With programs such as Race to the Top and Common Core, the Obama administration has been aggressive in it efforts to control local schools, even to the point of ordering that boys must be allowed in girls’ restrooms and showers when they say they identify as girls.
Along with the “transgender rights” order has come standardized tests to shape curriculum, which many students across the country, with the approval of their parents, have flat-out refused to take.
Now public schools are retaliating with disciplinary action against students who won’t take the tests, including even threats to hold them back a year.
In Orlando, Florida, for example, district officials have notified some students they are being held back a year, even though they have passing grades, the Orlando Sentinel reported.
Parent Rhonda Nickerson was interviewed by the paper after her 9-year-old daughter discovered she may be barred from fourth grade in Seminole County.
Her report card showed all As in academic subjects.
But it also said “Student Retained in Grade 3.”
“There’s no reason for a third grader with straight As to be retained,” her mother said. “What are they going to do with her in third grade again?”
Her daughter did not take the Florida Standard Assessments, and school officials claim they are following state law by penalizing students “without an FSA language-arts score,” the paper said.
The report, however, explained that while the law makes the tests mandatory and calls for students who fail the third-grade language arts exam to be held back, it doesn’t address those who don’t take the test.
The Florida Department of Education told the Sentinel as many as 224 students could be penalized.
“Our stance is that … state law requires that all students to participate in the FSA,” state agency spokeswoman Meghan Collins told the Sentinel. “Given that line of thinking, everyone should have a score.”
Another dispute has erupted in Greenville, South Carolina, where the Greenville News reported school officials already have disciplined “at least a dozen students” who refused to take new standardized ACT tests.
Parents told the newspaper their kids were pressured by school officials – in front of their classmates – to take the tests. When they refused, they were removed from class and taken to another room, where the principal again pressured them.
Ultimately, they were accused in an official discipline referral of “refusal to obey,” the parents told the newspaper.
Superintendant Burke Royster told the newspaper: “The protocols we put in place were meant to protect our employees, who are required by both state and federal law to test all eligible students. The student discipline referrals were utilized to provide documentation of our compliance with these laws and included no consequences for the students. We recognize the rights of parents to refuse testing, but it is clear we do not have the authority to allow anyone to ‘opt out’ of legal requirements, nor do we think it is right for us to give the impression to students that following the law is optional.”
The district told the paper that exempting someone would be a security violation, and anyone granting that permission could get into trouble.
Parent Sara Wallace told the News that rules for schools shouldn’t override what parents decide is best for their children.
She said her son is being scapegoated by educators.
“He was very discouraged yesterday when he came home from school,” she said. “He said ‘it’s embarrassing. I’m being treated like a criminal.’”
Wallace told the Greenville paper she supports her children’s teachers and administrators.
“But when I send my son to school, I don’t check my parental rights at the door.”
from PropagandaGuard https://propagandaguard.wordpress.com/2016/06/04/a-student-held-back-after-parents-opt-out-of-tests/
from WordPress https://toddmsiebert.wordpress.com/2016/06/03/a-student-held-back-after-parents-opt-out-of-tests/
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