Seattle Schools Community Forum: Feds Told NY State that Financial Penalities for Opt-Outs up to State

Seattle Schools Community Forum: Feds Told NY State that Financial Penalities for Opt-Outs up to State:

Feds Told NY State that Financial Penalities for Opt-Outs up to State

The NY Times has devoted much coverage to the issue of how the state/feds would deal with the massive number of students who opted out of their state testing (about 20%).  Naturally that number of opt-outs caused NY state to fall way below the feds' required participation rate of 95% under NCLB.  That below-the-mandated rate meant possible financial sanctions to states (likely withholding of some Title One dollars).

I missed this but on August 20th, the Times reported this:

As recently as last week, the state education commissioner, MaryEllen Elia, said that she was not sure if the federal Education Department would withhold money from districts with high opt-out rates. She declined to rule out the possibility that the state would do so on its own.

But on Thursday, the chancellor of the State Board of Regents, Merryl H. Tisch, said that the federal Education Department informed the state’s Education Department “a couple of weeks ago” that it was leaving any decision about financial penalties to the state. And Ms. Tisch, whose board oversees the state agency and appoints the commissioner, said the state did not plan to withhold money from districts.

But, the Washington Post reports that Ms. Elia also said this:

“I think opt-out is something that is not reasonable. I am absolutely shocked if, and I don’t know that this happened, but if any educators supported and Seattle Schools Community Forum: Feds Told NY State that Financial Penalities for Opt-Outs up to State: