COVID cases are rising as NC high school students take required in-person state exams
North Carolina high school students are being asked to show up on campus now to take state-mandated exams at a time when COVID-19 cases are at record levels.
This week, some North Carolina public high schools started giving state end-of-course exams and state career and technical education post assessment exams. The state is requiring the exams to be taken in person, regardless of whether a student is taking only online classes this semester.
“The governor has said we’re in a life-and-death situation,” Scott Fowler, an Asheville resident, said in an interview Tuesday. “So how can I responsibly let my daughter go into a closed setting with hundreds and hundreds of other students who I have no idea how they’ve been practicing COVID safety? That would be irresponsible and negligent.”
Fowler said he will not send his daughter to Asheville High School next week for any of her four state-mandated exams. There’s an academic risk because those exams, for now at least, are required by the state to count for at least 20% of the final grade in those courses.
The testing window is opening as the number of new coronavirus cases has skyrocketed. The state set a new single-day record on Sunday with 6,438 new reported confirmed COVID-19 cases.
On Tuesday, Gov. Roy Cooper announced a new statewide curfew, saying everyone should stay at home between 10 p.m. and 5 a.m. unless an exception applies. The new executive order, which goes into effect Friday, also says many businesses must close at 10 p.m.
Schools offer accommodations
School districts are trying to make taking in-person exams less stressful:
▪ Exams will be given in smaller than normal groups to maintain social distancing.
▪ Testing rooms will be cleaned before and after use.
▪ Hand sanitizer will be available.
▪ Families can request makeup dates.
Families can also request “medical exceptions” that would allow schools to not count the exams when calculating a student’s grade in those classes.
Families make the requests through their school district, which then submits them to an internal committee in the state Department of Public Instruction for approval.
Historically, the bar for getting an exemption is high. For instance, the state testing manual cites examples such as students who can’t take tests because they’re in the “final stages of terminal or degenerative illness, coma, receiving extensive short-term medical treatment.”
Families learn their testing rights
N.C. Families For School Testing Reform will hold an online webinar from 7-8 p.m. on Wednesday to explain to families their rights. Go to tinyurl.com/HighStakesNC to register.
The group has gotten more than 6,500 signatures on an online petition calling on the state exams to be waived this school year. In the meantime, Chelsea Bartel, the group’s organizer, said they’ve encouraged families to lobby their school districts to take advantage of the option the state is giving to extend the testing window into June.
Wake County will give students flexibility on when to make up the state exams, according to Michael Yarbrough, a district spokesman. A handful of Wake high schools will give state exams next week, but he said no students have requested a makeup date for the in-person tests.
But some districts are only extending the exam makeup window into January. There’s a concern that the students won’t do as well on the exams if they take them months after they finished the classes.
Fowler, the Asheville parent, said he doesn’t think he’ll let his daughter take the exams in January either. He’s expecting a post-Christmas wave of new COVID-19 cases.
“If you look at the numbers, it’s going to be worse day by day,” Fowler said. “To think it will be safe to go back into school in January doesn’t seem logical.”
Tests still required
Both the state and federal governments require annual standardized tests to assess school and student performance and to decide on things such as teacher and principal bonuses. The exams were waived last school year due to the coronavirus pandemic.
U.S. Education Secretary Betsy DeVos has said waivers won’t be granted this school year. The Biden Administration may grant waivers, but it won’t take office until Jan. 20, after North Carolina high school students take their fall semester exams.
Based on the current federal guidance, the State Board of Education tentatively agreed last week to ask for federal waivers to not hold schools accountable if large numbers of students opt out of the exams this year. But the board will not ask for a waiver from giving the tests, pointing to how the information can help determine how students are doing during the pandemic.
State board members say they’re being responsive by letting school districts delay the fall exams until June 30. In those cases, students would get a grade of “incomplete” until the exam is taken.
“I think everyone is acknowledging in the pandemic that there’s virtually no perfect answer, but there are answers here in terms of trying to move forward,” state board vice chairman Alan Duncan said at last week’s meeting.
“It’s just not as clear as everybody would like to have it. But we can move forward and do it in a respectful way in the interests of all people the best we possibly can.”
Lobbying to reduce 20% requirement
The state board made no decision last week on changing the requirement that the exams count for at least 20% of the final grade. State officials say the 20% requirement has historically made high school students take the exams more seriously.
But the lobbying to reduce or eliminate the 20% requirement will likely increase before most high school students take their state exams in January. Deputy State Superintendent David Stegall said the state has already received a “groundswell of requests” to change the 20% rule.
“Ask for federal waivers now,” Michele Thomas, a parent at Athens Drive High School in Raleigh, tweeted the state board on Monday. “Sending thousands of kids to school for a test is criminal in a pandemic.”
This story was originally published December 8, 2020 at 5:06 PM.
