Texas schools cheat

[donsu]

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGBSJ81NX2E.html


Newspaper's Analysis Finds Evidence of Widespread Cheating by Texas Schools


-snip-

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

-snip-

Jim Impara, a former state assessment director in Florida and Oregon, said he believes such school rating systems are changing the culture of education.

"When you have a system where test scores have real impact on teachers' lives, you're more likely to see teachers willing to cheat," he said.
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gggrrrrrr

[Not_Giving_Up]

1. Local radio (Houston) this morning had someone from

the teacher's association saying that they don't think it was the teachers. The lady said that the principals are graded on how the kids do on the TAKS test, not the teachers, and that if the school performs poorly for three years in a row, the principal gets fired. She said there were allegations of principals changing the answers so the kids would do better.

[PROGRESSIVE1]

2. I was the former Governor who now occupies the White House.

[GOPFighter]

3. This is nothing compared to...

...what's going to happen if the country goes to a school voucher plan that allows parents to choose what school (public or private) their kids go to. The pressure to cheat will be unbearable because schools with poor test scores will lose most of their students the next year.

[Stryguy]

4. My wife worked at a school in michigan....

In which they were encouraged to help students cheat on the MEAP test. Michigan's equivlent to Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills tests.

They even had school lawyers to help show what teachers could legally get away with and not.

You decide on money for schools based on how students perform on some test and you'll naturally have schools trying to boost student scores. Teaching is no longer about teaching the kids.. it turns into "how can I keep the school open and funded".

I'm sure people even do it in good concious thinking if the school looses funding or reduced funding then things will just become that much tougher to teach them.

My wife, by the way, quit teaching after that year. The whole experience disgusted her.

[bleedingheart]

6. That is just so sad..

Education is not about achieving the best test score, sadly it has been reduced to that..

[ChicanoPwr]

5. We knew, nobody listened

Reports would come out in the local news on how schools would cheat on the so called accountablity testing during the Chimps first term in office. The only problem the schools had, the teachers never got to teach and only teach to the test. When the school would fail again, the schools would cheat by dropping student scores or find some way to get the test.

[Stryguy]

7. Exactly

That's exactly what my wife's school was doing. They basically would get the test early and "teach to the test". They encouraged the exact problems be worked out on the chalkboard.

The lawyers talked to teachers individually about encouraging poor performing students to "stay home" at least one test day. Then they wouldn't have to report that child's test scores in the main report and could send it as an addendum later. Often funding was decided from the main report and the teachers were really just helping the school..

Like I said, threaten to take away funding based on test scores and schools will do anything to keep their funding. Often I think these decisions are made in good faith even.

Teaching is a thankless job anyway. My wife probably spent 25% of her take home pay on things for the classroom etc. If I had to spend any of my take home pay from my computer job on something for work I would be pissed. But it's just expected of them. Hell even Staples and OfficeMax have discount programs for teachers it's so prevelant.