http://www.commondreams.org/views/2015/09/19/seattle-teachers-strike-win-social-justice
Also in the settlement terms, according to a local television news outlet, were student-centered demands including requests for guaranteed 30 minutes of recess for all elementary students, additional staff such as school counselors and therapists, a reduction in the over-testing of students, and the creation of new teams in 30 schools to ensure equitable learning opportunities and treatment of students regardless of race.
While recess may seem to be an unworthy demand to the reform-minded editors of the Times, classroom teachers understand it to be something critical to the health, development, and academic success of their students, as numerous research reports have found.
Having access to school counselors, therapists, and other specialists is critical to many students, but in inadequately funded school districts, such as Seattle, these are the positions that are routinely the first to be cut.
The demand for less testing is also, ultimately, a student-centered demand. As Hagopian explains, this time to Erin Middlewood for The Progressive magazine, “’We oppose these tests because there are too many of them and they’re narrowing the curriculum and they’re making our kids feel bad, but they’re also part of maintaining institutional racism,’ says Hagopian, who serves as an adviser to Garfield’s Black Student Union.”
Hagopian sees the increasingly popular campaign to opt out of standardized tests as being connected to the Black Lives Matter movement because money that should be used to support and educate children and youth of color is being directed to punitive measures such as testing and incarceration.
The connection of education injustice, represented by standardized testing, to broader social injustices is also driving teachers’ demands for equity teams in schools to address widespread imbalances in disciplinary action based on race. Numerous studies have shown black students – especially in Seattle – are far more apt to face harsh disciplinary measures including suspensions and expulsions, and Seattle teachers are wise to insist the district address this disparity.
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