Context, Not Ideology: How Parents Negotiate Choices to Opt Out of State Testing

• In Event: The Implications of Testing Teachers and Students

Abstract

Growing opposition to standardized assessments has galvanized efforts to “opt-out” of state testing. Media coverage and emerging research has often focused on activists and advocacy organizations with strong ideological positions against testing. Drawing on interviews in a high “opt-out” context, we explore how parents negotiated decisions about testing, in ways that were complex, shifting and contextual. Parents, even with strong viewpoints against testing, nonetheless participated because of considerations about their school community and their child’s particular circumstances. Likewise, parents who opted out shared some of the shifting and flexible aspects of their choice. This nuanced view of opting-out underscores the need for states and districts to provide opportunities to discuss the aims and purposes of testing with diverse stakeholders.

Authors

• Terri S. Wilson, University of Colorado Boulder

• Maravene Taylor-Heine, University of Colorado - Boulder

• Wagma S. Mommandi, University of Colorado - Boulder

• Matthew Hastings, University of Colorado - Boulder