Our daughter's charter school went to work immediately and provided a response the first business day following receipt of our letter.
Our son's school principal in the largest school district in the state replied with an acknowledgement and plans to discuss later in the week. However, we are still waiting for a official response from our district. We are looking forward to discussing our decision and our intentions.
I have stated this before, but I am compelled to restate it - Our attempts are not adversarial in nature. Our hope is to work in conjunction with the leadership in each LEA to pave the path for our state to acknowledge the fundemental right of the parent to Opt Out as has occurred in Pennsylvania and California. In these states, parents opt their children out of testing without adverse consequences that punish either the child, the family, or the school, even if the schools dip below 95% participation.
From: http://unitedoptout.com/a-how-to-on-opting-out-in-pennsylvania-2/
It’s true. Directly from the PA Code, “If upon inspection of State assessments parents or guardians find the assessment in conflict with their religious belief and wish their students to be excused from the assessment, the right of the parents or guardians will not be denied upon written request to the applicable school district superintendent, charter school chief executive officer or AVTS director.”
Specifically, you must make an appointment with the school to review the PSSA test, sign a confidentiality agreement, review the tests, and write a letter that simply states that participation in PSSAs violates your religious principles. If you’re not sure how PSSAs violate religious principals please be aware that after 10 years of PSSAs childhood anxiety disorders have dramatically risen. Children have been denied a fully comprehensive education. Our children are being used to provide data that will label the child, teacher, school, and community a failure. This data is being sold to Washington think tanks and other data management organizations. Tax money (our money) has been diverted to testing and data management companies instead of schools and children. What religion supports such a system?From: http://unitedoptout.com/state-by-state-opt-out/california/
CA Ed Code 60615. Notwithstanding any other provision of law, a parent’s or guardian’s written request to school officials to excuse his or her child from any or all parts of the assessments administered pursuant to this chapter shall be granted.Even New York, a state similar to Delaware in that there is no designated method to opt-out in the state's laws/regs/codes, the NYC DOE has issued a FAQ that explains what happens if a school fails to attain AYP b/c test participation falls below 95% and it isn't designed to be punitive in nature:
All intervention decisions are based on intensive review of many factors; no intervention would ever be made solely on the basis of the State test participation rate. (The FAQ is published below.)Of course you're wondering why we haven't posted the response for our older child's school. We've chosen to withhold that one until we receive the second for the purpose of comparing how these two different LEAs in our state respond to the same request.
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