Should Schools be Closed or Turned into Charter Schools if Students Opt Out???

The State Education department has proposed new super punitive regulations to address schools who do not meet the federal 95% testing participation threshold. The regulations are flawed in a number of ways, but one of the most egregious is that they assign more penalties to Title 1 (high poverty) schools. From the NYC Public School Parents blog: These regulations violate assurances that were given parents that NYSED would continue to respect their rights to opt their children out of the state exams.  Instead the regulationss would allow the Commissioner to wrongly identify their children's schools in need of "Comprehensive Support," withhold Title One funds and even close these schools or turn them into charters if the opt out rates were judged too high.  Complete text here.

The Regents will be discussing these regs at their meeting on Monday.  Please consider contacting Commissioner Elia or your Regents member to make your voices heard.   You can also submit comments through July 9 here.