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August 29. 2015 12:01AM Other Views: Opting out of school testing threatens all The Bend Bulletin Oregonians who allowed or encouraged their children to skip the Smarter Balanced assessments in the school year that just ended did their kids no favor. Moreover, if their numbers grow, they could cause problems for all school-age children in Oregon. Smarter Balanced is the new exam that Oregon chose to replace its old Oregon Assessment of Knowledge and Skills exam when it adopted the Common Core curriculum. It was one of 17 states to use the new test last school year. The U.S. Department of Education requires the annual assessments as part of the No Child Left Behind law. At least 95 percent of students must take the tests, and at least 95 percent of individual groups — students in poverty, students with disabilities and others — must also complete the exam. While Oregon hit the overall goal, there were problems. African-American and disabled student participation both fell below 95 percent statewide, and two dozen of the state's 197 school districts also fell below the mark. More than 100 districts came up short for at least one group of students. Bend-La Pine Schools officials declined to provide information about their participation rates to us, citing an embargo on the information by the Department of Education. Those numbers matter because there's money at stake. If participation rates drop too far, Oregon could lose some $344 million in federal education funds. That money largely goes to special education and to schools with a higher-than-average number of low-income students, arguably the very kids who most need help getting through school. Neither Common Core nor Smarter Balanced will end education as we know it nor damage our children in the process. Rather, the former is aimed at getting kids to meet higher standards than before and to learn to think critically. The latter simply allows parents, educators and others to compare Oregon student achievement with student achievement elsewhere in the United States. Yet state lawmakers bought into the negative buzz this spring and passed a bill making opting out of exams arguably easier than opting out of immunizations — pretty much for any reason a parent can come up with. They apparently did so without thinking seriously about the matter, and while they will be the ones asked to replace missing federal funds if they're lost, it is we taxpayers who will supply them. http://www.mailtribune.com/article/20150829/OPINION/150829618 © 2015 Copyright © 1995-2011 Crain Communications Inc. All Rights Reserved. Terms of Use Privacy Statement -->