Several hundreds students in and around Seattle are refusing to take a new standardized test as part of the Common Core standards.

"There's actually a growing movement - in fact, probably the largest in Seattle's history," said Jesse Hagopian, a Garfield High School teacher.

Common Core standards, developed by educators across the country and bankrolled by the Gates Foundation, have been adopted in most states in the country.

In Washington, the test to ensure students have achieved these standards is called Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium, or SBAC.

This is the first year that all students in Washington state must take the test. It is administered to students in third through eighth grade, as well as tenth grade.

The test given for tenth graders is used as part of a high school graduation requirement. A statement from Seattle Public Schools said students who refuse to take the test will receive a zero score, which could mean they will need to take remedial courses in college.

Opponents of the test said it is unfair, especially for underprivileged students. The entire test is done on a computer, which they said is challenging for students who may not have access to computers or who haven't been taught typing skills.

Hagopian and other Seattle teachers gathered at the local chapter office of the NAACP to denounce the test and urge others to do the same.

Hagopian told KIRO 7 that since the inception of No Child Left Behind, there has been a series of standardized tests.

Chisnau - A billion dollars is a lot for Europe's poorest state of Moldova -- particularly when it disappears.

Anti-corruption prosecutors and American auditors have been searching the books for clues about the mysterious transactions, an embarrassment for the ex-Soviet state on track for EU membership.

The scandal has even threatened to destabilise the banking system in the country of 3.5 million people.

The case of the vanishing billion came to light when the Central Bank of Moldova discovered that three banks have given out loans worth a total of $1 billion, or 15 percent of the impoverished ex-Soviet state's GDP.

The financial establishments -- Banca de Economii, Banca Sociala and Unibank -- hold about a third of all bank assets in the country, including money for pension payments.

The transactions apparently happened over the course of several days, just before the parliamentary elections in late November, in which pro-European Union parties narrowly squeezed pro-Russian representatives out of the majority.

The recipients of the funds have not been identified and now the money seems as good as gone.

Harsh austerity measures including slashed welfare payments and dwindling public services have caused the rapid spread of food banks across Britain, new academic research suggests.

The analysis, published Wednesday in the British Medical Journal, was led by a team of academics from Oxford University.

The study, "Austerity, sanctions, and the rise of food banks in the UK," noted that increasing numbers of doctors in Britain are witnessing their patients turn to food banks to survive. Its authors concluded that the idea put forward by the Conservative-led government that this trend is the result of supply, not demand, was false.

The study's authors analyzed data from the Trussell Trust, a leading NGO that coordinates food banks across the UK.

The government has long refused to admit to a link between its austerity policies and a dramatic explosion in food banks across the state. However, the Oxford University report shows otherwise.

The study detailed a concrete link between demand for food parcels and the government's austerity measures. It found demand for emergency food aid is highest in areas where poverty occurs in parallel with reductions in social welfare payments. It also revealed that emergency food assistance is most common in regions where high levels of unemployment exist.

After more than a week of demonstrations and more than a dozen arrests, Hawaii Gov. David Ige said Tuesday that the company building one of the world's largest telescopes atop Hawaii's Mauna Kea has agreed to his request to halt construction for a week.

"They have responded to my request and on behalf of the president of the University and the Office of Hawaiian Affairs have agreed to a time out on the project, and there will be no construction activities this week," Ige said at a news conference.

Thirty Meter Telescope is constructing the telescope on land that is held sacred to some Native Hawaiians. Scientists say the location is ideal for the telescope, which could allow them to see into the earliest years of the universe. The $1.4 billion project is being built in partnership with the Chinese and Indian governments.

Last month, the US Department of Justice released a damning report on Ferguson, Missouri and the way in which law enforcement agencies and the local court system raise revenues through municipal fines and fees that disproportionately impact Black residents. The DOJ investigation — which detailed patterns of unconstitutional arrests and unfair court penalties — garnered national attention for its stomach-churning stories of excessive police force, overtly racist actions of city officials, and widespread mistreatment in court.

By some measures, California is not all that different. That's according to a new report released today by a group of civil rights and legal aid organizations, who argue that courts throughout the state systematically extract revenue from residents with exorbitant fines and fees for very minor traffic violations. The report, "Not Just a Ferguson Problem: How Traffic Courts Drive Inequality in California," includes a range of troubling statistics and anecdotes that illustrate how courts in the state trap people in poverty. The report argues that traffic courts in California — through harsh fines and punishments that can be impossible for low-income people to overcome — are increasingly destroying people's lives over minor infractions.

There are a number of inequities in the system and ways in which a traffic violation can rapidly lead to overwhelming debts, according to the report, which was co-authored by the East Bay Community Law Center, the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area, the Western Center on Law and Poverty, A New Way of Life Reentry Project, and Legal Services for Prisoners with Children. The most striking finding of these organizations relates to the courts' widespread practice of suspending drivers' licenses — a punishment that severely disrupts people's lives and is tied to fines that are often insurmountable for people living paycheck to paycheck.

We analyze the future of Israeli politics with Arthur Goodman, the Parliamentary and Diplomatic Liaison for Jews for Justice for Palestinians, Europe's largest Jewish voice against Zionism. We cover his history with the organization, explicate the process of the recent Knesset elections, and express our knowledge and understanding of the situation happening in Palestine, as well as the international community's shift in support from Benjamin Netanyahu as he engages in further dangerous hardline rhetoric and crimes against humanity.

HANEUL: Can you tell us a little information about yourself?

ARTHUR: I've been handling lobbying for JFJFP ever since it was formed; about 13 years ago. I grew up in a middle-class Jewish family and used to be 100% supportive of Israel. I had always assumed that everything Israel was right and Arabs wrong, without much thought behind it, until my mid-50s. One day, towards the end of the first Intifada, I looked at a newspaper with a picture of Palestinian teenagers throwing stones at Israeli soldiers across barren wasteland. I thought, "It takes guts to throw stones at armed soldiers". That never occurred any time before, but it shows how your psychological preconceptions can color how you look at things.

The mother entered the courtroom Tuesday weighed down by a padded green smock that attorneys said is given to inmates held in the Sacramento County jail's psychiatric unit.

That's where she's been since Saturday, when, officials said, she poured gasoline on her 7-year-old daughter and lit the girl on fire.

Porche Latrice Wright, 27, stood quiet and still as Sacramento Superior Court Judge Ben Davidian read the charges against her - attempted murder, with premeditation, and aggravated mayhem. Davidian also noted that Wright had two outstanding issues of probation including settling a case of domestic violence against a spouse or cohabitant.

According to court records, Wright completed a "batterer's treatment program" to settle a felony domestic violence charge from last year. She was scheduled to appear in court to provide proof that she had completed the program Monday, at which point she was back in jail.

She was arrested at her home, a light blue duplex in the 600 block of El Camino Avenue, Saturday afternoon when a family friend called for help after seeing burn marks on Wright's 7-year-old daughter.

The girl was taken immediately to a hospital, where she remained Tuesday. Though it was not immediately clear how badly burned the child was, a charge of aggravated mayhem indicates "extreme indifference to the physical or psychological well-being of another person, intentionally (causing) permanent disability or disfigurement of another human being," according to California law.

The girl is expected to survive.

A Texas woman has accused a cop of beating her when she was 38 weeks pregnant. Thanks to a surveillance system in her parents' home, a video has been published online that appears to prove her allegations. An investigation is under way.

The Hunt County sheriff's deputy has been identified as one of several officers who stood in the woman's home in Quinlan on the evening of March 4. Two officers can be seen keeping Deanna Robinson in the corner of her kitchen, next to the counter, restraining her, as her 18-month-old toddler watched.

Next, the deputy can clearly be seen taking at least two quick punches at Robinson, who wouldn't stop yelling. This was after she shouted, "I'm pregnant." She was handcuffed during this, she told the attorney's office on Monday, according to WFAA.

Robinson, 38, is a decorated Air Force veteran and recipient of the Airman's Medal for the time she pulled her colleagues out of a burning plane in Iraq. She now lives in Quinlan, with another infant and three step children, aged six to nine. But her marriage had been undergoing a turbulent period lately, which culminated in a shoving match with her husband several days prior to the incident.

Apparently, one of the kids told a teacher at school, who then reported the couple to Child Protection Services.
She was arrested on March 4 on charges of resisting arrest, assaulting a police officer and interference with child custody, and spent some six days in jail.

The court case was over her 18-month-old son, Landry. The rest of the children are now in protective custody, while the infant son, Levi - who was born less than a week after her release from custody, is with grandparents.

It was 5:06 a.m. on a Tuesday in September 2013 when sex crimes Detective Derrick Williams caught the call. It came from the hospital. It was a distraught woman. She was saying she had been raped.

She told Williams a familiar story of French Quarter trespass: She'd hit the clubs the night before, she said. Drank a lot. Met a man. Went to his house. And awoke the next morning to find him on top of her, naked. But she told Williams she had never said yes to sex.

Williams typed up a brief report. He labeled the incident a rape. But Case No. I-31494-13 wasn't quite ordinary. The accuser was a former cheerleader for the New Orleans Saints. And the alleged rapist was Darren Sharper, a hero of the Saints' 2009 Super Bowl team, former Pro Bowl player and broadcast analyst for the league's television network.

News of the Sept. 23, 2013 incident quickly shot up the ranks. New Orleans' police superintendent and top prosecutor were briefed. In the weeks that followed, police records show that Williams gathered evidence. He got a warrant to collect a sample of Sharper's DNA. It matched a swab taken from the woman's body. Witnesses told of seeing Sharper with the intoxicated woman at a club, and later at his condo. Video footage confirmed Sharper and the woman had been together.

It wasn't enough for the district attorney's office. This was a "heater" — police shorthand for a high profile case. Prosecutors were hesitant to move too quickly on a local football hero with deep pockets and savvy lawyers, according to two individuals with knowledge of the investigation. They held off on an arrest warrant.

"If his name was John Brown, he would have been in jail," one criminal justice official with knowledge of the case said. "If a woman says, 'He's the guy that raped me,' and you have corroborating evidence to show they were together and she went to the hospital and she can identify him, that guy goes to jail."

Sharper did not — and continued an unchecked crime spree that ended only with his arrest in Los Angeles last year after sexually assaulting four women in 24 hours. In March, Sharper owned up to his savagery. He agreed to plead guilty or no contest to raping or attempting to rape nine women in four states. The pending deal allows his possible release after serving half of a 20-year sentence — a strikingly light punishment that has drawn widespread criticism.

A Fort Lauderdale cop who was caught on cell phone camera slapping a homeless man across the face is now facing charges.

On February 22, a bystander recorded the altercation between Officer Victor Ramirez, 34, and Bruce Laclair, 58.

From CBS Miami:

The video, captured by a witness at a downtown Ft. Lauderdale bus depot, shows what appears to be Ramirez striking 58-year old Bruce Laclair.

"I was sitting there on a bench and a police officer came up and started rousing me and said he was going to arrest me for trespassing," Laclair told CBS4's Ted Scouten shortly after the incident.

In the police report, Ramirez said Laclair was sleeping on a bus bench.

"I had to go to the bathroom," Laclair said, "and he wouldn't let me go to the bathroom, so the argument stemmed from simply going to the bathroom, that's all I wanted to do."

In the video, Laclair, is seen walking in front of the officer.

You then see Ramirez put his hand on Laclair. When Laclair tries to pull away, Ramirez appears to shove him on the ground. Laclair then shouts an obscenity and tells the officer he needs to use the restroom.

"You're not going to pee. You're not supposed to be here, OK? So get up," Ramirez is heard saying in the video.

Another exchange of words ensues, and that's when the officer is seen slapping Laclair.

Watch (warning: profanity and violence):