that he didn’t think protesting teachers were setting a good example for students. Rep. McDugle said in a now-deleted Facebook post that he would not vote “for another stinking (education) measure when they’re acting the way they’re acting.”

Rep. McDugle said teachers can, “Go ahead, be pissed at me if you want to.” Then he also complained that the protest has been “pretty rowdy,” and that “legislators have received death threats and alluded to legislative aides being released from duty early Tuesday due to safety concerns at the overcrowded Capitol.”

During the 3rd day of the walkout, Rep. John Enns (R) said that “25% of protestors were paid actors from Chicago.”

Contrary to those charges, the Oklahoma Highway Patrol tweeted that it has merely provided medical assistance, helped with one lost child, handled one minor traffic accident, and “assisted large crowds of teachers and other pedestrians crossing the streets.” The OHP said that the House Speaker had cleared the House Chamber due to noise. The reason why the OHP was limiting entry to the Capitol was that the Fire Marshall restricted entry to to crowd size, requiring a “one in, one out” procedure to avoid overcrowding.

http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/teacherwalkout/oklahoma-lawmaker-s-rant-inspires-teacher-to-announce-campaign-for/article_7535f223-f90b-5b8f-ad5f-a4f2a742c89b.html

http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/teacherwalkout/go-ahead-be-pissed-at-me-oklahoma-lawmaker-upset-at/article_b2ad7075-7b66-50f0-8c1f-a42587e8b739.html

https://www.facebook.com/KOCOZach/?fref=mentions

I haven’t seen any signs of Antifa or violence, but one supposed “outsider” lives three blocks from me. He is a member of a notorious radical group – the Oklahoma County Democratic Party.

However, I did see teachers acting like teenagers in one sense. I mean no disrespect to my former high school students; they were great dancers. But I don’t know that they could compete with the moves of dozens of teachers line dancing to Tom Petty’s “We Won’t Take It Anymore!”

Here are other things I’ve seen as 35,000 or more teachers have rallied the last three days.

The first teachers I met were discussing a former student at my old high school. They were mourning his decision to drop out. Rep. Jacob Rosecrants, who used to teach in my classroom, said that testing contributed to the student leaving school. I later learned about the tragic outcomes of two of my former students. Those conversations were reminders that despite the best efforts of teachers, in a state where more than 60% of students are economically disadvantaged, and where 85 to 90% of urban students are eligible for free and reduced lunch, funding for a system of student supports is essential.

I’ve also seen information that has been left for the legislators that explains:

Oklahoma loses 383 teachers per month;
Over 62,000 school kids are being taught by someone who isn’t certified to teach; and
Three of every four student teachers will leave Oklahoma.

https://www.poncacitynow.com/school-superintendent-arrott-issues-letter-on-teacher-walkout-guidance-for-parents/

https://www.cnn.com/2018/03/05/us/oklahoma-teachers-possible-strike-trnd/index.html

http://www.stwnewspress.com/news/feeling-unsupported-by-state-student-teachers-bolt-for-better-pay/article_fa6d99e0-4be0-5a94-a536-e756dabfb07c.html

We’ve also had a chance to look at Oklahoma education through the eyes of national journalists who are documenting the ways that teachers struggle with huge classrooms, the lack of teaching materials, and the exhaustion resulting from working multiple part-time jobs, not to mention the indignity of selling plasma and going to food pantries to feed their families.

I have to admit, however, that I’ve enjoyed PBS’ coverage of teachers posting photos of today’s raggedy remnants of the textbooks. We used some of them in a school that was closed over a decade ago.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/it-just-hurts-my-heart-low-pay-big-classes-are-the-plight-of-oklahoma-teachers/2018/03/30/e5e10eb8-2c88-11e8-b0b0-f706877db618_story.html?utm_term=.010c339d211f

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/apr/02/teachers-wildcat-strikes-oklahoma-kentucky-west-virginia?link_id=6&can_id=790e8d3653612cbd5257360c47a6e4fe&source=email-wave-of-teachers-strikes-kentucky-and-oklahoma-interviews-available&email_referrer=email_328219&email_subject=wave-of-teachers-strikes-kentucky-and-oklahoma-interviews-available

http://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-us-canada-43578465/oklahoma-teacher-strike-i-have-29-textbooks-for-87-pupils

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/oklahoma-teachers-are-posting-their-crumbling-textbooks-online

The Oklahoma walkout is a grassroots uprising. Like the teachers unions, the rank-in-file educators who revolted were aware of the many dangers that they took by stepping up. But as the National Education Association president Lily Eskelsen Garcia says, this is the “education spring.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/02/us/teacher-strikes-oklahoma-kentucky.html?action=click&contentCollection=us&region=rank&module=package&version=highlights&contentPlacement=1&pgtype=sectionfront

And as American Federation of Teachers president Randi Weingarten advised marchers, in every job action, there is “always a moment of truth.” She predicted that Oklahomans would do both – stand firm and respond wisely to evolving circumstances.

It is no surprise that educators have kept the focus on our children, who have suffered through state funding cuts of 28%. Neither can we be surprised by the juvenile way that so many Republican leaders have responded to the moment of truth. Every day, we are feeling our hope grow. The whole world is watching, and outside of the besieged conservative leadership that created this crisis, there is no doubt as to who is battling for our kids.

Categories Funding, Oklahoma, Resistance

Defending the Early Years: The Assault on Early Childhood Education

By dianeravitch
April 5, 2018 //
12

 

The group called Defending the Early Years has released a report on very troubling trends in Massachusetts.

The report shows that academic pressure has invaded kindergartens and that children have lost the time once spent in play, socialization, recess, even lunch.

Child-directed activities have increasingly been replaced by teacher-directed activities and scripted curricula.

It seems that “reform” in early childhood classes means stamping out the interests of children.

This is wrong. Let the children play. Let them have a childhood.

Categories Education Reform

Georgia: Chair of Senate Education Committee Resigns to Protest Extra $$$ for Charters

By dianeravitch
April 5, 2018 //
11

 

State Senator Lindsey Tippins resigned as chair of Georgia’s Senate Education Committee to protest a bill giving more money to charter schools than to public schools.  

“House Bill 787 passed the House and landed in the Senate Education Committee. Tippins said he spoke with Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle, letting him know he could not in good conscience pass the bill out of his committee. According to Tippins, while charter schools were asking for more money, there are 577,000 traditional public school students in 46 school districts already receiving less funding than the average charter schools receive.”

Tippins is considered the most effective advocate for public schools in the Georgia Legislature.

I hope Senator Tippins changes his mind. Meanwhile I name him to the Honor Roll as a champion of children and a man of principle.

“What triggered that decision involves a bill that seeks more money for charter schools, one Tippins believes is not fair or equitable to traditional public schools. The bill would give charter schools the average of what all school districts receive in state and local funding and in equalization, costing an additional $17.9 million a year.

“My problem with that is charter schools had a funding formula, but you have to realize that charter schools don’t have to take every kid that comes in the front door,” said Tippins, a former chairman of the Cobb Board of Education. “They don’t have to provide all the services that are provided, and they can also dismiss kids because of disciplinary reasons and send them back to public school, so while they may not be earning the average that public schools earn, they don’t have the average problems that public schools have either, because they have a select clientele….

”And if the bill giving them more money passes, the number of traditional students who would receive less in state and local funding for maintenance and operations would rise to 1,150,000 in 90 school districts.

“Were the state to bring all students in Georgia’s public schools up to the level of funding the charter schools receive now, it would cost an additional $170 million. If the charter school funding was increased with the bill’s passage, Tippins said, it would cost the state an additional $510 million to close the gap between what charter schools then received and what public schools were getting.

“Tippins wanted to know how he would tell a school system such as Jeff Davis County, the lowest funded district in the state, which receives $6,952 per student, he was voting to raise the funding charter schools received from $8,415 to $8,816.

“It’s hard for me to explain to Jeff Davis County why they’re getting about $1,450 a year less than what charter schools are getting when Jeff Davis takes any kid who walks in the door regardless of disabilities,” Tippins said.”

Tippins is a conservative Republican of the old school. He believes in public schools.

 

 

Categories Charter Schools, Funding, Georgia, Honor Roll

Bob Wise: Building the Digital Future in the Classroom (Beware!)

By dianeravitch
April 5, 2018 //
63

 

Bob Wise is a former Governor of West Virginia and currently president of the Gates-funded Alliance for Excellent Education. He co-authored a report in 2010 with Jeb Bush called Digital Learning NOW, which attempted to promote a vast expansion of technology in the school and classroom with minimal oversight.(I wrote about the report in my book “Reign of Error.”) The purpose of the Wise-Bush report was to urge states to spend more on hardware and software, lest they fail to prepare for the future and/or fall behind other states. The report was financed by the EDTech industry. Each year, the Digital Learning Council issues a “report card” and grades the state by whether they have spent enough on technology. Here is the 2014 report. Such reports rely on the instincts of state officials to want to be #1, even if the goal is wrong. Who would want to be #1, for instance, in infant mortality. Behind the report card is a marketing strategy.

Maine, under its current Governor Paul LePage, jumped aboard Wise and Bush’s digital learning train. A seasoned reporter, Colin Woodard, followed the money and produced this scathing critique, which won the prestigious Grorge Polk Award in 2012 for Education Reporting.

In this article, Wise continues to push technology, but does so on the assumption that there is a “diminishing supply of teachers” and “static state budgets.” Teachers in states like his own West Virginia are fighting those assumptions, on the belief that teachers can and must be paid more and that corporations should pay higher taxes. The possibilities of paying teachers a professional salary and expanding the tax rolls are not on Wise’s agenda.

Funny, I wrote an article in the same publication about the risks of misuse of technology. I mentioned the risk to student privacy; the failure of cybercharters; the lack of evidence for “blended learning” or “personalized learning”; the money spent by tech companies to place obsolete or ineffective products.

Wise mentions none of these risks. He is a cheerleader for EdTech.

Here is an axiom: Learning happens most and best when children interact with human teachers who are in the same room.

Buyer beware. Caveat emptor.

Categories Budget Cuts, Bush, Jeb, Funding

Kentucky: Legislators Break “No New Taxes” Pledge But Give Tax Cuts to Rich

By dianeravitch
April 5, 2018 //
4

 

This editorial in a Kentucky newspaper thanks teachers for breaking a legislative deadlock. There will be new taxes. There will be money for pensions. But watching the Republican Legislature jump through hoops to prove how conservative they are can make your head spin. There will be new cuts to education to fund tax breaks for the rich.

They have learned nothing.

”First some good news: Teachers were heard.

“Lawmakers knew that fired-up educators and pro-education Kentuckians, who filled the Capitol for weeks, were watching.

“That’s a big reason the Republicans who control the General Assembly abandoned some of Republican Gov. Matt Bevin’s and their own worst ideas for cutting public pensions and public spending.

”Instead, lawmakers chose — of all things — to raise taxes. Many had to break the pledge that they had signed to oppose all tax increases. They responded to the needs and demands of Kentuckians rather than answer to distant anti-government puppet masters. That’s refreshing and encouraging.

”Unfortunately (bad news starts here), rather than investing in educating Kentuckians and building 21st century infrastructure, Republican lawmakers gave away a big chunk of that new tax revenue in the form of tax cuts that will most benefit affluent individuals…

”As Jason Bailey of the Kentucky Center for Economic Policy writes, “In an economy where most income growth is at the top and where corporations are experiencing record profits, a tax system that taxes them less while taxing low- and middle-income people more will result in slower revenue growth,”

“Republicans, who proudly say that once their tax plan becomes law Kentucky will be among the 10 states with the lowest income taxes, are devoted to the notion that low income taxes trigger economic growth. Time will tell.

“More likely, though, new budget crises are in Kentucky’s future — at which point lawmakers will have to take their pencils to the tax exemptions and economic incentives that drain billions from state coffers and that went largely unexamined in this session.”

The Kentucky Republicans don’t need to wait and see. They could just look at Kansas and Oklahoma as states where their ideas were tried and failed.

”Meanwhile, despite almost $250 million a year in net new revenue, Kentucky will still underfund education, even though it would have been worse under Bevin’s budget or the budget passed by the Senate.

“A decade-long disinvestment in higher education will continue. Kentucky has cut almost a quarter-billion dollars in state support for higher ed since 2008.

“On the up side, the state will continue to fund transportation and school employee health insurance at close to current levels. Bevin had proposed shifting much of the cost of running school buses onto local districts.

“But the budget makes many cuts in education, including preschool, textbooks and instructional resources, family resource and youth service centers, extended school services, teacher professional development.

“Lawmakers did the most important thing they could to solve the underfunding of public pensions: They fully funded public pensions. Rebuilding the once healthy pension funds will take decades, but the only way to do it is one year at a time.”

Read more here: http://www.kentucky.com/opinion/editorials/article207865339.html#storylink=cpy

 

 

 

 

 

 

Categories Funding, Kentucky, Pensions

Why is New York Condoning Illiteracy?

By dianeravitch
April 4, 2018 //
28

 

Shulem Deen was raised in an Orthodox home. He wrote an opinion article in the New York Times today about the low quality of education he received in religious schools.

He writes:

”Last Friday, as observant Jews hurried with last-minute preparations for Passover, one Orthodox Jew was in Albany, holding up the New York State budget. He was insisting that this roughly $168 billion package include a special provision that would allow religious schools to meet the state’s educational requirements by using their long hours of religious instruction.

“In recent years, education activists, among them former Hasidic yeshiva graduates, have pushed aggressively to bring the yeshivas into compliance with the state’s education laws. Simcha Felder, the state senator from Brooklyn who represents the heavily ultra-Orthodox neighborhoods of Borough Park and Midwood, was on a mission to get legal permission for the state to turn a blind eye to the near-absence of secular instruction in many yeshivas. The upshot? Tens of thousands of children would continue to graduate without the most basic skills.

“I know about the cost. I was one of those kids.

“I was raised in New York’s Hasidic community and educated in its schools. At my yeshiva elementary school, I received robust instruction in Talmudic discourse and Jewish religious law, but not a word about history, geography, science, literature, art or most other subjects required by New York State law. I received rudimentary instruction in English and arithmetic — an afterthought after a long day of religious studies — but by high school, secular studies were dispensed with altogether.

“The language of instruction was, for the most part, Yiddish. English, our teachers would remind us, was profane…

”When I was in my 20s, already a father of three, I had no marketable skills, despite 18 years of schooling. I could rely only on an ill-paid position as a teacher of religious studies at the local boys’ yeshiva, which required no special training or certification. As our family grew steadily — birth control, or even basic sexual education, wasn’t part of the curriculum — my wife and I struggled, even with food stamps, Medicaid and Section 8 housing vouchers, which are officially factored into the budgets of many of New York’s Hasidic families….

”I now have two sons, ages 16 and 18. I do not have custody of them — I lost it when I left the Hasidic world, and so I have no control over their education. Today, they cannot speak, read or write in English past a second-grade level. (As for my three daughters, their English skills are fine. Girls, not obligated with Torah study, generally receive a decent secular education.)

“Like me, my sons will be expected to marry young and raise large families. They too will receive no guidance on how to provide for them and will be forced into low-wage jobs and rely heavily on government support.

“They are not alone. Across the state, there are dozens of Hasidic yeshivas, with tens of thousands of students — nearly 60,000 in New York City alone — whose education is being atrociously neglected. These schools receive hundreds of millions of dollars in government funding, through federal programs like Title I and Head Start and state programs like Academic Intervention Services and universal pre-K. For New York City’s yeshivas, $120 million comes from the state-funded, city-run Child Care and Development Block Grant subsidy program: nearly a quarter of the allocation to the entire city.”

These are the schools to which Betsy DeVos would supply vouchers. What a shame. The children deserve better education.

Categories New York, New York City, Religion, Vouchers

New York Parents: Don’t Be Bullied, Opt Out

By dianeravitch
April 4, 2018 //
9

 

A Message from NYSAPE (New York State Allies for Public Education):

 

Please TAKE ACTION NOW CLICK HERE and share your stories with NYSED and the Board of Regents. ASK them to CORRECT the MISINFORMATION and INTIMIDATION being spread on opting out of the 3-8 grade state tests.

Despite the fact that Commissioner Elia has acknowledged that parents have the right to opt out of the state tests, NYSAPE has been flooded with emails from parents sharing stories of misinformation being disseminated by their school districts regarding test refusals. Many stories detail intimidation and bullying, as well as false claims that schools or students will be punished for opting out.

Here is the reality: NO student will have a low score entered into their records for opting out, NO school will be identified as failing because of high opt out numbers and NO school will lose funding.

The New York State Education Department (NYSED) and Board of Regents MUST HEAR from you regarding intimidation and misleading information being spread in your school district regarding your right to refuse the NYS Grades 3-8 state tests.

Here is the truth according to NYSED: “To comply with the federal law, one school academic accountability calculation still must be based on the percentage of all students who pass state tests.… But New York’s plan also creates a new “core subject performance index” that reflects the results only for the portion of students who actually take the state tests [emphasis added] If the result using the index calculation is better, that performance measure can be used to determine whether a school is targeted for additional funding and academic support. In essence, both of these measures are looked at,” Schwartz [of NYSED] told the Regents… “if we have schools that have high achievement but also have high rates of non-participation, those schools will not likely end up on our list of those schools that need to be focused upon.” [1]

Schools have a legal obligation to administer the state tests. HOWEVER, parents have the legal right to opt out their children free of coercion or penalties of any sort.

We are imploring NYSED and the Board of Regents to address these issues!

We refuse the state tests because we do not want to have our schools focus on test prep, and have our children subjected to biased, flawed exams. We demand that our schools focus instead on creating a meaningful, student-centered learning environment. If you’re in doubt about what to do, check out the video of one of our founders, Jeanette Deutermann, available here.

If you do decide to opt your child out of the tests, here’s a NYSAPE TEST REFUSAL LETTER to send to your child’s teacher/s and building principal.

Time is of the essence, as state testing is around the corner! Please TAKE ACTION NOW CLICK HERE and share your stories with NYSED and the Board of Regents. ASK them to CORRECT the MISINFORMATION being spread, and to stop the bullying of our children.

Thank you, NYSAPE

Categories Education Reform, New York, Opt Out, Parents
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