The U.S. Department of Education has told Pima Community College that it has resolved all issues cited in a review report on the college's handling of Title IV student aid programs.

Title IV, or the Higher Education Act of 1965, covers the administration of the United States federal student financial aid programs.

In a September 2014 letter, the education department pointed out several concerns, including failure to have a functional system in place to identify class no-shows and unofficial withdrawals, reimbursing the wrong amount of money to the department after students who had already received financial aid dropped out, failure to verify students' information submitted when applying for financial aid, and the absence of exit counseling for students who took out loans and then dropped out, transferred or graduated from Pima.

From a PCC press release:

In a letter dated Jan. 27, Martina Fernandez-Rosario, Division Director, San Francisco/Seattle School Participation Division, wrote: “PCC’s response has resolved all findings related to the issues cited in the program review report. In addition, PCC has provided assurances that the appropriate corrective actions have been taken to resolve and prevent future occurrences of all findings. Therefore, PCC may consider the program review closed with no further action required.”

The College is required to apply for recertification of PCC participation in Title IV programs no later than March 31, 2015, but this is not tied to the Program Review findings. Higher education institutions are approved to participate in a six-year cycle and PCC’s cycle ends in June 2015.

Read the department of education's letter here.

No PARCCing! That was one of the signs held up during a New Jersey Board of Education meeting in January. PARCC (Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers) is one of the high stakes tests for Common Core being used in some states.

Today is the last day of my Opt Out Week on the Range, and this post is a collection of tidbits from the news in states I haven't written about. At the end of a post is a link to the four previous posts.

Let's begin here in Arizona. Though a few students opted out of last year's state testing, it was nothing that could be considered a movement compared to some other states. But if a Capitol Times article is correct, we could hear lots of grumbling during and after the upcoming assessment season. Opening line of the article:

The Arizona Department of Education is expecting the initial achievement test tied to the Common Core learning standards to be a disaster.

Not surprisingly, many schools' computers and network capacities are old and slow, which means they can't handle the online tests. That means going with the costlier paper versions — which teachers haven't been trained to administer. According to Michael Bradley, Ed Supe Diane Douglas' Chief of Staff, the Department of Ed would like to opt out of the tests entirely this year, except that the state could lose a lot of federal funding.

Arizona students won't be taking either of the two tests OK'd by the Common Core consortium, the PARCC and the Smarter Balance tests. It's using its own AZMerit test. And it has good company. Just over half the nation's students will be taking other tests. So much for the "Common" in Common Core assessment, which, of course, is one of the aspects proponents are most proud of. If every child takes the same tests, we'll be able to compare their scores and sort out the winners and losers across the country. Looks like it ain't gonna happen any time in the near future.

Next, to Florida. Florida has a vibrant opt out movement, but the state has laid down the law: opting out is not allowed.

Florida students cannot legally opt out of the state's standardized exams, and their teachers and school districts could face trouble if they do — or their parents do it for them, Education Commissioner Pam Stewart wrote today in a letter sent to key Florida state senators.

Stewart's letter — written in response to a letter the senators sent her — reiterated her position that state law (see section 1008.22 of the Florida statutes) "requires students to participate in the state assessment system, therefore there is no opt out clause or process for students to opt out or for parents to opt their children out."

In New Jersey, the opt out movement has gained some acceptance. In Haddon Township School District, the superintendent has told parents to submit a letter saying their child won't participate in the test. Their children will be marked present, then moved to a separate area from where other children are being tested. In Montclair District, a 10 year old gave an impassioned speech in front of the board, to a standing ovation. The board adopted a resolution stating that parental opt out requests "should be met at the district level with educationally appropriate and non-punitive responses." The state's Education Commissioner said that if students refuse to take the tests and aren't disruptive, districts “should have a policy of what you do with that child.”

Superintendent of Public Instruction Diane Douglas plans to form a committee, made up of current and retired school district officials, that will review Title 15, the Arizona statute dealing with all things education, to identify regulations and requirements in the statute that are "antiquated, overreaching or unnecessary."

The announcement was made Wednesday during a meeting between the Arizona Department of Education and the House Appropriations Committee. 

“I support Gov. Doug Ducey’s efforts to reduce regulation on business and believe the same should be done for school districts that are struggling with limited resources,” Douglas said in a statement. “If a rule, regulation, or statute does not contribute to bettering the education of our children or providing financial accountability, it needs to be seriously evaluated for elimination. While this will not solve all problems, laws are continually added over time, but rarely, if ever, reviewed for removal when they no longer serve a purpose.”

Douglas pointed to a federal rule that controls what type of food or snacks parents are allowed to bring to school fund-raisers, known as Smart Snacks requirements, as major federal overreach. The schools chief said yesterday that she would be granting exceptions to these requirements.

“Forcing parents and other supporters of schools to only offer federally approved food and snacks at fund-raisers is a perfect example of the overreach of government and intrusion into local control,” she said. “I have ordered effective immediately, that the ADE Health and Nutrition Services division grant exemptions for all fund-raisers for both traditional public schools and charter public schools.”

Currently, there is a bill, sponsored by Republican state Sen. Debbie Lesko, which would "codify the granting of exceptions in state law." The bill was partially created after a fund-raiser was told she couldn't sell snow cones after school unless the snow cones were the type allowed on a list of federally-approved snacks. 

“I appreciate the leadership shown by Senator Lesko and completely agree with her that this illustrates the ridiculous regulations so pervasive today in government of all levels. Like Senator Lesko, I have confidence that parents can decide whether or not to buy food for themselves or their children at fund-raiser events, just as easily as they make their own food choices when their children are not at school.” Douglas said. “The thought that a federal bureaucrat knows better than parents what they can feed their own families is condescending and reprehensible.”

Smarts Snacks came into effect July 2014, and are part of the governments effort to improve students' eating habits. First Lady Michelle Obama is a major proponent of serving healthier foods at schools to tackle childhood obesity.

(Added after publication):

U.S. Department of Agriculture's Food and Nutrition Service Regional Administrator Jesus Mendoza response to Douglas' statement:

“States have always had complete authority to set policies on bake sales and other fundraisers that work for them. The updated school meal standards made clear that states are free to allow fundraisers that don’t meet the healthy standards if they choose.”

Today is two-states-for-the-price-of-one day, since we're approaching the end of Opt Out Week on the Range. I'm featuring a couple of states where some people have taken aggressive, activist stands against our obsession with standardized, high stakes testing.



First, Colorado. We begin last November when 5,000 seniors opted out of the recently adopted state social studies and science tests. Here's what happened at one high school in Boulder, CO.

Students protested outside Fairview High School in zero degree temperatures holding signs that read, “education not standardization.” They took turns standing outside, collecting non-perishable food items for a food bank. Inside, dozens of students were busy writing letters to state lawmakers expressing why they chose to skip the tests.

The district supported the students' right to opt out.

District officials told students if they opt out with parents’ permission, it’s considered an excused absence. If they don’t show up, it’s counted as unexcused.



“We understand they are exercising their rights on this and their feelings about it — both them and their parents,” says Boulder Valley Superintendent Bruce Messinger. “If their parents have signed an opt-out form and we respect that and we’ll go forward.”

Move forward to January, at the Colorado Board of Education.

A divided Colorado State Board of Education voted Thursday to let school districts skip a portion of new state tests this spring, ignoring warnings that the board lacked the authority and that its action could invalidate the tests.



The motion from new Republican board member Steve Durham directs the education commissioner to grant waivers to local school boards and districts that want to opt out of the first part of math and English language arts tests set for March.



But it is unclear whether the motion — approved 4-3, and not along party lines — will amount to more than a gesture.

One Democrat and three Republicans voted for the measure, showing the testing issue is controversial on both sides of the aisle. The state's Department of Education is looking into the legality of opting out. So far as I know, it hasn't reached a decision.



But, hot off the presses, in a story from yesterday, Feb. 4, the State Board of Education voted to support a bill in the legislature that would cut Colorado's ties to Common Core.

House Bill 1125 proposes repealing existing state law that binds Colorado to a consortium of states that test students using Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) tests, which were developed to mirror Common Core English and math standards. The bill asks the State Board of Education to create new curriculum standards for Colorado and select three assessment systems districts could use in place of PARCC English and math tests and Colorado Measures of Academic Success science and social studies tests. School districts would pick which of the three tests to use.



The bill also would roll back how often students take statewide tests, from every year between third and 12th grade to every year between third grade and eighth grade and once between 10th and 12th grade for math and English, which is the federal minimum. Science and social studies testing would remain once in elementary school, once in middle school and once in high school.

How will all this affect the spring testing season in Colorado? Stay tuned for further developments. Meanwhile, in Illinois . . .

The Opt Out momentum has picked up in Louisiana this week. The reason: Gov. Bobby Jindal issued an executive order Friday saying the zero test scores of students who opt out of state testing by refusing to bubble in answers on the test shouldn't be averaged in with other scores.

Friday, just a day after Gannett Louisiana's story on parental withdrawal of students from the testing, [Jindal] issued an executive order allowing such parental moves and urging BESE [Board of Elementary and Secondary Education] to "'provide clear standards and expectations for schools and school systems so that assessment of their effectiveness will be understood' in order to avoid student achievement being negatively impacted by a score of zero as a result of non-participation" and to "to grant districts the ability to offer nationally norm-referenced or other comparable assessment appropriate for Louisiana as an alternative to the PARCC test, including abbreviated versions for the purpose of benchmarking, rather than penalizing students, teachers and schools and jeopardizing our statewide accountability system."

A few school districts are asking the Louisiana BESE (Board of Elementary and Secondary Education) not to penalize them for students who opt out.

Caddo Parish School Board:

The board unanimously voted to send the Louisiana Board of Elementary and Secondary Education a resolution asking to not be penalized for students opting out of the PARCC test.

St. Tammany Parish School Board:

The board voted unanimously Monday night (Feb. 2) to send a letter to members of the state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education asking them to hold the meeting and discuss the ramifications to the students, districts and schools of the students "opting out'' of PARCC testing. Moreover, the School Board wants discussion of placing a moratorium on performance letter grades for schools and districts on the meeting agenda.

The issue hasn't reached a conclusion, and probably won't until BESE weighs in. But there's an inherent logic in the request that a student's "sit and stare" zero not be averaged into classroom and student scores. Look at the two parts of the issue.

Pima Community College has been on probation since April 2013 over allegations of corrupt hiring practices, alleged sexual misconduct by the former chancellor, lack of collaboration between the board and the administration, wrongdoings in the financial management, among other concerns listed on a letter they got at the time from their accrediting agency, the Higher Learning Commission.

In the probation letter, the HLC says Pima's governing board appeared to "have no processes in place to oversee these financial practices. The Arizona Auditor General's recent financial audit of the institution also identified concerns with financial management. In addition to the contracted services under review by this team, the Auditor General found 'significant deficiencies' in the institution's internal financial controls."

Today, Arizona's Office of the Auditor General released its financial report for PCC for the fiscal year that ended June 30, 2014, saying that there were no deficiencies found during the audit of financial statements and that Pima had fixed one of the concerns noted in the same report from the previous fiscal year. 

From a Pima Community College press release:

The Auditor General also released the “Independent Auditors’ Report on Compliance for Each Major Federal Program” or “single audit” report for fiscal year 2014. The report identifies two material weaknesses. One weakness concerned the College’s standard purchase order terms and conditions regarding vendor debarment. A corrective action plan has been created by the Purchasing Department and the deficiency has been remedied by updating the language in one of the standard purchase order terms and conditions. The auditors performed reviews of all vendor transactions exceeding $25,000 and determined no payments were made to suspended or debarred vendors.

An additional deficiency in this report involved the reporting of enrollment for students who received financial aid and who completely withdrew from classes. These student enrollment statuses were not always correct or up-to-date. Both the Financial Aid and Admissions offices are responsible for enrollment reporting and have prepared a corrective action plan that includes improvements to procedural and policy changes that will correct these weaknesses in internal control. In addition, these offices will increase staffing involved with these processes.

This is a similar weakness to those in the U.S. Department of Education’s Federal Student Aid Program Review of June 2014. In its January 27, 2015 Final Program Review Determination response Martina Fernandez-Rosario, Division Director, San Francisco/Seattle School Participation Division, wrote: “PCC’s response has resolved all findings related to the issues cited in the program review report. In addition, PCC has provided assurances that the appropriate corrective actions have been taken to resolve and prevent future occurrences of all findings. Therefore, PCC may consider the program review closed with no further action required.”

The auditor general also released an annual budgeted expenditure limitation report for the FY ending June 30, 2014 and said Pima met its expenditure limitation requirements and "appropriately excluded expenditures of certain revenues set by law resulting in college expenditures under the...limitation by more than $7 million."

When Pima was placed on probation, it was given two years to fix the problems. PCC Chancellor Lee Lambert has said the college is heading the right direction and that they should be able to keep their accreditation. 

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but I don't remember "Raising Taxes" being one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. War, Famine, Pestilence and Death are more traditionally mentioned. But an AZ Capitol Times article warns in its headline, K-12 funding suit could bring fiscal doomsday scenario. So, maybe the prospect of raising taxes in Arizona to pay the state's bills really is that dire.

The topic is the deadbeat dads and moms Republican legislators who just don't want to pay the child support education funding they owe, by law. It's $337 million a year, plus $1.3 billion to make up for their short-changing our children since 2009. Admittedly, they have a legitimate problem right now. The state is having a hell of a time figuring out how to cover its current shortfall even if it doesn't make its legally mandated education payment. And Governor Ducey ran on a No New Taxes Cut Taxes Even More pledge. What's a conservative gonna do?

Ducey wants the legislature to make a deal with the plaintiffs who are demanding the full $337 million, hoping the lege can get away with paying pennies on the dollar. At this point, the plaintiffs aren't interested, though that may change. But Republican Rep. David Livingston doesn't like the idea of compromise. He says the Republican legislators should just refuse to pay up.

“The real question is does a court system want to have a constitutional battle over this? They can tell us we are required to pay that. But I don’t believe legally they can force us to do that."

Don Peters, the lawyer representing the school districts, doesn't agree.

The courts have ways of enforcing such decisions, [Peters] said, including holding state officials in contempt, imposing fines or even putting parts of state government into receivership. He said he doubted that the Legislature would actually take such an action.

There's an easy, or at least an obvious, solution. Raise taxes. Tim Steller made the case for a tax hike in a recent column in The Star, showing the state budget is at the lowest percentage of state residents' income it's been in 35 years. Raise that percentage a bit by getting rid of some of the more ridiculous tax exemptions and raising the income tax rate on those who can best afford it—yes, tax the rich, who are doing very well in these days of growing income inequality—and the state can pay its bills, with maybe a little left over to, say, fix a pothole or two.

But Republicans won't have it—or not enough of them, anyway. If it only took a simple majority to raise taxes, it's possible that a few renegade Republicans could join with Democrats and pass a tax hike. But in Arizona, it takes a two-thirds majority in the legislature to pass a tax increase, meaning that one-third-plus-one representatives or senators can block any tax bill that comes their way. Arizona voters passed the supermajority referendum a few decades ago. If we want the state to regain its fiscal sanity, voters need to pass a new referendum to get rid of it. Then getting legislators to pass a tax hike would be only very difficult, not impossible.

The Arizona Department of Education is seeking people's comments on drafts of updated state standards for physical education and foreign and native language. 

"This is an excellent opportunity for Arizona parents and teachers to have a direct impact  on standards that affect our children,” Superintendent of Public Instruction Diane Douglas said in a statement. “I am excited to hear their feedback and will work with my staff to ensure their thoughts are incorporated into the final versions of these drafts.”

The drafts up for review will be used to revise the state's current standards. Parents, teachers and others will be allowed to comment until March 2, 2015.

There are a few options: You can fill out surveys online, send a fax, letter or email (more inform on that here, Physical Education Standards, and here, Foreign and Native Language Standards).

The department also has some webinars in place in the coming days.

Foreign and Native Language Standards:

From 3:30 to 5 p.m. Friday, Feb. 20, 2015

From 4 to 5:30 p.m. Monday, Feb. 23, 2015

From 6 to 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, Feb. 25, 2015

Physical Education Standards:

From 3 to 4 p.m. Monday, Feb. 23, 2015

From 2:30 to 3:30 p.m. Wednesday, Feb. 25, 2015

From 3 to 4 p.m. Monday, March 2, 2015

You have to register online for those. For language, here, and for PE, here.

Jia Lee - Senate Hearings Reauthorization of NCLB Jan 2015 from nLightn Media on Vimeo.

New York is one of the hotbeds of the national Opt Out movement. Last April, an estimated 33,000 students opted out of the state's annual standardized tests. What was done to all those children, parents and schools as a result of this protest against standardized testing? Apparently, very little.

According to the state survey, most schools do not stand in the way of opt outs. Still, at 2 percent of schools, parents or students were pressured not to opt out. Another 20 percent did not allow students who opted out to participate in an alternative activity, such as reading. Children had to sit quietly and do nothing.

Some schools where a majority of students refused the tests have not been penalized.

Some New York teachers are risking their jobs by refusing to administer the test, like Beth Dimino, an eighth-grade teacher in Long Island.

“I find myself at a point in the progress of education reform in which clear acts of conscience will be necessary to preserve the integrity of public education,” [Dimino] writes. . . . "The next logical step has to be the movement of conscientious objectors,” she tells the Press. “I believe, and I said this to [New York State Education Commissioner John] King and [state Board of Regents Chancellor Merryl] Tisch and [state] Senator [John] Flanagan at the Three Village Rally [in November 2013], that this is child abuse. I believe that it is child abuse. I believe that giving these tests to my students makes me culpable in the abuse of children and I can no longer do that.”

Dimino has a powerful ally: her district superintendent, Dr. Joe Rella.

“I have known Beth for over 20 years,” he says. “This was not something she has done lightly. There was a lot of soul searching that went on and she said to me, as a matter of conscience, she cannot participate. She cannot proctor this test. And I support that.”

Last week was School Choice Week, the privatizers' national love fest for vouchers and charters, spiced up with a touch of scorn for "government schools." I'm declaring this Opt Out Week on the Range, on my own. The Opt Out movement is growing in reaction to our national obsession with high stakes testing, and I figure interested Arizonans can benefit from knowing what's going on around the country.

Over the past weeks, I've been downloading every article I can find on the Opt Out movement, which encourages parents to protest high stakes testing by refusing to allow their children to take the tests. I've found articles about opting out in 21 states. In some states like Florida, Illinois, New York, New Jersey, Colorado and, recently, Louisiana, it's a pretty big deal. Here in Arizona, more articles have been written recently about people opting out of the measles vaccine than opting out of state testing, the one exception being articles that talked about the opt out bill in the legislature, HB 2246.

In coming days, I'll focus on the way the opt out issue is playing itself out in a number of states, but today, I want to to take a more general look at the topic. But first, this, just in (last Friday) from Louisiana:

Jindal issues executive order on PARCC testing

Gov. Bobby Jindal issued an executive order this afternoon urging the state's education board to offer alternatives to the controversial PARCC testing that starts in March.

The governor's order also asks that the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education protect school districts from being punished for students whose parents opt them out of the testing. Current policy would have a negative impact on school performance scores if students opt out of the test and receive a score of "0."

That's a first so far as I know: a governor issuing an order saying opting out is OK.

Which brings us to one of the most interesting aspects of the opt out movement. It brings together right wingers who are anti-Common Core but not necessarily against high stakes testing per se, and left wingers who are anti-high stakes testing but not necessarily against Common Core per se. Armed with different agendas, and often for different reasons, lefties and righties are fighting similar battles when it comes to high stakes testing. And that makes for a powerful, two-pronged attack.