More high school students are refusing to take required standardized tests, this time in the Northshore School District, which serves Woodinville, Bothell and Kenmore. KING 5 reports that about 640, or 41 percent, of the district’s high school juniors have decided to opt out of the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium, or SBAC, tests. The tests are mandated as part of the federal No Child Left Behind Act.
Parents met with district leaders on Wednesday and started asking tough questions about the tests, the station reported.
Meanwhile, about 95 percent of juniors at Garfield and several other Seattle high schools have refused to take the test, KING reported. That’s despite direction from the Seattle Public Schools superintendent telling teachers at Nathan Hale High School that they had to administer the test.
Standardized testing is a hot-button issue for many parents, and groups have formed to oppose such testing for various reasons.
State Superintendent of Public Instruction Randy Dorn has said schools risk losing federal funding if students don’t take the federally mandated tests. Dorn says that teachers could be investigated to see if they “encouraged” students not to take the test. “That, to me, is an ethics violation, a code of conduct violation, and a teacher could be disciplined," Dorn said, according to Northwest Public Radio.