Earlier this week,  NYC Department of Education Chancellor Dennis Walcott announced that henceforth there will be 50 words and concepts that would no longer be allowed on the many standardized assessment tests created by NYC's vast network of standardized assessment test creators. The Committee-That-Knows-Better-Than-You put their collective heads together to created this list because they fear that some student could be so traumatized at the very thought of the concept of "children dealing with serious issues" that they will not be able to perform at their best. They decided that this is the reason for the steep decline in test scores over the last few years. Of course, not learning how to read, write a simple sentence, and to do simple arithmetic may be more traumatizing when faced with a standardized test, but hey that's just me. Some of the forbidden words are predictable, but some are just baffling. Here is the full list:


***WARNING: SOME OF THESE WORDS AND/OR CONCEPTS MAY BE TRAUMATIZING***
FORBIDDEN WORD/CONCEPT LIST
Abuse (physical, sexual, emotional, or psychological)
Alcohol (beer and liquor), tobacco, or drugs
Birthday celebrations (and birthdays)
Bodily functions
Cancer (and other diseases)
Catastrophes/disasters (tsunamis and hurricanes)
Celebrities
Children dealing with serious issues
Cigarettes (and other smoking paraphernalia)
Computers in the home (acceptable in a school or library setting)
Crime
Death and disease
Divorce
Evolution
Expensive gifts, vacations, and prizes
Gambling involving money
Halloween
Homelessness
Homes with swimming pools
Hunting
Junk food
In-depth discussions of sports that require prior knowledge
Loss of employment
Nuclear weapons
Occult topics (i.e. fortune-telling)
Parapsychology
Politics
Pornography
Poverty
Rap Music
Religion
Religious holidays and festivals (including but not limited to Christmas, Yom Kippur, and Ramadan)
Rock-and-Roll music
Running away
Sex
Slavery
Terrorism
Television and video games (excessive use)
Traumatic material (including material that may be particularly upsetting such as animal shelters)
Vermin (rats and roaches)
Violence
War and bloodshed
Weapons (guns, knives, etc.)
Witchcraft, sorcery, etc.

My sample question: If traveling (oops, don't use traveling because some kids may not have the means to travel) for 40 miles (what about those kids who only understand the metric system?) going East (oops, what if they live on the East Coast less than 40 miles from open water?) at 40 miles an hour (oops there's that metric issue again) how long will it take you to get to get to your destination in the astral plane (oops, no parapsychology references allowed) ?


It must be frustrating for any test writers. I mean, yeah, before you couldn't write questions based on pornographic images or with those seven words you couldn't say on television, but now you can't write questions based on "parapsychology".  I mean what is up with that?  It's interesting that the one word they do not use is "ban". These words are not "banned", they are just "forbidden". "Banning" is bad, "forbidding" is just fine if done by the most liberal school system in the country. Okay, in all fairness, Chancellor Walcott backed off the "forbid" to a much softer "suggest" four days later, but the list went out and the damage was done.

Next week: Foods and donations that are now banned...er forbidden...er suggested strongly that one not use or do.

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Earlier this week,  NYC Department of Education Chancellor Dennis Walcott announced that henceforth there will be 50 words and concepts that would no longer be allowed on the many standardized assessment tests created by NYC's vast network of standardized assessment test creators. The Committee-That-Knows-Better-Than-You put their collective heads together to created this list because they fear that some student could be so traumatized at the very thought of the concept of "children dealing with serious issues" that they will not be able to perform at their best. They decided that this is the reason for the steep decline in test scores over the last few years. Of course, not learning how to read, write a simple sentence, and to do simple arithmetic may be more traumatizing when faced with a standardized test, but hey that's just me. Some of the forbidden words are predictable, but some are just baffling. Here is the full list:


***WARNING: SOME OF THESE WORDS AND/OR CONCEPTS MAY BE TRAUMATIZING***
FORBIDDEN WORD/CONCEPT LIST
Abuse (physical, sexual, emotional, or psychological)
Alcohol (beer and liquor), tobacco, or drugs
Birthday celebrations (and birthdays)
Bodily functions
Cancer (and other diseases)
Catastrophes/disasters (tsunamis and hurricanes)
Celebrities
Children dealing with serious issues
Cigarettes (and other smoking paraphernalia)
Computers in the home (acceptable in a school or library setting)
Crime
Death and disease
Divorce
Evolution
Expensive gifts, vacations, and prizes
Gambling involving money
Halloween
Homelessness
Homes with swimming pools
Hunting
Junk food
In-depth discussions of sports that require prior knowledge
Loss of employment
Nuclear weapons
Occult topics (i.e. fortune-telling)
Parapsychology
Politics
Pornography
Poverty
Rap Music
Religion
Religious holidays and festivals (including but not limited to Christmas, Yom Kippur, and Ramadan)
Rock-and-Roll music
Running away
Sex
Slavery
Terrorism
Television and video games (excessive use)
Traumatic material (including material that may be particularly upsetting such as animal shelters)
Vermin (rats and roaches)
Violence
War and bloodshed
Weapons (guns, knives, etc.)
Witchcraft, sorcery, etc.

My sample question: If traveling (oops, don't use traveling because some kids may not have the means to travel) for 40 miles (what about those kids who only understand the metric system?) going East (oops, what if they live on the East Coast less than 40 miles from open water?) at 40 miles an hour (oops there's that metric issue again) how long will it take you to get to get to your destination in the astral plane (oops, no parapsychology references allowed) ?


It must be frustrating for any test writers. I mean, yeah, before you couldn't write questions based on pornographic images or with those seven words you couldn't say on television, but now you can't write questions based on "parapsychology".  I mean what is up with that?  It's interesting that the one word they do not use is "ban". These words are not "banned", they are just "forbidden". "Banning" is bad, "forbidding" is just fine if done by the most liberal school system in the country. Okay, in all fairness, Chancellor Walcott backed off the "forbid" to a much softer "suggest" four days later, but the list went out and the damage was done.

Next week: Foods and donations that are now banned...er forbidden...er suggested strongly that one not use or do.

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