Unlock with PatreonWhen Kids are Pawns
As principal of Nazareth School, I believe that your children are our focus and not the
STAAR tests. Our students and teachers achieve amazing results, but this is not because we
focus on tests or legislative requirements. We focus on your children and teaching them what
they need to be successful.– Letter from Nazareth School Principal Robert O’Connor (removed from district website Summer 2024)
The soothing reassurances offered by Principal O’Connor to Nazareth ISD parents mirror the messaging that many school districts offer to parents as STAAR assessments draw nearer. They assure the parents that STAAR is not the end all and be all of assessments, that their kids are “More than a Score”, and that the best interest of each unique student is always the driving force behind the district’s mission. But the strength of those convictions is laid bare when parents decide to push back against the federal and state demands for constant assessment, by refusing to let their kids be cogs in the data machine that not only rates their local campuses primarily based on STAAR scores, but then aggregates that data to punish teachers, students and even strip entire districts of local control and the tax paying residents of their voting rights. Because when the conviction of the parent leads to a refusal to be assessed, the commitment of the district to the best interest of the students often disappears as quickly and easily as Principal O’Connor’s letter disappeared from the district website.
The overemphasis on STAAR, and the negative impacts that obsession over test data has on the classroom, has long been a point of contention across the country. Particularly in Texas, where assessment requirements have always exceeded federal requirements, and which has stack punitive consequences on students and districts alike, the parental pushback has been steady and insistent. When the legislature lost its collective mind in 2009 and put a regime of 12 EOC graduation tests in place, that also impacted GPA, moms organized and pushed back and quickly got the requirements cut to 5 EOCs (still in excess of federal requirements). Later developments included shortening the length of assessments, detaching retention requirements from 3rd grade assessment, and limiting the amount of benchmarking or pull out tutoring related to test prep.
By 2021, in fact, a new outlook on STAAR began to settle in both at the TEA and the legislature. The TEA began to clarify for districts that they were not obligated to fight parents who wanted to decline STAAR. They just had to offer the opportunity to be assessed; they did not have to lock kids in a room with the assessment for five hours and try to force them to take it. A simple e-mail from a parent was enough. At the legislature, the regime of automatic retention at the 5th and 8th grade level was repealed. Under the previous law, students had three chances to pass STAAR, and if they didn’t they were retained subject to review by a Grade Placement Committee. On appeal the committee could decide to promote the child to the next grade level. (As a side note, in ten years we did not receive a single report of an Opt Out student being retained). Nonetheless, the legislature, recognizing the forced retention has negative academic consequences, and was not moving the needle on test scores, removed the threat from students.
Indeed, the TEA, sent clear messaging to Texas parents that the state’s purpose for STAAR had changed. Parents were sent a flyer touting that STAAR was no longer a high stakes setting for kids. Specifically, parents were told that “Recent changes in Texas law have eliminated student-level promotion consequences associated with STAAR.”
Against this backdrop, Nazareth mother Samantha Nelson set about to assert her family’s protest of the STAAR Accountability regime.
Tabbing Through
So it’s opt out time for STAAR. We’ve already told you that the school is not going to “agree” that you can opt out. Now that doesn’t mean you can’t opt out. In fact, some schools play the game of pretending that refusing to participate (your option) is not opting out. It is. They don’t get to define words for us.
So what do we know?
We know that the TEA has told schools that they can accept parental refusals and submit a blank assessment without ever putting it in front of the student. And thankfully, we are seeing more districts than ever working with parents and offering this option.
We know that if the district doesn’t offer that option, the student can refuse in person and either be sent on to class (good job school!) or sit and not engage the assessment (punitive, but as long as they don’t coerce you, it’s OK).
But many parents (and kids) decide that sitting for three or more hours to refuse the assessment is a silly game, and that the best way to successfully opt out is to submit a blank assessment in the testing room. This is what you will see called “Tabbing Through”. In this process, the student advances to the next question without answering, dismisses all warnings about missing answers, gets to the end and submits the assessment (without asking for the proctor to review it). But this raises the question: how do we teach our kids to do this?
Thanks to a wonderful TTAAS Facebook member, we present the video tutorial “Tabbing Through” Enjoy the video and let’s get out there and opt out. Because it is OUR option, not the school’s.
TEA Support Ticket – Refusal Without Testing Permitted
Facebook has decided to block a direct link to this document for reasons only their algorithm know. So I am placing it in this article for your use and review. This confirms again that the TEA does not require schools to put the assessment in front of your kid. It does not require that they “present” the child with the assessment on the day of the assessment. They CAN accept your refusal. The question is: WHY does your district refuse to do this.
This document was received directly from the TEA via Public Information Act request in April 2024.
teastudentassessments.zendesk.com_tickets_45753_print_RedactedRelated Story: TEA Confirms: School Can Accept Parental Refusal of STAAR
TPERN Demands Lake Dallas ISD Stop Threatening Parents
We recently received the below letter from Lake Dallas Middle School telling parents that due to scores on district and state practice assessments, their kids had been deemed in danger of not passing STAAR (Oh the horror!) and were required to attend after school tutorials under threat of detention, ISS or possibly other punitive measures. Just one problem, the compulsory attendance law provides specific instances where attendance may be required outside the regular school day, and school tutorials based on practice assessments is not one of them.
If you are ever subjected to such a threat, we encourage you to immediately send an opt out letter under Section 26.010. Further, please forward us a copy of the threat letter. Reprinted below is our response to Lake Dallas Middle School.
Why I Opted Out
From the Facebook group Texans Take Action Against STAAR, an opt out kid now at Texas A&M reflects on why she went from Mastering her STAAR assessments to refusing to take them!
Carroll ISD Formally Recognizes Parental Refusal Rights
This is a big one folks! To be clear: it doesn’t change the law or TEA positions. This is simply an almost word for word regurgitation of what the TEA has been permitting for three years now. It does not break new ground. It communicates existing guidance and options. But it is a BIG ONE!
Why is it big? Because it is in writing, publicly available, and set out in clear, straightforward language. It is an example of how EVERY DISTRICT IN TEXAS should engage with its parents. And it comes from a district that ordinarily is a big beneficiary of the STAAR assessment program. Carroll ISD is a high income, high achieving, suburban school district. Across the district, campuses are awarded accountability ratings of “A.” They boast of great quality in public schools. The district has the facilities and resources that many districts can only imagine. It has active, engaged parents and an engaged school board. And it just so happens to have a school board president who has had enough of STAAR madness. After nearly getting a resolution passed to refuse state dictated field testing (the vote failed 3-3), the district decided to face parental pushback on STAAR head on.
So how did they address parents who have concerns over STAAR assessment and want to opt out? No threats. No intimidation. No lies. Just the plain truth — and they put it right on their website.
Parents may refuse STAAR testing and Accelerated Instruction
This is the opening to the district’s departmental accountability page! And it is true. We’ve known it is true for over a decade and for the last three years, the TEA has been telling districts that they don’t have to fight with parents, that they don’t have to threaten parents, that they don’t have to try to trick kids to disobey their parents just to create assessment data. And while a number of districts have, often after contentious discussions with parents, started to employ this approach, it is still a moving target in many districts. In part, this is because the TEA has failed to give clear guidance. Instead of spelling it out like Carroll ISD does, the TEA says things like “the district must offer the child the opportunity to be assessed. What that looks like may vary district to district.” The answers are found in various unpublished emails and response logs, only available by public information request. Only when asked directly will the TEA directly tell a district that they don’t have to put an assessment in front of the kid or that they can accept parental refusal and submit the assessment from scoring based only on the parental refusal letter.
But right on the Carroll ISD website is the pure unadulterated truth for parents:
After giving notice (either by email, letter or district created form) the district will honor and respect the parental refusal:
- Carroll ISD will not present a child with a STAAR assessment on an initial testing day or on a make-up testing day if a parent refusal has been received.
- Carroll ISD acknowledges the rights of parents to refuse the STAAR and HB1416 on behalf of their child.
- When a parent refuses STAAR assessments for their child, the child will receive a raw score of zero.
- STAAR assessment score is not used to promote a child to the next grade level.
- The zero does not impact your child’s GPA.
- Carroll ISD is not allowed to encourage refusal of STAAR or of HB1416 Accelerated Instruction.
- CISD will always support parents in their educational choices for their children.
How different is this approach from many of the district responses we see? How straightforward is this approach? No need to threaten, lie or create fake consequences. And on high school issues, even though the district refusal form is not fully accurate, again, the webpage talks about substitute assessments and links parents to the commissioner’s substitute assessments that are available to meet graduation requirements.
TPERN congratulates the Carroll ISD parents who have engaged their district to bring about this change. But we particularly want to honor and appreciate the district leadership, both administrative and elected, that have decided that they will not be defined by STAAR, that they will not place themselves above parents in determining what is the best educational approach for a child, and that they will deal with their parents honestly and openly in presenting the true options available to parents and districts in responding to state assessment requirements.
