Report: Texas Schools May Have Cheated

[Jon8503]

DALLAS - Dozens of Texas schools appear to have cheated on the state's redesigned academic achievement test, casting doubt on whether the accountability system can reliably measure how schools are performing, a newspaper found.

An analysis uncovered strong evidence of organized, educator-led cheating on the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills at schools in Houston and Dallas, along with suspicious scores in hundreds of other schools, The Dallas Morning News reported.

Texas education policies on student accountability became the model for the federal No Child Left Behind law enacted after President Bush (news - web sites)'s election in 2000.

The newspaper analyzed scores from 7,700 Texas schools, searching for ones with unusual gaps in performance between grades or subjects. It said research has shown that schools that are weak in one subject or grade are typically weak in others.

More than 200 schools had large, unexplained score gaps between grades or between the TAKS and other standardized tests, such as the Stanford Achievement Test.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=ap/texas_school_cheating

[Not_Giving_Up]

1. I'm not suprised

Houston ISD got in trouble for cooking the books on dropout rates. They would list the student as moved, but no record of where they supposedly moved to. That one cost them a superintendent.

[clydefrand]

2. Test tampering? Sounds a lot like vote tampering

and that these teachers might have been taking lessons from their beloved "favorite son".