Say "No" to standardized exams and computer-based assessments in our school district for the year.

Sign this petition to support young people in our district by REJECTING district-wide standardized exams and computer-based assessments for this year.  

What do our young people need most right now? 

If you are an educator who brings social-emotional support to your students in any meaningful way, you must empathize with young people at this time of social-distancing and rising issues for families in urban districts.  Currently, the Vallejo City Unified School District offers lip-service to social-emotional practices, while emphasizing "data collection" and Odysseyware as part of a valuable support system for student learning.

How will this data support young people?  Data collection without a comprehensive plan for specific, tested, and teacher-approved interventions will never yield benefits for student learning.  The fact: no long-term goal exists and/or no  adminstrator remains that can adequately rationalize NWEA as a viable strategy. 

Why do we squander precious time and resources on 30-minute slideshows and lectures that do not allow for feedback or questions?  We, the true leaders of our youth in schools, should be allowed to use that time for researching, sharing, collaborating, and discussing REAL interventions, instead of copy/pasting on irrelevant pacing guides.

If we are truly educators, now is our time to exercise our most basic U.S. freedoms, including that of free speech and petitioning the government - of effecting a positive social change.  We have a responsibility to model for young people what passionate, informed, and engaged adults can do against oppressive and unhealthy conditions in our country by starting here in our own school.

Charles (Chad) O'Connor    Contact the author of the petition