Scripps Howard Foundation Wire

WASHINGTON – Fake tombstones lined the sidewalk in front of the Department of Education on Friday, reading, “R.I.P Imagination” and “Here lies meaningful instruction. We will miss you.”

The signs were part of Occupy the Department of Education 2.0 protest, which brought students, teachers, professors and educators from all over the country to unite in the “movement to end corporate education reform.”

They define corporate education reform as standardized testing, removing art and theater classes from schools and the movement toward charter schools.

“Students are the biggest stakeholders in our education, and we don’t have a voice,” said Kim Runyon, 18, a senior at Cherokee Trail High school in Aurora, Colo.

Rebekah Rittenberg, 21, a junior studying integrated language arts, and Jacob Chaffin, 21, a junior studying middle childhood education, both at Ohio University, said they attended the event because the occupation offers a platform for those dissenting against corporate education reform.

“The system is too one size fits all. They’re not looking at students as individuals, or even as people,” Rittenberg said.

Runyon, along with fellow high-school students Alexia Garcia, a senior at Lincoln High School in Portland, Ore., and Alex Kacsh, 17, a junior at Jefferson County Open School in Lakewood, Colo., spoke to the crowd of about 60 people.

Garcia has encouraged students in Portland to participate in the “opt-out” campaign, in which students refuse to take standardized tests, resulting in the state giving the school a failing report card grade.

“Anyone who comes into our schools knows they’re in need of improvement,” Garcia told the crowd. “We don’t need test scores to tell us that. If anything, it’s the system that’s in need of improvement.”

Runyon said they were here not only to change the way schools teach but also to change what schools teach.

“In school they don’t teach you how to farm,” Runyon said. “ They don’t teach you how to balance your checkbook.

There’s no media or financial literacy classes, and then they just let you out into the world and expect you to perform like adults in society.”

A group of eight protesters was scheduled to meet with Samuel Ryan, the regional and youth outreach associate at the Department of Education.

But as they prepared to enter the building, they were stopped and berated by an official who told them they needed an appointment. The students said they had a confirmed meeting with Ryan. But they were denied access for about half an hour as officials just inside the door debated what should be done.

Eventually, the eight students met with Ryan and another official. Afterward, the students said the conversation left them less than satisfied.

“The majority of it was them telling us about the difference between the federal and state legislatures,” Runyon said. “It felt like they were trying to take forever so that we would leave.”

They said the door to the conference room was locked and guarded by two policemen.

“We were being run around in circles, and they were buying up a lot of time,” Runyon said. “Again, the students’ voice was lost.”