Questions of Bias Are Raised About a Teachers’ Exam in New York

New York Times ^ | April 7, 2015 | Kate Taylor

[reaganaut1]

A federal judge is questioning whether a new exam for aspiring teachers in New York is discriminatory against minorities, a case that could derail the state’s efforts to create a more rigorous set of tests for entry into the profession.

Black and Hispanic applicants have been passing one of the exams, intended to measure reading and writing skills, at lower rates than white candidates, prompting concerns of decreased diversity in the teaching ranks.

The judge, Kimba M. Wood of Federal District Court in Manhattan, has asked the state for extensive documentation on the development of the test, which was first given during the 2013-14 school year.

The request came as part of a long-running case brought in 1996 by black and Hispanic teachers against New York City. In 2012, Judge Wood ruled that an older state-certification test, which was intended to measure teachers’ knowledge of the liberal arts and science, was racially discriminatory.

Although compensation has not yet been awarded, the city is expected to have to pay back wages to several thousand teachers who were demoted to being substitutes from the early 1990s to 2004, or were never hired as full-time teachers because they did not pass the older test.

The lawyer for the plaintiffs, Joshua Sohn, a partner at Mishcon de Reya New York, said that he did not know if the new test, the Academic Literacy Skills Test, was discriminatory. But, he said, given the fact that blacks and Hispanics are passing the test at lower levels than whites, “the court has an obligation to ensure that the historical discrimination is not continuing.”

The State Education Department declined to comment on the judge’s request, citing the pending litigation.

[Brooklyn Attitude]

Diversity is the the excuse liberals use to rationalize the hiring of unqualified females and minorities instead of qualified white males.

Disparate impact is the excuse liberals use to dumb down job requirements because females and minorities are unable to meet the standards that white men have been meeting for generations.

[MeshugeMikey]

now as we KNOW..mose Teachers in the Guvment Skoo IS Liberals...

how come they dont KNOW nothin bout no Liberal Arts??

[SaraJohnson]

For teachers, skin color trumps literacy. Sick.

[lepton]

As I recall that was Zoe Baird. Kimba Woods had hired an illegal, but paid the taxes.

It was the Clinton Administration that started torpedoing her with talk about her having been a table dancer.

[Lizavetta]

As usual, not a single example of a question on the test that is singularly unfair to minorities, just the pronouncement that minorities are scoring lower on the test than everyone else so the entire test is bogus.

And of course, it couldn't possibly be that minorities are less prepared for the exams because they come from crap schools. It's obviously because the tests are biased.

That a conclusion like this is not only published but believed is, frankly, very depressing.

[FredZarguna]

Yeah, my recollection was faulty.

Unlike Zoe, Kimba Wood had paid the taxes, but she was the second in line with an illegal nanny, so she also bit the dust. Considering that we got Janet el Reño [She's full of hot air/She spins but goes nowhere/Reminding us of el Niño] who was probably cut from the same political cloth but much harder on the eyes, I'm not sure we won that skirmish.