Cheating on state tests found at two Los Angeles schools

[bemildred]

The state has thrown out the test scores of a top-performing Los Angeles school and of the highest-scoring campus in the nationally known Green Dot charter group after cheating was uncovered involving several teachers.

Short Avenue Elementary in Del Rey and Animo Leadership Charter High School in Inglewood were barred from receiving academic rankings released last week by the California Department of Education. That action deprived the schools of the state rating that has become the key figure used by parents and officials to judge campuses in California.

At Short, three teachers are accused of changing answers or coaching students to the correct answers or both. At Animo Leadership, a science teacher is accused of fixing wrong answers.

L.A. schools Supt. John Deasy characterized the Short Avenue teachers' actions as gross misconduct.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-cheating-20110905,0,1315164.story

[notadmblnd]

1. is there any connection to Rhee or her group Students First?

[iemitsu]

2. while i never condone or excuse cheating,

i believe that more and more of these incidents will surface in the future.
when districts and administrators tie the employment and salary of teachers to student's test scores, some teachers will resort to extreme measures to appear successful according to these criteria.
some will even cheat (the opposite of being a good teacher or mentor) to appear successful and to secure their position, and ironically, when they are discovered they are dismissed (which may or may not have happened if their students did poorly on the tests).
everyone who is honest knows that student's test scores are not a valid method to evaluate a teachers effectiveness.
there are too many variables outside of a teacher's control to have the test scores of their charges be valid measurements of the teacher's worth.

[bemildred]

3. A fish rots from the head.

This was all set up by NCLB and it is happening exactly like anybody with a brain thought it would.

[iemitsu]

4. yep,

those of us whose thought patterns are not dictated by faith identified this result from NCLB the minute it became law.
by 2014 every public school in america will be failing according to the NCLB formula. by then every child must be above average in all subjects.

[bemildred]

5. And then we will have to "privatize" the whole mess.

And soon it will be worse than "health care".

[proud2BlibKansan]

6. I completely agree

Cheating is inevitable - and deplorable.

[brooklyn297]

7. +100