LITTLE ROCK -- A group opposing the Common Core State Standards is telling parents it's their right to boycott standardized tests aligned with Common Core -- but officials in at least one Arkansas school district say refusing to take the tests could have severe consequences.
This spring, Arkansas schools for the first time will administer tests aligned with the Common Core standards, which the state has gradually implemented over the past three school years. The tests were developed by a coalition of states, the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers, or PARCC.
Grace Lewis of Mount Vernon, chairman of Arkansas Against Common Core, said the group isn't calling for a boycott of the tests, but it has heard from parents who want to keep their children out of the tests.
"We tell them that's completely their right to do that," she said.
But Cabot School District officials say the tests are mandated by law and students can be held back a grade or kept from graduating if they refuse to take them.
"We've already started getting calls from parents about the PARCC assessments that will be coming up in spring ... saying 'my kid is not going to take that test,' ... for whatever reason they might have," Cabot Superintendent Tony Thurman said during a Cabot School Board meeting on Dec. 16.
Thurman said students in grades 3-8 who refuse to take the tests could be "retained" at their current grade in the following school year.
Linda Payne, director of professional development and testing for the district, said at the same meeting high school students can be denied credits needed to graduate if they have refused the PARCC assessments.
"The law says you cannot receive graduation credit, or graduate, if you have not taken the test," she said.
Payne cited Arkansas Code Annotated 6-15-2009, which states in part, "A student in grades three through eight identified as not passing a benchmark assessment and who fails to participate in the subsequent academic improvement plan shall be retained and shall not be promoted to the next appropriate grade" until the student either is deemed to have participated in the academic improvement plan or has passed the benchmark assessment.
The law also states, "A student who is identified as not meeting the requisite scale score for a general end-of-course assessment shall not receive academic credit on his or her transcript for the course related to the general end-of-course assessment until the student is identified as having participated in remediation through an individualized academic improvement plan."
Cabot school officials also said parents cannot simply keep their children home on testing day to avoid the tests, because a student who is absent on testing day can still take the test at any time in the next six weeks.
The Arkansas News Bureau asked state Department of Education officials whether school districts have the authority to hold students back a grade or deny them the credits needed to graduate if they refuse to participate in the PARCC tests. The officials noted the language of Arkansas Code Annotated 6-15-2009 has been written into Education Department rules.
Department spokeswoman Kimberly Friedman declined to comment on whether Cabot officials are interpreting the rules correctly,
"It's a local district issue," she said.
Payne said last week she stands by her comments at the Dec. 16 meeting. Thurman didn't return calls Tuesday and Wednesday seeking comment.
Lewis said she has heard from parents across the state who said they told their superintendents their children wouldn't be taking the PARCC test and weren't told that the students would be held back or prevented from graduating.
"If I had a child in (the Cabot) district, I would still go forward with opting my child out and standing up against the system," she said.
Common Core was initiated by the National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers and later embraced by President Barack Obama, whose administration allowed states to receive extra points in the competition for Race to the Top grant program if they adopted Common Core or other college and career readiness standards.
Forty-five states initially adopted Common Core, but lawmakers who oppose the standards in a number of those states, including Arkansas, have advocated repealing them. In June, Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin signed legislation repealing the Common Core standards in that state.
Supporters of the standards say they seek to ensure a child doesn't receive an inferior education because of where he or she happens to live. Opponents say Common Core opens the door to a federal takeover of education and the PARCC assessments could become a venue for intrusive data collection.
"It's what it could lead to," Lewis said. "You're going to be losing privacy."
Debbie Jones, the state Education Department's assistant commissioner of learning services, said the department collects only "minimal" information on students and never shares with the federal government or anyone else information that could identify individual students.
NW News on 01/05/2015