Your Opinion: Parental control and opting out of tests

Dear Editor:

This spring Missouri students took the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium's Test. In a number of states legislators passed laws that would make districts inform parents of opt-out rights for their children.

In Missouri, DESE took the position that parents could not have their children opt-out of the test. The Jefferson City School District administration took their cue from DESE and successfully bullied most parents that an opt-out of the test was not an option for their children in the district.

This kind of arrogant attitude of the district administration does nothing to promote trust and cooperation of the public for Jefferson City schools.

In New York, legislators urged Congress to protect funding despite opt-outs. The move came in response to education Secretary Arne Duncan's warning that the "funding could be withheld for districts that didn't meet the 95 percent participation level during the recent round of testing."

To be fair, Jefferson City was not the only school district in Missouri that reacted in the manner in regards to not allowing opt-outs. I checked with a number of colleagues around the state and a good number of school districts did not permit opt-outs. Parents were upset that government was taking away their rights as parents to have their children opt-out. These events give rise to some parents' beliefs that they are being deprived of having any parental control of their children's education. Just last week a group of parents met to get organized to circulate petitions to get a parents bill of rights amendment to the Constitution.

We've seen in the past what happens when you put an amendment in the Constitution on right to farm and right to bear arms. They can be misinterpreted to go far beyond what the original intent was. One must be careful what you ask for, you may get it.

In the future it would be a good idea if the school board would not rubber stamp administration's recommendations with a 7-0 vote without allowing public input into some of the decisions they make that affect the entire school community.