Polk County Itemizer-Observer • February 11, 2015 17A
Polk County Schools/Education
Exclusion
day from
school set
Testing opt-outs
concern district
By Emily Mentzer
The Itemizer-Observer
Vaccinations must
be current Feb. 18
Itemizer-Observer staff report
POLK COUNTY — Children
whose records on file show
missing immunizations will
not be able to attend school or
child care starting Feb. 18, the
state’s school exclusion day.
State law requires that all
children in public and private
schools, preschools, Head
Start and certified child care
facilities have up-to-date doc-
umentation on their immu-
nizations or have an exemp-
tion, according to the Oregon
Immunization Program.
“Immunization is an effec-
tive way to keep schools and
the entire community
healthy,” said Stacy de Assis
Matthews, school law coordi-
nator in the Oregon Health
Authority Public Health Divi-
sion. “We want to make sure
children are fully protected
against vaccine-preventable
diseases such as whooping
cough and measles.”
Parents should also know
about an updated vaccine re-
quirement: The hepatitis A
vaccine, which protects
against a communicable viral
infection, is a two-dose series
required for children 18
months and older in child
care, preschool and kinder-
garten through sixth grade.
If school and child care vac-
cination records are not up to
date, the child will be sent
home. In 2014, local health de-
partments sent 32,345 letters
to parents and guardians
statewide informing them that
their children needed immu-
nizations to stay in school or
child care. A total of 5,227 chil-
dren were kept out of school or
child care until the necessary
immunization information
was turned in to the schools or
child care facilities. Letters to
parents this year were sched-
uled to be mailed by Feb. 4.
Parents seeking immuniza-
tions for their children should
contact their health care
provider or local health de-
partment, or call 211Info —
just dial 211. No one can be
turned away from a local
health department because of
the inability to pay for required
vaccines. Pharmacists can im-
munize children 11 and older.
For more information:
www.healthoregon.org/imm.
JOLENE GUZMAN/ Itemizer-Observer
Jacob Reimer, second from right, and Jake Shryer, third from right, maneuver their
team’s robot during a scrimmage Saturday. The team won despite technical difficulties.
Robotics: Dallas High teams
qualify for state competition
Continued from Page 18A
Along the way, he’s found
out engineering really is a
field he will enjoy — and an-
other valuable lesson he will
likely fall back on in his ca-
reer: test and retest your de-
signs.
“Your first designs aren’t
going to work,” he said.
“You have to see what
works, what doesn’t, and
make it better.”
And they did.
At the end of the day,
Team ramRod, partnering
with another Dallas robotics
squad, Jones’ #1 Fans, took
home tournament champi-
on honors — and set a
school record for points
scored in one match at 71.
The award earned the two
teams a trip to the Oregon
VEX Robotics Competition
state championship in
March and high school U.S.
Open Robotics Champi-
onship in April.
A third Dallas team, Your
Mom Goes to College, won
the tournament sportsman-
ship award.
District audit receives praise
Itemizer-Observer staff report
DALLAS — The Dallas
School District accepted its
2013-14 fiscal year audit re-
port, which contained no
major issues.
Auditor Pauly, Rogers and
Co. gave the district a “clean
opinion” on the audit,
found the district met the
state’s minimum account-
ing standards, and that the
district used federal re-
sources properly.
Business Manager Tami
Montague gave credit to dis-
trict staff for helping make
the audit process run
smoothly, especially when it
came to accounting on “stu-
dent activity funds,” which
include, for example, clubs
funds and student govern-
ment funds, at each school.
“We have outstanding
staff out in the buildings
doing hard work,” she said.
“We heard more than once
during our audit that it is
pretty unusual for student
activity funds to be that
clean.”
In other business, the
board:
We are a locally family owned metal
roofing & siding manufacturer.
We still believe in value with quality.
Look for us at The Polk Home & Garden Show
February 20, 21, & 22 • Booth #41
Oregon rain will
be here soon.
Are you ready
for it?
Have a shed or
barn that needs
to be covered
immediately?
Solution on Page 9A
• Re-appointed David
Morris to the Dallas School
District Budget Committee
and appointed Greg Locke
to complete the term of Sam
Collins on the committee.
Collins’ term expires in Feb-
ruary 2016.
INDEPENDENCE —
When a parent decides their
student does not need to or
should not take a state-
mandated test, it is consid-
ered an automatic “does not
meet” standards.
Central School District Su-
perintendent Buzz Brazeau
addressed the school board
at its Feb. 2 meeting about
the topic, including inform-
ing board members that the
district will be adopting poli-
cy on how to handle parents
who opt-out of tests.
“There is potential for a
parent to opt out based on
one of two reasons: reli-
gious purposes or disabili-
ty,” Brazeau said.
No movement to opt out
of testing is afoot, Brazeau
noted, but two parents have
chosen the option. Brazeau
said he had to inform the
board of the situation so it
would be prepared to adopt a
policy regarding opting out.
Ben Gorman, a Central
High School teacher, Central
Education Association presi-
dent and parent of a district
student, wrote extensively
on his personal blog, the-
sumofourgods.com, about
opting out of state testing.
In the blog, Gorman said
he is not encouraging par-
ents to opt out of testing,
but he includes a fill-in-the-
blank style form letter par-
ents could use to opt stu-
dents out and provides ar-
gument for opting out.
Gorman is one of the par-
ents who opted his son out
of testing, according to his
24 hour
Service
blog. The second parent-
teacher who opted out used
the form letter provided by
Gorman.
“The tests are not de-
signed to give information
about an individual student
to a teacher in a way that
will improve that individual
child’s education,” Gorman
said in an email. “They are
designed to grade teachers
and grade schools.”
If less than 94.5 percent of
students take state tests, it
can cause the district’s
scores to drop, Brazeau said,
regardless
of how
schools
perform
elsewhere.
“If you
are per-
forming
at a 5, and
miss the
Brazeau
percent-
age (of participation), you
automatically come down
to a 4,” he said. “If you are a
5 the next year, and miss
participation again, they
keep doubling it to bring
you down. There’s some real
negative aspects to the
school and to the school
district as a whole.”
While laws are changing
constantly, Brazeau said
testing is, for the moment,
how to tell if students are
learning what teachers are
teaching.
“Certainly, I’m not a fan of
testing,” he noted. “But I
have to be real honest, when
I played football I wasn’t a
fan of lifting weights and
getting in shape, but I did it
because I had to.”
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