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| My lame attempt to take a selfie with a blackberry - looks gross? Blame the chicken parm and the strudel I ate tonight |
Nice headline. But they quote Eva vassal Jenny Sedlis?
"While I'm sure there is some genuine
parent pushback, there's no question the teachers' union ginned up
dissatisfaction so that union members would not be held accountable for
student learning," said Jenny Sedlis, the executive director of
StudentsFirst New York, a state affiliate of the Sacramento-based
StudentsFirst.
Jenny must be the one ginning up. She knows full well the UFT has to be kicked and dragged into supporting the opt out movement. Note how this article points to the 600,000 member NYSUT but doesn't point out that 30% come from the UFT which turned down the MORE attempts to support opt out - though word from the NYSUT RA is that they began to give ground to the inevitability. More on the NYSUT story - I know lots of interesting stuff, but as usual, would have to kill you if I told you.
http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2015/05/06/opt-out-push-gains-traction-amid-common-core-testing.html?cmp=ENL-EU-NEWS1-RM
Published Online: May 5, 2015
Published in Print: May 6, 2015, as Some Balk As Testing Rolls Ahead
'Opt-Out' Push Gains Traction Amid Common-Core Testing
'Opt-Out' activists set sights on hobbling states' exams
The push by activists of various stripes to have parents opt
students out of state exams this spring has transformed skepticism and
long-running anger over the direction of education policy into a
movement with numbers and a growing public profile. Whether those
activists can craft a durable and effective political movement remains
an open question.
Advocates, standardized-testing opponents, and observers continue
to debate the movement's true goals, the disparity between the
proportion of opt-outs and their broader importance, and how much the
demographics of participating parents hurt or strengthen the cause.
Recent events in New York state, where disputes over the fiscal
2016 budget ratcheted up tensions over the role of testing in state
policy, show how the opt-out campaign can gain traction. After years of
negotiations and disagreements with the state over evaluations, the
600,000-member New York State United Teachers called on parents to opt
their children out of exams aligned with the Common Core State
Standards, and tens of thousands reportedly have done so.
And in a sharp counterpoint to social-media monitoring conducted
on behalf of the testing company Pearson to watch for breaches in
testing security, last month a Facebook group opposed to New York
state's testing posted portions of the state's English/language arts
exam online.
In remarks last month, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan
indicated the Education Department would intervene in states and
districts with high opt-out rates. Sanctions for insufficient
participation on federally required exams can include the withholding of
Title I funds. Federal law requires 95 percent of students to be
tested.
Many states don't have policies that specifically address
opt-outs, according to a survey by the Denver-based Education Commission
of the States. That uncertainty, along with many parents' anxiety over
the footprint and variety of tests in public schools, has helped propel
opt-outs, said Maria Ferguson, the executive director of the
Washington-based Center on Education Policy, which tracks implementation
of the common core and aligned tests.
"This stuff is really confusing. It does differ from state to
state," Ms. Ferguson said. "People don't know what to do, and so it's
like, 'We'll opt out. We'll free our children from this tyranny.' "
Searching for a Tally
Official statistics on the number and proportion of opt-outs continue to be hard to come by in many instances, but not always.
Last month, the New Jersey education department reported that for
the first window of the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for
College and Careers tests in English/language arts and math, the
parental refusal rate for students in grades 3-6 was 3.8 percent. For
high school juniors, who don't have to pass the test to graduate, the
refusal rate was 14.5 percent. (The PARCC test is given over two testing
windows.)
However, in New York, the state education department has not
reported the number or percentage of parental opt-outs from the state's
English/language arts and math tests, and does not plan to do so until
the summer, according to spokesman Tom Dunn.
The
Newsday newspaper in New York reported late last month
that in two Long Island counties, roughly 32,700 students out of 67,600
eligible students in grades 3-8 (48 percent) refused to take the math
test.
United 2 Counter, a group opposed to New York's common-core tests,
reported in late April that statewide, there were about 193,000
opt-outs from the English/language arts test, and 151,000 opt-outs from
the math exam. The statewide K-12 enrollment is about 2.7 million, with 1
million in New York City, although not all of those students are
eligible to take the common-core test.
The group cites news media, union representatives, school officials, and parents
as sources,
but doesn't always put a name to them. Asked to what extent the public
should trust the organization's numbers, Loy Gross, the group's
co-founder and a math tutor in upstate New York, responded that, if
anything, United 2 Counter undercounts the real tally of total opt-outs.
She explained that parents involved with the group, for example, are
told to count heads on three testing days and report the lowest of the
three opt-out numbers.
Ms. Gross said schools have become "shackled" to the common core and aligned tests.
"These tests are not telling us anything that we haven't known
since NCLB started," said Ms. Gross., referring to the federal No Child
Left Behind Act. "The testing initially did give us some useful
measurements. But ever since that point, it's become all about those
measurements, that if we measure these kids enough, somehow they're
going to grow faster."
While Ms. Gross acknowledged the NYSUT support for a boycott of
the tests was an important step for the opt-out campaign, she strongly
objected to the argument that unions are the true leaders of the push.
Among opt-out proponents, there's also a deep distrust of Gov. Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat, and state K-12 governance, she said.
"The only thing left was to starve the beast," said state
Assemblyman James Tedisco, a Republican who is sponsoring a bill that
would require districts to inform parents about their rights to opt
their students out of the state tests, and to provide alternate
activities for opt-outs. "We're not going to take it any more."
But one advocate for the use of test scores in teacher evaluations
said that without the self-interest motivating NYSUT, the opt-out
campaign would lose critical fuel."While I'm sure there is some genuine
parent pushback, there's no question the teachers' union ginned up
dissatisfaction so that union members would not be held accountable for
student learning," said Jenny Sedlis, the executive director of
StudentsFirst New York, a state affiliate of the Sacramento-based
StudentsFirst.
This year, New York legislators charged the state education
department with overseeing a new teacher-evaluation system. Board of
Regents Chancellor Merryl H. Tisch subsequently announced her plan to
extend the deadline for implementing new evaluations from this November
to September 2016. Ms. Tisch has urged parents not to opt their children
out of testing, but she also vigorously opposes the idea that the
federal government should respond to high opt-out rates by withholding
funding from schools.
'Bootleggers and Baptists'
Just where the movement will ultimately lead is an open question.
Without a broad strategy that covers the full range of tests
beyond common-core exams, Ms. Ferguson said, opt-out proponents' success
may be limited.
But significant ideological divides may actually help the opt-out
push in certain ways. According to Dick M. Carpenter, a professor of
leadership and foundations at the college of education at the University
of Colorado at Colorado Springs, the opt-out movement fits the
"Bootleggers and Baptists"
phenomenon articulated by economist Bruce Yandle. In this environment,
groups that typically disagree sharply about issues, like liquor
smugglers and religious anti-liquor activists, unite in their position
toward a certain policy, like "blue laws" that restrict alcohol sales.
Similarly, opt-out can appeal to conservatives, who see the test
as an intrusion of government, and liberals, who believe the tests hurt
schools without helping instruction, Mr. Carpenter said.
For example, last month the Colorado Senate gave preliminary, bipartisan approval
to a bill that reduces state testing to the minimum required by the federal government.
"It's an issue that's getting a surprising amount of attention in a relatively short period of time," Mr. Carpenter said.
Vol. 34, Issue 29, Pages 1,16-17
