BIXBY — The Bixby school board Monday adopted a policy to allow parents to opt their children out of state standardized testing as a response to parent inquiries about doing so.
“We started getting contacted by parents around the start of school about opting out. Our basic response was we really didn’t think that was possible,” said Superintendent Kyle Wood.
Parents who feel their children are over-tested are behind a growing national opt-out movement. And several area school districts have reported that parents are contacting school officials about opting their children out of state testing.
But to answer whether parents may opt their child out of the tests, Bixby sought the guidance of the Oklahoma State Department of Education, he said.
Kim Richey, the state Education Department’s general counsel, notified Wood on Jan. 29 that districts are required to provide a test to every student in a “testing grade” — which begins in third grade — and that the law allows no “opt-out option” through the state department.
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However, any parent opt-out requests should be handled through the local school district, which will require districts to adopt a policy for handling and documenting such requests, she wrote.
Bixby’s school board responded by adopting such a policy.
“We’re not going to force a child to take a test that the parent tells them not to do,” Wood said. But he said the district discourages it in the form.
Last year, a number of Jenks parents opted their children out of field tests, which are used by testing companies to evaluate questions and don’t count in a student’s or a school’s grade.
The policy adopted by Bixby provides a form that parents may sign to opt out their child out of any standardized testing and outlines three consequences that students and the district may face as a result.
The consequences are:
• Oklahoma law requires that a third-grader score proficient or higher on the reading test or be retained in third grade. “There is nothing in the law that would allow for the promotion of those students (who don’t take the test)” unless they meet one of the six good cause exemptions that aren’t predicated on taking the test first, said education department Tricia Pemberton.
• Oklahoma law requires that any person under age 18 to demonstrate score satisfactory on the 8th grade reading test to get an Oklahoma drivers’ license.
• And Oklahoma law now requires students demonstrate mastery of state academic content standards by scoring proficient or higher on four of seven end-of-instruction standardized tests.
Wood also said parents are informed that the school district and its schools’ grades are based on testing. A district is required under the state’s A-F school grading system to test at least 95 percent of enrolled students or drop one letter grade. If 90 percent or fewer students are tested, the district receives an automatic “F.”
There could also be federal funding consequences if the appropriate numbers of students are not tested, Pemberton said.
Wood said he said he doesn’t expect a large number of parents to opt their children out of testing.
“We’re not encouraging or promoting it one way or the other,” he said. “Our primary objective with this policy is to answer parents’ questions.”
