AIMS testing is a requirement for every child in grades 3 though 8. Parents can’t opt their children out of the tests, except through one maneuver which jeopardizes their children’s education. But some local parents, fed up with the high stakes testing regimen and upset with their lack of choice in the matter, are joining the national Opt Out movement.
In a segment of this month’s Access Tucson show, “Education: The Rest of the Story,” Ann-Eve Pedersen and I go over the statewide AIMS mandate and the portions of the Arizona Revised Statute (A.R.S) that the Dept. of Ed. and the Attorney General use to defend the policy. In my un-legally-trained reading of the passages, their interpretation is a bit of a stretch.
The Tucson Weekly is working on a larger piece on the national and local Opt Out movement. Meanwhile, this video gives you the basics. And in case you want to read the relevant passages of the statute, here are links to A.R.S. 15-741 and A.R.S. 15-102.
This article appears in Apr 10-16, 2014.
If a school tests a student against parents’ wishes or threatens to do so, parents need to make some noise. Go to the media, including this blog. In addition to protecting your child, opting out is a way to make your voice heard. If a school dares to go against your stated demand that your child not be tested, expose it.
Here’s a great letter that you can deliver to your school’s principal to opt out. I encourage parents everywhere to opt out of the exam for your students. Your child’s teachers and school administrators are probably on your side already. The highstakes testing has been pushed entirely by the political system and not from within the education community. If we unite we can force change.
http://www.fairtest.org/arizona-aims-or-st…
A note from a retired public school teacher who did lots of things he didn’t want to do because it was required. Much as some teachers and administrators (school and district) dislike the testing regimen, they are required by the state to abide by it. If someone tells you, “Sorry, it’s the rules,” that’s the truth. What you do with that information is up to you, but remember, the people you’re talking to aren’t making it up or arbitrarily ignoring your wishes. Their school’s funding, and maybe their jobs, are on the line here.
It seems like enough parents are opting out for TUSD to notice. The following letter was distributed to the students at my daughter’s school today.
http://www.zackswagon.com/random/TUSDAIMSL…
The letter refers to an AZ Attorney General opinion from 1997 but the opinion was not attached so I have dug it out:
http://azmemory.azlibrary.gov/cdm/ref/coll…
Interesting stuff here.
OK, now we have it from Zack Jarrett. TUSD is going to put a child in the position of telling her teacher no. Not just no, but “No, my parents said I’m not supposed to take this test.” What a horrible thing to do to a child. And then they’re going to tell the child that no matter what her parents say, she has to take it. Take a good look at this f$@ked up picture. Testing mania has made educators sick and act in ways that are not in the best interests of kids (like fire a principal even if it will not be good for students.)
HT just let parents know that they will have to keep their kids out of schools for the entire 3-week testing window if they do not wish for their children to be tested. 3 weeks out of school is NOT in the best interests of kids.
Dave, I do not fault teachers for following orders. But I do fault central administration. Although I am sympathetic to the fact that funding and teachers’ 301 bonuses depend upon testing, that is the reason that parents have no other option but to opt out. How do teachers think that this madness will be changed? By sitting down with legislators and talking with them? Legislators, both Democrat and Republican, have rigged this game so that parents’ voices don’t matter and everyone is coerced to accept what is happening because of the negative consequences of resistance. They treat parents like cows.
It is not the fault of the district that this is happening. From the district superintendent down to the teachers everyone is doing what is required by law. Many of them dislike it as much as anyone. I cannot ask them to risk their careers by breaking the law.
Speaking to our legislature is exactly what needs to happen. The game is not rigged. Parents and educators need to organize, opt-out, and speak out. We need to write letters, make phone calls, and advocate for ourselves. The government belongs to us and we can bring about change.
One thing anyone can do today is to visit the Network for Public Education at http://www.networkforpubliceducation.org and print and mail their call for Congressional hearings on the misuse of overuse of standardized tests. We are many and together we can make our schools whatever we want them to be.
I have been harping on this point for many years. The public votes for the Legislature. The public returns to office most of them every election. The public has no one else to blame for this testing mess. A bold Legislature could change all of this, if it so chose. Please take note that home-schooled students must meet no requirements whatsoever, and there are no tests to determine the efficacy of the instruction, or indeed, whether instruction is provided at all. Again, an act of those same legislators.
Zack, look at Dave’s video again. You missed his point. Testing kids against their parents’ stated desire is NOT required by law. Don’t be led around like a cow. Yes, teachers are doing what they have to. But Dr. Sanchez has a choice. School districts all over the country are facing it.
You say that parents should opt out? Does that mean that you are going to hold your child out of school for 3 weeks? To do that to your child in order to opt out is outrageous.
The game IS rigged because Arizona is forcing you to hold your kid out for 3 weeks in order to opt out. Then they will disenroll your kid so she doesn’t count as an untested student and your opt-out accomplished NOTHING. What needs to happen is for superintendents to recognize that parents have the right to say that they disapprove of what is happening in the classroom during the school day. That is our right under 15-102 (see Dave’s video). To do otherwise puts kids in a horrible situation.
My uneducated — non-lawyer’s — opinion is that A.R.S. 15-741 and A.R.S. 15-102 together don’t take away a parent’s right to opt out. But the A.G. office’s decision disagrees. It sounds to me like the decision can be contested. But so long as the A.G. decision is accepted, when enough parents opt out to bring a school’s tested students below 95%, the school is punished. At least that’s how I understand the situation. So the school and the district administrations are protecting their funding and their status by requiring children to be tested regardless of the parents’ wishes.
The proper term probably isn’t “unintended consequences,” but it’s a similar situation. You create a high stakes testing regimen to evaluate a school and a district, then to make the evaluation fair and valid, you have to get every student tested so no school can game the system. That means children can’t be taken out of the testing pool for any reason, including parental request. All these anti-opt out rules are there to prop up a testing system.
I’m encouraged by H.T. Sanchez’s letter. It means there’s enough of an opt out groundswell that the district needs to respond. As this becomes more public and parents become more aware, it’s likely the numbers will grow. I doubt it will do anything to affect this testing cycle, but there may be time to organize people in the Tucson area, and maybe around Arizona, who object to this high stakes testing regimen to create change during the next school year.
The question for which I cannot find an answer is, what will the AZ Dept. of Ed. do to a school district that honors parents’ opt-out requests? I find no penalty in the state statutes. So what is the consequence to a district that does not follow the AG’s letter?
With regard to federal money, No Child Left Behind requires that a portion of Title I funds be spent in a certain manner if less than 95% of students are tested. (There is also the possibility that feds can take control away from districts. But if that possibility occurs merely because of opting out, as opposed to students’ poor performance on tests, no one knows whether the feds would really act on that. It seems unlikely, given that the 95% rule is designed to avoid having schools not test exceptional ed and ELLs in order to look better.) Is that really all the district is trying to protect? Or has the State threatened districts with something?
This is a really important question to answer when evaluating whether districts are acting reasonably by forcing kids to tell their teachers no or forcing parents to keep kids out for 3 weeks. Other districts are not going to such extremes. What is motivating ours?
Homeschooling parents managed to eliminate the AZ requirement for standardized testing of their students. If their public school counterparts band together and do the same, I’m sure they can do the same. Problem is, the more you depend on the services the government provide (yes we pay, but don’t get a heck of a say in what goes on), the more at their mercy you are.