State to hire $10-an-hour temporary workers to grade FCAT exams

Sun-Sentinel ^ | March 9, 2006 | Linda Kleindienst

[twippo]

TALLAHASSEE · Critics of Florida's high-stakes FCAT exam are lashing out at the state for hiring thousands of $10-an-hour temporary workers to score tests that are so critical in determining school grades and student promotions.

[twippo]

This isn't the first time. From February - March 2002, I had a temporary job with NCS Pearson as a test grader for the 4th grade FCAT writing exam.

I and everyone else who made it was hired on the spot after the interview soley from having a college degree. We were paid $11.00 an hour. There was no requirement to have any educational background, though representatives from the Dept. of Ed. were present at our work site. We had to sign a waiver not to speak to the media about this. And remember, this is ***writing***, a subjective study, not a class like math where you have clearly right and wrong answers.

The students were prompted to write a story about meeting a famous person, and what they did with the famous person. Lots of Britney Spears, Spongebob and Bow Wow stories. They were graded on a 1-6 scale, with the more precise language, correct spelling and elaborated events described earning them the higher scores. We were also instructed to point out content in a story that could indicate abuse, neglect or illegal activity by a child's parents (one child's story mentioned parents having a meth lab). A few stories were written in Hebrew, Chinese and other languages. I don't know why they don't pay actual 4th grade teachers to do this.

[Proud_USA_Republican]

They could just hire the Seattle King county election workers.

All students would get a passing grade after 3 recounts.

[proxy_user]

"I don't know why they don't pay actual 4th grade teachers to do this.

Hmmm...because you can't pay them enough to read the Chinese-language story about meeting Brittany Spears in the meth lab?

[EagleUSA]

They could just hire the Seattle King county election workers.

All students would get a passing grade after 3 recounts.
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LOL! My thoughts almost instantly -- :-)
Talk about a target for corruption...give me a break.

[mlc9852]

I thought computers graded the tests.

[Pessimist]

I'm guessing what's really at stake is union wage jobs for spare teachers.

[PETEPARSLEY]

FLORIDA.....TEMPORARY WORKERS ????


Sounds like they are trying to hire Haitian and Cubans that got lucky and made the swim

[EagleUSA]

I thought computers graded the tests.
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Forget that -- it is far more difficult to corrupt a machine. Remember, liberal academia is more concerned with OUTCOME than they are with EDUCATION. Far more.

Feeling good about one's self, is far more important than being flat-out stupid.

[PETEPARSLEY]

Ya....tell that to Vince Young

[SuziQ]

I heard on the news yesterday that some of the grading on the SAT was incorrect, and that some students' scores could go up by as much as 100 points! Just heard the blurb on the radio, so I don't know much more than that.

Anyone else heard about this?

[SoftballMominVA]

Computers can't grade the written tests.

[mlc9852]

Oh yeah, they have the essays now.

[twippo]

From reading the stories, I found it incredible what some parents allow 9 and 10 year old children to be exposed to. I also noticed that some children gave identifying information about themselves, like their full names, schools, home addresses, their friends' names. Dangerous information for complete strangers to be reading.