Reply to SEL screener survey

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Putting aside the uselessness of the survey itself, the results letter was incredibly dense and full of jargon.  The second sentence is 50 words long!  Although the letter sort of says it's not a "grade", the rating scale is very similar to a grade.  The entire rating scale is poorly described and the two digit decimal precision is ridiculous.  There's also no other context given - how do my kids ratings compare to the overall school average?  A friendlier format that fully explains each topic with the student's results and suggested discussion questions would have been far more useful.

There may be some value here, but the average parent either won't understand this letter or worse, completely misunderstand it.

We'll be opting out in the future.[/quote]

Why didn’t you opt out to begin with?[/quote]

Where was this? Never saw it. [/quote]

An opt out form was sent in our Friday folders. Additionally, it was on the FCPS website, along with a copy of the exact survey that was being administered. Once I saw the survey, I immediately knew I wanted to opt out.[/quote]

I have a senior. No Friday folders for us. [/quote]

I didn’t first see the information in Friday folders. It was on the FCPS website since the beginning of the year under testing. It listed what tests would be administered this year for each grade level. I saw SEL survey and clicked on it. I knew immediately based on the inappropriateness of some of the questions that I would be opting my kids out.

I check the website frequently, especially at the beginning of the year. I suggest you do the same. Oh that’s also how I found out about the “urban youth” survey. We opted out of that one too.[/quote]

I have teens and realize that fcps is not very forthcoming with these kinds of surveys nor is fcps too terribly interested in informed consent.

I try to opt out of these things, but realize that I might miss some of them.  I believe there have been 5 or 6 different opt out thpe surveys so far this year.  Multiply that by 2 or 3 kids and given that the forms come to parents in so many ways, most of which do not guarantee that the forms and information actually reach the parents, it can be easy to overlook an opt out of two.

I tell my teens that they are never, ever to answer any of these outside surveys administered by fcps, even if I did not formally opt out.  They know to just leave them blank.

No non family adult or non personal medical doctor or for profit company needs to know any minor child's musings on race, their sexual history, whether or not they use drugs or alcohol, their family's personal information, sexual preferences,  etc, etc, especially if that private company is making millions of dollars off this information.

Nothing is private online.

Tricking our minor kids to divulge this kind of intimate information, particularly without informed consent by the child and parents, to a company that is making millions of dollars off this information, is a huge violation by fcps and frankly, should be criminal.[/quote]

It's not even a guarantee that the opting out process is easy.  I opted my 8th grader out.  The MS sent an email saying to tell the assigned counselor if you wanted to opt out.  I tracked down which counselor who was assigned to my DC, but direct emails are no longer listed on the school's website (I'm guessing because of the hacking issues a few years ago).  You have to fill out a form which is theoretically sent to the person.  I filled it out twice and never got a response.  Having not gotten a response, I directly emailed the counselor who was listed as being in charge of the survey for the school because that email address was provided.  I received no response.  I told my DC not to fill out the survey.  Of course, her teacher gave her the survey and then argued with my DC that she had to take it, because she wasn't on the list of opted out students.  DC very politely told the teacher she wasn't taking the survey because her mom told her not to.  But there was some back and forth, with DC texting me and me ultimately forwarding her the email I had sent to the counselor to show to the teacher.  A student who hadn't been fully prepped not to respond to the survey would have just taken it.

I'm not into the conspiracy theory of Facebook connections or anything like that.  I just didn't like the fact that it became a part of my child's educational record, as defined under FERPA, and that students who scored 'poorly' would be given interventions.  I felt very strongly about my DCs not taking the survey for those reasons.
[/quote]

We are told by FCPS that these surveys or screeners are voluntary, right?  Then, why did her teacher insist that your daughter takes it to the extent that you had to prove you had opted your daughter out? If they only put that much effort into the academic  output of our children they would be better off in that area. After all, we send them to school to learn not to be some else’s statistics pawns.
After reading your posting I will tell my child to ignore any survey or screener from now on, and instead request that his teachers assigns him class work during the administration of these surveys. [/quote]

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