TRI In The News
Parents Need to 'Be on the Ball'
9/28/2011
TRI IN THE NEWS: PARENTS NEED TO 'BE ON THE BALL'
From One News Now
Original article available here.
An Indiana high school has agreed to comply with a federal law that requires it to obtain parental consent before administering an intrusive mental health survey.
The Rutherford Institute, on behalf of a concerned parent, wrote the Portage Township School Corporation requesting that the district comply with the rights of parents and the requirements of federal law, specifically the Protection of Pupil Rights Amendment. And according to Rutherford Institute president John Whitehead, the school is complying.
"So now, this particular school district, the Portage Town[ship] school district, is saying they will not administer tests without written consent," Whitehead reports. "The reason they're doing it is because that's what the law requires, and a parent here happened to be on the ball."
And he contends it is imperative that parents be aware of the content of these explicit surveys that ask about suicide risk and drug use and include personal information about illegal, anti-social, self-incriminating, and demeaning behavior, and/or mental and psychological problems that are potentially embarrassing.
"What they find on the studies ... is that when parents don't know about these tests or what's on the test, it's a 90-percent participation rate by the students," the attorney notes of the "telling" finds. "When parents know what's on the test [or] have actually seen some of the questions, it's less than 30 percent."
Whitehead concludes that the nation is at a crossroads for parental rights, so parents need to get involved in their children's education process.
