Posted on 07/18/2011 6:34:38 AM PDT by Libloather
Cracking a System in Which Test Scores Were for Changing
By MICHAEL WINERIP
Published: July 17, 2011
ATLANTA — There had long been suspicions that cheating on state tests was widespread in the Atlanta public schools, but the superintendent, Beverly L. Hall, was feared by teachers and principals, and few dared speak out. Last summer a supposedly Blue Ribbon Commission, headed by a businessman volunteering his time, produced yet another flimsy report, urging further investigation.
Gov. Sonny Perdue said he was fed up and determined to conduct a thorough investigation. For this, he called on three men who had spent a good part of their careers putting people in prison: Michael J. Bowers, a former state attorney general; Robert E. Wilson, a former county district attorney; and Richard L. Hyde, who could well be the most dogged investigator in Georgia.
It took them 10 months to uncover the biggest cheating scandal ever in a public school district.
They started with one school, as Mr. Wilson said, “to see if we could crack the egg.” From a list of schools with large numbers of erasures on answer sheets, Mr. Hyde chose Venetian Hills Elementary, in a neighborhood he had patrolled as a young police officer.
“You start by walking around the school, giving everyone your card,” he said. “Stir the pot.” The first time he made the rounds, nobody cracked. But then, a religious woman with a lot to get off her chest came forward. One cracked egg led to the next, and within two weeks, five teachers plus the testing coordinator, Milagros Moner, had confessed that they had changed answers to raise the school’s scores.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Amazing.
So in an Obama public sector union world, the problem is religion.............
“Apparently Dr. Hall applied that same rigor to fabricated test data, enabling her to collect $600,000 in performance bonuses over 10 years to supplement her $400,000 annual salary.”
So why hasn’t she been arrested for fraud? Does retiring mean one can keep everything one managed to steal from U. S. taxpayers? Oh, I forgot....she’s one of Eric Holder’s people.
The article in the NYTs starts off fine, but then takes shots at testing. They just don’t get it.
It’s not a national story, but the same thing has been happening in Philly.
Last I heard the bitch was in Hawaii. Living large.
Megalomania at its best. A couple of vignettes come to mind:
1) In "Fahrenheit 451" Captain Beatty gives his picture to Montag (hero) as a reward.
2) William Randolph Hearst used to invite a lot of people to his estate in San Simeon and using a gigantic Medieval-like dining hall with a roaring fireplace to entertain them. As they wore their welcome out, he'd seat them closer and closer to the fire until they finally got the idea.
One wonders how many doctors, lawyers, and who knows, maybe even a PRESIDENT are out there, totally unqualified to pour piss out of a boot.
But having straight A averages and advanced degrees...
Doesn't America now rank like 25th in the world for academics? Or LOWER?
Right now that educational system is brainwashing them with Radical Environmentalism, Values-Free ethics and as little Reading, Writing and Arithmetic as possible. They use the worst methods to teach reading and make them write essays on Leftist Rot. In one class, I heard students were told to justify Homosexual kissing or fail.
Folks, if you don't want your children indoctrinated with Left wing theology - Please consider Home or Private Schooling. If you have any hope of having grandchildren, you will do this.
“Does retiring mean one can keep everything one managed to steal from U. S. taxpayers”
Notices have been sent out to 178 people that they may retire or get fired. I guess retiring means they get to keep their sweet public pensions on the taxpayers dime for the rest of their lives. Essentially being rewarding for cheating students out of an education.
Sad, just sad. So much for “doin’ it for the chirrens”.
Everyone with fiduciary responsibility for the good or goods of others (with a few honorable exceptions) seems to think and act as if their position exists for their own benefit, rather than that of those whose interests they are paid to uphold, and many with fiduciary responsibilities are willing to bend or break the law against the interests of their beneficiaries and in favor of their own interests. These school teachers are just Enron, WorldCom, Bernie Madoff, Charlie Rangel, and every CEO who walked off with a fat bonus as shareholder value in his company tanked writ small. Paid to look out for the interests of children and society by educating them, they instead violate the most basic concepts of academic integrity and probably some laws to ensure their own positions, while arguably harming their charges by preventing the trigger of thes school-choice provisions of No Child Left Behind.
The Atlanta city government is a spoils system designed to reward black democrats with taxpayer money. That is its primary function. Anything else that gets done (like city "services") is done as an adjunct to this and is incidental to the primary function. It has been that way since the late and unlamented Mainturd Jackson was mayor.
you could almost say the same thing about the federal govt. must be good to get a $150k do nothing gubmint job. whitey need not apply.
80% of everything a child learns comes from home.
An Atlanta newspaper editorial this a.m. says that the real solution to the problem of student underachievement in our public schools is to expand the school day and pump still more money into the schools.
The atlanta Urinal/Constipation's editorial board never met a tax increase or a government spending program it didn't like.
:-( true.
If you can get away with it, it’s okay.
I wonder if her retirement gave her a golden parachute?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.