This

Anonymous wrote:We can all have our views, but for those parents who want to opt out, why?

I just don't get your holier than thou approach as if you know better. You are all pretending to be experts on standardized tests. You are all experts on testing procedures. Go ahead and opt out, I hope your teachers also opt out of anything above and beyond for your kids. When you opt out, you are hurting many people, your school, your teachers, your kid's friends, your neighborhood, DCPS, and so on. And the final nail could be your own child. You think you are doing good but it could even be detrimental.

Live and let live, right?

I dont plan to opt but if I did Im not sure how it hurts the school or my kids friends. My kid is almost two grades ahead in her current classroom and I know the eacher and school really really want to make sure kid takes the test the school scores. But its not like school has ever gone above and beyond for my kid, its always "smart kids will be fine anywhere"

Reminds me a little of how the District finally decriminalized possession of small quantities of pot for personal use in the spring of 2014, long before the law on possession changed.

Pages back, somebody posted that the director of assessments at OSSE has changed since 2019. Actually it's the DCPS Assessments Director who's changed: the new director is Kyu-Ryung Hwang, formerly an instructional coach and ES classroom teacher in the system.

Hwang recently issued instruction to ES principals and their registrars telling them to permit families to opt out of PARCC without students accruing unexcused absences in the process for the first time. What used to happen is that parents who wanted to opt out would generally contact OSSE and/or DCPS Assessments directly, asking for information on procedures, a bothersome arrangement for staff (particularly since no directives or procedures related to opting out had been established or published). For their part, school registrars would sometimes report opt out families to DCPS Student Attendance and Support for truancy, launching investigations involving social workers, gumming up the works at that department.

This year, as was pointed out on page 1, families can opt out simply by letting their admins know that they intend to, in writing. Admins then OK opt outs via email and make arrangements with families for students to leave their regular classrooms during testing time blocks. The city council hasn't amended DC law/Every Student Succeeds Act to afford families a formal opt out like California, Colorado and Oregon have, but has effectively decriminalized the practice.

Anonymous wrote:I can understand the opt-out parents were anxious kids. You have a valid reason.

The opt-out parents who think in their infinite wisdom that PARCC is useless are pathetic. Your hypocrisy sticks. When you moved and were looking for a good school for your kids you used test scores to decide where to live. I'm sure you wouldn't have moved in-boundary, or even stayed, for a JKLM school if the scores were low.

Your privilege also comes through when you say you'll take time off and spend it indulging your child in this or that activity. Just sickening.

The test scores help. PARCC is not the best, but having no data is even worse.

You don't get to decide who has a valid reason for opting out. With the US Department of Education and OSSE electing not to penalize families who opt out, any family in any DC public school can do so freely.

Anonymous wrote:I can understand the opt-out parents were anxious kids. You have a valid reason.

The opt-out parents who think in their infinite wisdom that PARCC is useless are pathetic. Your hypocrisy sticks. When you moved and were looking for a good school for your kids you used test scores to decide where to live. I'm sure you wouldn't have moved in-boundary, or even stayed, for a JKLM school if the scores were low.

Your privilege also comes through when you say you'll take time off and spend it indulging your child in this or that activity. Just sickening.

The test scores help. PARCC is not the best, but having no data is even worse.

Speak for yourself. I put no stock in corporate elementary school standardized tests and have never relied on test scores to decide where I live. Test scores will invariably be high for a JKLM type public school, given that they mainly test parents' income and levels of educational attainment.

There simply is no forcing American families to acquiesce when they are against testing where children's scores are of no consequence to their families. When DCPS hassled and threatened us about opting out pre Covid, we talked the situation over with our eminently capable 5th grader, who was often bored at school. She headed into the test determined to bomb it in protest. Things would have been different if a stellar score had provided a pathway to a GT program.

In a free society, what is sickening to one citizen is eminently worthwhile to another. That's the way free societies should work. If you want good data on education reform, collect it on something other than how students perform on lengthy poor-quality tests designed to turn profits for foreign companies (Pearson Education, not incorporated in the USA) and to turn eager young learners off learning.

Anonymous wrote:I can understand the opt-out parents were anxious kids. You have a valid reason.

The opt-out parents who think in their infinite wisdom that PARCC is useless are pathetic. Your hypocrisy sticks. When you moved and were looking for a good school for your kids you used test scores to decide where to live. I'm sure you wouldn't have moved in-boundary, or even stayed, for a JKLM school if the scores were low.

Your privilege also comes through when you say you'll take time off and spend it indulging your child in this or that activity. Just sickening.

The test scores help. PARCC is not the best, but having no data is even worse.

I agree, no data is worst especially with all the grade inflation and lowering of standards due to equity. Your kid’s A is not all that it’s made out to be, and you may have a false sense of security. That is why standardized testing is a useful data point.

I can understand the opt-out parents were anxious kids. You have a valid reason.

The opt-out parents who think in their infinite wisdom that PARCC is useless are pathetic. Your hypocrisy sticks. When you moved and were looking for a good school for your kids you used test scores to decide where to live. I'm sure you wouldn't have moved in-boundary, or even stayed, for a JKLM school if the scores were low.

Your privilege also comes through when you say you'll take time off and spend it indulging your child in this or that activity. Just sickening.

The test scores help. PARCC is not the best, but having no data is even worse.

+1. You rock, PP. At least two-thirds of the kids in our Ward 6 DCPS won’t stick around for 5th grade. The school won’t have 4th grade results for them on the dumb PARCC until after they’ve flown the coop. The testing calendar is absurd, reason enough not to bother with the test.

OPT OUT. PAARC is useless and a waste of time. Use your power parents. My kids will not be taking it.

Anonymous wrote:We can all have our views, but for those parents who want to opt out, why?

I just don't get your holier than thou approach as if you know better. You are all pretending to be experts on standardized tests. You are all experts on testing procedures. Go ahead and opt out, I hope your teachers also opt out of anything above and beyond for your kids. When you opt out, you are hurting many people, your school, your teachers, your kid's friends, your neighborhood, DCPS, and so on. And the final nail could be your own child. You think you are doing good but it could even be detrimental.

Live and let live, right?

not every parent that opts out has high performing students.

some children have testing anxiety or other challenges that make testing one more slap in the face of not being "normal".

I'm all for parents having choice.

I think the scores from PARCC are one of many factors when parents consider a school for their children. If it wasn't available, how else would you know 70% of the students were proficient at reading and math? Would you send your child to a school that had only 25% or lower proficiency rates?

You’re allowed to teach your children that the government isn’t always right, that bad laws and policies can be challenged in a free society in good conscience and that there is cause for civil disobedience in certain situations. You teach your children what you believe and those opting out will do the same. All good.

Anonymous wrote:We can all have our views, but for those parents who want to opt out, why?

I just don't get your holier than thou approach as if you know better. You are all pretending to be experts on standardized tests. You are all experts on testing procedures. Go ahead and opt out, I hope your teachers also opt out of anything above and beyond for your kids. When you opt out, you are hurting many people, your school, your teachers, your kid's friends, your neighborhood, DCPS, and so on. And the final nail could be your own child. You think you are doing good but it could even be detrimental.

Live and let live, right?

+1 I would also add it sets a poor example for your kid. Don’t like the test, don’t like how long it is, then you don’t need to do it. See how that works in the real world at your job when it comes to performance evaluations. Not a team player, see how well that goes when your colleagues complain and the company will find someone else who is.

We can all have our views, but for those parents who want to opt out, why?

I just don't get your holier than thou approach as if you know better. You are all pretending to be experts on standardized tests. You are all experts on testing procedures. Go ahead and opt out, I hope your teachers also opt out of anything above and beyond for your kids. When you opt out, you are hurting many people, your school, your teachers, your kid's friends, your neighborhood, DCPS, and so on. And the final nail could be your own child. You think you are doing good but it could even be detrimental.

Live and let live, right?