Mark Johnson has well over a month still in his term and while we could spend entire days discussing the magnitude of how poorly he did his elected duty, he can end his tumultuous term by doing one good thing for our schools and students: act to negate the use of federal and state mandated standardized tests for this semester.

No matter what Betsy DeVos might say as her even more embarrassing tenure as Secretary of Education, she is gone in January. Applying for a federal waiver now and receiving a “NO” from her office does not mean that having a waiver request on file would not have sway with the next Secretary of Education whose agenda is surely to try and undo many of DeVos’s policies immediately.

DeVos’s “NO” can be overturned.

Johnson could make a public stand by saying that NC will not give standardized tests in December and January despite what the feds may say. That public statement would at least be in line with his “local control” of education mantra that he has being trying to scream for years now.

Or Johnson could decree that any standardized test given this semester can only count 0.01% of a final grade and 0.0001% of a school’s performance grade.

He could even sign this petition by NC Families For School Testing Reform: