To: The Tennessee State House, The Tennessee State Senate, and Governor Bill Lee
Opt Out Tennessee
The Tennessee state standardized assessment tests (TCAPS for 3-8 and Gateway for high school students) of our public education system are being misused and should be considered inaccurate and inappropriate tools used to judge student progress, achievement, school quality, and teacher effectiveness.
We, the undersigned parents of students in the Tennessee public school system, in order to return a whole and equitable public education to the students of Tennessee, exercise our 1st and 14th Amendment rights of the federal Constitution to opt our children out of the aforementioned standardized tests without penalty to student grades, as approved by recent state legislation. Furthermore, class level placement, which is currently being determined by these tests at the discretion of any county, shall not be affected by the absence of this score.
Why is this important?
To support students, parents, and teachers alike, we need to let our state representatives know that the use of high stakes testing is damaging children, teachers, schools and communities. Standardized tests have failed to produce real reform; too much time is taken away from our students' learning in lieu of test preparation and practice, which narrows the curriculum and dissuades any intrinsic desire to learn.