Investigation into Atlanta PS System Finds Unethical Behavior Across Every Level

[Dusty]

http://www.ajc.com/news/investigatio...g-1001375.html

Across Atlanta Public Schools, staff worked feverishly in secret to transform testing failures into successes.

Teachers and principals erased and corrected mistakes on students’ answer sheets.

Area superintendents silenced whistle-blowers and rewarded subordinates who met academic goals by any means possible.

Superintendent Beverly Hall and her top aides ignored, buried, destroyed or altered complaints about misconduct, claimed ignorance of wrongdoing and accused naysayers of failing to believe in poor children’s ability to learn.

For years — as long as a decade — this was how the Atlanta school district produced gains on state curriculum tests. The scores soared so dramatically they brought national acclaim to Hall and the district, according to an investigative report released Tuesday by Gov. Nathan Deal.

In the report, the governor’s special investigators describe an enterprise where unethical — and potentially illegal — behavior pierced every level of the bureaucracy, allowing district staff to reap praise and sometimes bonuses by misleading the children, parents and community they served.

The report accuses top district officials of wrongdoing that could lead to criminal charges in some cases.

The decision whether to prosecute lies with three district attorneys — in Fulton, DeKalb and Douglas counties — who will consider potential offenses in their jurisdictions.

For teachers, a culture of fear ensured the deception would continue.

“APS is run like the mob,” one teacher told investigators, saying she cheated because she feared retaliation if she didn’t.

[greenberetTFS]

What a shame that whole crew of educators are,top to bottom they got away with this for so long,they should all be fired and replaced ASAP......

Big Teddy

[Pete]

Originally Posted by greenberetTFS

What a shame that whole crew of educators are,top to bottom they got away with this for so long,they should all be fired and replaced ASAP......

Big Teddy

It ain't about education - it's about job security.

Once you kick Johnny out with a diploma that says he's an A student few track him to see he failed out of college his first year and is now flipping burgers.

Now we're back on the treadmill of "they inflate the grades because of the national tests - but the national tests were required because they were inflating the grades".

Union job security is the main goal of public eduction - not education.

[BrowningFan]

The state of our public education system nationwide from Pre-K through post-grad is deeply disheartening and I fret over it often. The question that I ponder most is are the schools the way they are because people are ignorant or are people ignorant because of the schools? The chicken or the egg. Seems the be a vicious cycle.

[greenberetTFS]

Originally Posted by Pete

It ain't about education - it's about job security.

Once you kick Johnny out with a diploma that says he's an A student few track him to see he failed out of college his first year and is now flipping burgers.

Now we're back on the treadmill of "they inflate the grades because of the national tests - but the national tests were required because they were inflating the grades".

Union job security is the main goal of public eduction - not education.

I recall at one of my sons high school graduation,when he told me some of the students couldn't even read what was on their diploma's...........

Big Teddy

[Sigaba]

While I agree that the lion's share of the blame belongs to those charged with educating Atlanta's youths, I ask: Where were the parents when their kids were not learning?

[Pete]

Originally Posted by Sigaba

While I agree that the lion's share of the blame belongs to those charged with educating Atlanta's youths, I ask: Where were the parents when their kids were not learning?

Happy - Happy that their kid got a "Terrific Kid" bumper sticker this past year. Happy Billy got a B average all school year (inflated grades).

Around here the bumper sticker is given to 1/4 of the students in each of the four grading periods each year -regardless of their grades or actions. The reason? So every student gets something they can stand up in front of all the students at an awards ceremony during the year and get applauded for.

[Dusty]

Originally Posted by Pete

Happy - Happy that their kid got a "Terrific Kid" bumper sticker this past year. Happy Billy got a B average all school year (inflated grades).

Around here the bumper sticker is given to 1/4 of the students in each of the four grading periods each year -regardless of their grades or actions. The reason? So every student gets something they can stand up in front of all the students at an awards ceremony during the year and get applauded for.

LMAO

[rdret1]

Originally Posted by Pete

Happy - Happy that their kid got a "Terrific Kid" bumper sticker this past year. Happy Billy got a B average all school year (inflated grades).

Around here the bumper sticker is given to 1/4 of the students in each of the four grading periods each year -regardless of their grades or actions. The reason? So every student gets something they can stand up in front of all the students at an awards ceremony during the year and get applauded for.

Sad, but true. The actual education of the kids takes a back seat to ensuring their self esteem is assuaged, whether they deserve it or not. I believe many of the higher ups in the school system fail to realize that the only true way to elevate a student's self esteem is to show them that they actually can learn.

[Ret10Echo]

Originally Posted by Sigaba

While I agree that the lion's share of the blame belongs to those charged with educating Atlanta's youths, I ask: Where were the parents when their kids were not learning?

Well I know where those parents were NOT...


They were NOT at the fall welcome night

They were NOT at the fall sports-orientation

They were NOT at the mid-term parent/teacher/student night

They were NOT at PTO/PTA meetings

They were NOT at the sports award-ceremony

They were NOT at the student-of-the-month coffee

They were NOT online checking student assignment due dates and course progress

They were NOT reading the myriad of emails, fliers and robo-calls from the school on events, and student status

They were NOT checking out the summer reading list and, in spite of the whining, having their child READ and PREPARE for the next semester

They were NOT shutting off T.V., iPod, Web surfing, X-box and text messaging when their child needed to be concentrating on school work


The AVERAGE school day in the United States is at 7 hours or LESS. (doing some quick math.....carry the 12.....plus Pi)

That means the "student" is NOT in school for 17 hours each day during the week for about 180 days out of a 365-day year.

8760 hours in a year

1260 hours in school (average)




The point being, without active parental involvement in the vast majority of the "student's" life it is a losing proposition. You can slap together as many standardized tests and graduation prerequisites as you want. It won't matter. Flogging the teachers does not change the reality. It does not excuse cheating or lying about the condition, but the U.S. society needs to understand the reality.
Why is America falling behind in Engineering and the Sciences? Because amassing gold stars and bumper stickers does not teach you physics or advanced mathematical theory that is the basis for those skills.

[ddoering]

Originally Posted by Pete

Happy - Happy that their kid got a "Terrific Kid" bumper sticker this past year. Happy Billy got a B average all school year (inflated grades).

Around here the bumper sticker is given to 1/4 of the students in each of the four grading periods each year -regardless of their grades or actions. The reason? So every student gets something they can stand up in front of all the students at an awards ceremony during the year and get applauded for.

Are you implying that my kid wasn't a "Super Bus Rider?"

[Richard]

I miss Boston Public.

Richard

[ZonieDiver]

If you miss Boston Public, go see Bad Teacher! I found it much more accurate than the usual teaching movie.

[Sigaba]

Originally Posted by ZonieDiver

If you miss Boston Public, go see Bad Teacher! I found it much more accurate than the usual teaching movie.

I don't know if I'd have studied any more efficiently had any of my teachers looked like Jeri Ryan or Cam Diaz. I do know that I'd have studied harder.

[nmap]

Of course there is grade inflation - and it is endemic. The vast majority of students, parents, administrators, bureaucrats and politicians want high grades. That is one measurement of student learning, so higher grades are the desired result. Few really want anything about troubling realities.

So this brought in the standardized testing crowd, and the multiple-guess standard test was supposed to be a panacea. It isn't, naturally. Since there are benefits for doing well on those tests, and a price to be paid for poor performance, then there is a clear incentive to do whatever it takes to get the numbers up. One can focus on teaching to the test to the exclusion of most other things. Or, one can use the cheating referenced in the original post.

A fair and accurate test is likely to produce a normal distribution curve - and that means that some will excel, and some will do poorly. Interestingly enough, there is a high correlation between zip code and school success - in other words, your neighborhood determines how well you do (yes, I know, correlation is not causality). I cannot supply a link, but I have a paper out of Scotland easily at hand for those who wish to read further details.

Anyway, we would have to accept that there most certainly will be children left behind, that not every student can succeed, and that there are some who are just not able to grasp concepts. The results may not be what society wants them to be. If we as a society accepted that dispassionately and decided to proceed with valid, well-designed experiments to find approaches that worked, and then applied them, we might improve the situation. However, I perceive that we prefer comfortable lies to harsh reality, so I won't hold my breath.

In the meantime, we emphasize retention and graduation in higher education and quietly reduce the number of D's and F's assigned. (Grade inflation? Heavens no!) And so we get college graduates that approach cluelessness. They, in turn, teach according to their ability, thus reinforcing a destructive cycle.

In short, we must accept that the phrase "If you can dream it, you can do it" is nonsense. We won't do that until reality rubs our noses in the adverse consequences.