If you have not read Rachel Aviv’s “Wrong Answer” in The New Yorker, drop everything and read it now.
Aviv tells the story of the Atlanta cheating scandal through the ideas of one man, one teacher, who cared deeply about his student. Step by step, he got sucked into the data-driven obsession with test scores, thinking that if he raised the children’s test scores, it was a victimless crime. He knew that his students had needs that were even greater than their test scores, but the law’s absurd requirement that scores had to go up year after year drew him into a widespread conspiracy to falsify test scores.
One day will we look back on the Atlanta cheating scandal as the wake up call that made us think about how successive administrations and members of Congress have given their approval to laws and goals that hurt children and warped education? Or will we continue on the present path of destruction?
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Here’s the full report from the state investigation. I think people will be surprised if they read it, because the investigators point out a lot of the problems with a reliance on test scores and the “winners and losers” mentality that went along with it.
The report is much more nuanced and thorough than the narrative around testing and cheating in Atlanta and elsewhere. Compare this report with the humiliating perp walks that were conducted for the media and the ridiculously high bail that followed and see what you think, see if you think that was justified.
The third section is where the investigators get to the “why”:
“Part 3: Here’s where you turn to understand the big picture. Investigators outline why cheating occurred, detail the “culture of fear” that existed at APS, and probe allegations that school officials disregarded warnings or complaints about cheating. The school system’s so-called “Blue Ribbon Commission” convened to investigate the cheating scandal and the business the community also receive some attention. Finally, the investigators reveal their findings.”
The report is also quite harsh on the role of the business community in pushing a reliance on scores and promoting a “culture of fear”. That never gets mentioned either.
http://clatl.com/freshloaf/archives/2011/07/06/atlanta-schools-cheating-investigation-full-report
I would like to title this post…
“WHAT AN IDIOTIC CORPORATE REFORMER SOUNDS LIKE”
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/07/07/atlanta-cheating-scandal-_n_892169.html
Check out this video of Secretary of Education Arne Duncan answering questions in the immediate aftermath of the Atlanta cheating scandal. Notice the answers… or rather NON-answers that Duncan gives to what he is asked by this Atlanta TV reporter (who, by the way, does an awesome job hitting Duncan with tough questions).
For example, she asks a simple “YES” or “NO” question, meaning that, after the question has been asked, the first word out of Duncan’s mouth should be either “YES” or “NO”, followed by more detail and clarification… as in, for example…
“Yes, and let me tell you why… ”
or
“No, that’s not the case, and here’s why… ”
DUNCAN doesn’t do that, instead spewing double-talk.
– – – – – – – – – – – – – –
01:05 – 01:25
REPORTER: “What’s your position on testing? Is there too much emphasis on the standardized testing?”
ARNE DUNCAN: “Well, what you want to do is you want to make sure you’re evaluating students each year, but the way to get good results is through good teaching, and when you cheat… you… again, you do grave, grave harm to children, and so there’s a right way to do it, and the vast majority of folks around the country do it the right way.”
– – – – – – – – – – – – –
Huh??? WTF??? Where’s the “YES” or “NO”?
If she had asked him, “What’s the key to getting good results on standardized testing? What’s the right way?” … then the answer would be responsive.
The obvious conclusion that people were making back in 2011 (and still are three years later) is that the over-emphasis on standardized testing results and the punishment-rewards (monetary or otherwise) meted out based on these results DID contribute to the fiasco in Atlanta. However, Duncan—following his corporate masters’ marching orders—wants to shut that idea or thought process down.
Check out the next question and Duncan’s non-answer:
————————————————-
01:25 – 01:41
REPORTER: “Some people have been critical all along of No Child Left Behind and the testing portions of this. Umm, how fair is that criticism?”
DUNCAN: “Well, we want to fix the No Child Left Behind Law. That’s a much longer conversation, and we’re working very hard in Congress to do… to do that now.”
————————————————-
Again… W-T-F? His response is that he wants to “fix” NCLB. Well, exactly WHAT about NCLB do you want to “fix”? For Duncan’s answer to be responsive to the question, he must then address criticism of “the testing portions” that the reporters’ question references… the “portions” that create the breeding ground for cheating scandals like the ones in Atlanta, Washington, D.C. and elsewhere…. and Duncan ain’t doing that.
The reporter is pushing Duncan to admit that all this test-based evaluating/punishing/rewarding is harmful, but he responds with pointless blather about how “we’re working very hard in Congress to do that now.”
Really?… “to do WHAT now”? You meant that politicians and education officials should “fix the testing portions” that are harming education and harming kids?
Again, no answer.
The reporter then questions whether, in urban areas with so many challenging factors teachers have to fight, that demanding “unrealistic” results led to the cheating problem, that when asked to do the impossible, teachers who are threatened with firing for not achieving the impossible, will then be driven to cheat. (which is the conclusion one gets from reading Rachel Aviv’s NEW YORKER article.)
This is another great question, by the way. Kudos to the reporter!
Again, Duncan totally ducks this query. He challenges those doubters who think that the NCLB benchmarks were “unrealistic” that they are the ones in the wrong, that he is “seeing students learn every single year”
This is his version of the Michelle Rhee diversionary response to evidence of cheating: “You must be racist to think that poor, minority kids can’t learn.”
————————————————-
01:41 – 02:14
REPORTER: “But, but the whole idea of unrealistic measurements… something for urban districts, et cetera… Is that – ?”
ARNE DUNCAN: “I don’t think there is anything ‘unrealistic’ about seeing students learn every single year, and you have in many urban areas tremendous progress being made. The sad fact is that I actually think in Atlanta there’s probably tremendous progress being made… fairly… and unfortunately, this, this… scandal is going to cloud that… ummm…. but this does not in any way take away from shouldn’t take away from the hard work, and the accomplishments, and the improved graduation rates that we’re seeing in many urban districts around the country.”
—————————————————-
Let’s move on to the next question, about the idea that Atlanta school district’s monetary incentives helped create the problem. This is the closest he gets to being responsive to the question being asked.
He says that monetary incentives ARE NOT ONLY GOOD for education, but that we should have started doing them long before now.
Oh really?
The only problem with Arne’s claim is…. the overwhelming evidence shows that…
THESE MONETARY INCENTIVES DO NOT WORK.
THESE MONETARY INCENTIVES HAVE NEVER WORKED.
THESE MONETARY INCENTIVES WILL NEVER WORK.
All the decades of evidences show that not only do they not improve education; they actually do grave harm to it.
But hey, Arne thinks we should keep trying anyway, so we’re just going to have to be stuck with more of it. At the end of his spiel, he vomits up the idea that using monetary incentives is “not a hard thing to do”, that you just “have to do it with integrity.”
Really? “Not a hard thing to do”?
Then how come it has NEVER worked, that historically, doing so has an utter and total failure rate?
Duncan thinks we should “spotlight” and “celebrate” good teachers and principals… with monetary rewards (the next question BEL0W).
Duncan’s assumption is that prior to, or without those rewards to push them, teachers will or are holding back their “A Game”, and not giving it their best effort… and that with monetary rewards, they’ll get off their duff and do the job they should have been doing all along.
This comes from a man who has never taught a day in his life, or worked as a principal a day in his life, for if he had, he’d know that this is all total garbage.
————————————————–
02:14 – 03:02
REPORTER: “Should… a lot of this is about money, I think, you know, that both teachers and principals are evaluated by their test scores of their students, and there’s a lot of money involved in this. Should that be decoupled from student learning?”
ARNE DUNCAN: “Well, I think rewarding teacher excellence is important. I think I would argue the opposite, that far too often in our country, we haven’t celebrated great teachers, we haven’t celebrated great principals who are making a huge difference in students’ lives. You just want to make sure that they’re doing it honestly, and again, the vast vast majority of teachers are doing an amazing job, often in very difficult circumstances, in helping students beat the odds every single day.
“I think we need to do a better job of spotlighting that, and incentivizing that, and encouraging that, and learning from that. In education, we’ve been far too reluctant to talk about success. We need to do that. We just need to make sure that we’re doing it with integrity…. not that hard to do.”
———————————————————–
The reporter finishes with a questions about one of the intangible ways that this harms education and society as a whole. She gets personal and talks about how this cheating scandal has taken away her “last heroes”, the teachers, and on and on.
I’m sick and tired of transcribing this words of this vile person (Duncan, not the reporter, whom I admire)… so, if you want to, you can watch her ask this last question, and the entire video here:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/07/07/atlanta-cheating-scandal-_n_892169.html
At the time of the fight over the anti-labor bill in Ohio, about 6 regional Chambers of Commerce, in the state, came out to support the ALEC-inspired bill. I checked the identities of the Boards of Directors and I was shocked. One-fourth of the board members, for the chamber in my area, were public employees or worked at organizations supported by public funding. I asked the chamber director if the members’ organizations paid dues to the chamber and my jaw dropped when he said, yes. So, taxes intended for defense (an air base), education (a public university), book lending (a library) were diverted from their intended use, and may have helped to finance business’ anti-labor activity.
I wrote to each board member, who worked for the public, and asked him/her to review the policy. In the latest directory, public employees were no longer chamber board members.
When I read the comments following Chiara’s link, several people mentioned the report ignored the role the Atlanta Metro Chamber played.
If the situation in my area was not isolated, chambers’ boards may be heavy with public employees, who apparently have an unusual interpretation of the meaning of the term, public servant..
I really believe this is just the “tip of the iceberg” for nationwide cheating due to the pressure of high-stakes testing. Many instances probably went unreported and were not investigated. This includes my own experience. The high school I taught in from 2005-2011 was largely Hispanic, working-class to below poverty level. It went 4 years in a row not meeting the NCLB standards in math and graduation rate. The district removed the administrators, and brought in the “new leadership team.” We were pressured, harassed, and bullied at every turn. I was an elective teacher, but was expected to teach math in my classes everyday. After two years, some progress was made, but not enough.
The third year…
1. Math teachers in the school reported on the morning of the administration of the math test, administrators walked into several classrooms, pointed to various students and said, “Come with me.” These students were taken elsewhere in the building and tested. No one is sure under what conditions the testing occurred, but the tests were brought back to the classes and bundled with the others.
2. These math teachers reported this to the state department of ed, but nothing was ever done.
3. Our math scores that year went up 26%, compared to the 2% and 3% gains the past two years
4. Graduation rate was another issue. After graduation that year, six senior teachers went to the central office to report someone had gone in to their electronic grade books and changed grades so kids could graduate. Nothing was ever done about this report.
5. That same summer I went into my electronic grade book and found names of students whom I never had in class added to my rosters and given final grades.
I resigned soon afterward and have since gone into higher education.
The principal of this school? Was given a promotion within the district and now is in charge of the highest achieving cluster of schools in the district. Many feel the superintendent put her in schools that would not require cheating so the district would not weather a scandal. Her career aspirations? She told us she wants to be the U.S. Secretary of Education.
I don’t think my story is unusual. I think if teachers were honest there are examples of this all over the country. It’s a sign of the times with high-stakes testing.
BTW, this occurred in Texas.
I keep coming back to the disconnect between what we SAY as adults about testing and what we DO.
I just don’t believe kids will buy that these tests aren’t “high stakes”. We keep telling them that, but the entire culture around testing contradicts that assertion. THEY KNOW. They’d have to be completely oblivious not to know. Hell, I know just watching this constant ranking and A-F school scores and how the the total focus on numbers ramps up every year and has for a decade, and I’m not in a public school at all.
Maybe they aren’t unduly affected by that – I don’t think my 6th grader is particularly stressed by testing- but my sense is that has more to do with his temperament than anything adults do or don’t do. I think my eldest son would have been really bothered by a “culture of fear” for example. He would have been anxious about it. He would care, a lot, what that number attached to his name was.
I think we have to decide, and be straight with them.
Are tests just assessments to “see where they are” or are they methods to rank and sort students, teachers and schools? We can’t have it both ways. Our rhetoric has to line up with their reality, or we risk losing much more than the “reliability of of tests”. We’ll lose credibility as adults and we’ll lose their trust.
The truth is, every report of a “miracle” school or district includes reams of test score comparisons. We ARE ranking them, and there ARE really punishing consequences. The idea that people inside those schools aren’t going to pick that up is just fantasy.
Chiara,
Where are they telling students that these aren’t high-stakes? In my district, (except for last year) we tend to tell the students that they are super important. The truth is that there are almost no stakes for students, except possibly not going into an honors track, and very high stakes for the school.
I don’t really separate “the students” from “the school”. If there are high stakes for the school, there’s high stakes for the students in the school.
One of the things I hate about ed reform is what I think is the absolutely nonsensical division and fragmentation of people and things and concepts.
They take children out of the context of their neighborhoods and communities, they separate what benefits teachers from what benefits students (I think those two things are connected) and they even divide parents from children (Duncan’s ‘suburban moms’ who are only concerned with property values).
I don’t buy that they’re ranking schools and teachers but not ranking children. I don’t think children buy it either, nor should they. It’s nonsense. It doesn’t make any sense.
I think that’s a perfect example of how “ed reform” seems to have nothing to do with real life and real people. If there are high stakes for schools and teachers then that permeates the entire entity that is “a school”, including students. I don’t think you can divide these things out. Some children may handle “high stakes” better than others, but that’s a different issue than whether that environment exists or not.
We should just tell them that. We should admit “we have decided that the most important thing is your test score, obviously, and you knew that, since that’s how we measure everything under the sun including your school, community, teachers and parents”. That would be at least honest.
Chiara,
I see what you’re saying. But In middle school, I do see students who have gotten the message that if they are failing, it’s because the teachers are no good. I guess it’s a way to rebel against a rigged system, because they figure out (around 7th grade) that they can fail all of their classes and the tests and they will still just be pushed on to the next grade. I know retaining students isn’t a good answer, but having no consequences or intervention or anything does not work well, either.
English Teacher,
I agree that a test can be high stakes for some and no stakes for others and have often posted about that. Young students can be made to care very deeply about tests that have no impact on their academic future, but when I asked my high school aged son if the periodic MAP exams caused him a great deal of stress he looked at me like I was an idiot. He and his classmates care about the exams that determine their grades.
Some states do have exams that are high stakes for students. New York, for example, has long had Regents Exams, and I believe that some states are using exams to determine if a student should be held back a grade.
APS is about to start the tenure of a new Superintendent brought in from Austin, TX. If we are looking for red flags, we do not have to look too far. She was brought in with anonymous donor $$ pushed for by Mayor Kasim Reed and handled by the president of the BOE. Her salary is over $300K per year…unheard of. Could never afford a Golden Parachute with that salary.
Pressure galore for high test scores, under the new leadership of several TFA BOE members the new appointee – second in command of APS, KIPP Charter admin of Atlanta’s KIPP schools. Money is rolling in to make this new administration work.
APS also has 13+ charter schools, 6 KIPP, serving few, if any, SWD & ELL. Those children stay in APS or quickly return to APS under the no-excuses KIPP practice.
APS is still involved in the old Cheating Scandal, taxpayers paying $M, while celebrating a new era, new $$, and old strategic corporate players. Everyone is moving on!?
Should we be concerned? You bet!
Hurley, the education activists were glad to get rid of her. She is charter-happy and worst of all, a Broadie. Business community bought more of the same.
I suspected as much.
I kept pressing those same issues and was rebuffed.
APS is ripe for the taking.
Poverty pays, just not for the children in poverty!
So we learned absolutely nothing, and we’re doubling down.
Wonderful.
I hope they are telling the kids that tests ate just assessments to “see where they are”! That is obviously not true, but if we say it enough will become true, I guess.
It’s important we continue to involve students in this fantasy scenario where everyone is still judged on test scores, but we as adults deny that. Sure. They’ll buy that. It’s not like they’re actually in these schools every day or anything.
In Cinncinati kids in some schools attend pep rallies before the statewide tests are delivered, some are engaged in yoga like calming exercises, and so on. The rehersals for tests take up to a week.
We have pep rallies in Jersey too. They absorb hours of instructional time.
HEY Mr. Wilson…
““So the mark [grade/test score] becomes part of the story about yourself and with sufficient repetitions becomes true: true because those who know, those in authority, say it is true; true because the society in which you live legitimates this authority; true because your cultural habitus makes it difficult for you to perceive, conceive and integrate those aspects of your experience that contradict the story; true because in acting out your story, which now includes the mark and its meaning, the social truth that created it is confirmed; true because if your mark is high you are consistently rewarded, so that your voice becomes a voice of authority in the power-knowledge discourses that reproduce the structure that helped to produce you; true because if your mark is low your voice becomes muted and confirms your lower position in the social hierarchy; true finally because that success or failure confirms that mark that implicitly predicted the now self evident consequences. And so the circle is complete.”
“In other words students “internalize” what those “marks” (grades/test scores) mean, and since the vast majority of the students have not developed the mental skills to counteract what the “authorities” say, they accept as “natural and normal” that “story/description” of them.
Although paradoxical in a sense, the “I’m an “A” student” is almost as harmful as “I’m an ‘F’ student” in hindering students becoming independent, critical and free thinkers. And having independent, critical and free thinkers is a threat to the current socio-economic structure of society.
July 19, 2014
The article “Wrong Answer” (The New Yorker, for July 21, 2014) tells a lengthy story about Atlanta Public Schools’ (APS’) test cheating crisis. The story is a rather obvious close-up look at a few key people at one APS school, Parks Middle School. However, Parks was just one among the 80 APS elementary and middle schools about which a systemic, wide-angled lens story might have been told.
Indeed, the test cheating crisis at Parks Middle School was horrible in the extreme. But Parks wasn’t alone. By my report, “CRCT 2009 Wrong-to-Right Answer Erasures: Seeing System Behavior through Quality Lenses” (April 15, 2010), 51 of 57 (89.5 percent) of Parks classrooms were detected to have had uncommon, non-random occurrences of students’ answers changed wrong-to-right, which made the school the third highest. Second highest was Peyton Forest Elementary School, with 62 of 69 (89.9 percent) of its classrooms detected. And first highest was Dunbar Elementary School, with 30 of 30 (100 percent) of its classrooms detected.
Still, as horrible was the test cheating crisis that emerged from Parks, Peyton Forest, and Dunbar, it remains an absurdity to think or to accept that any close-up, reductive story limited to a few people at one school proffers useful learning about “why” the test cheating crisis happened. Inarguably, the test cheating crisis showed up in a massively systemic way for which no people at a single school or even at a few schools was the root cause, as the tabulation below represents.
In the tabulation below, each horizontal bar represents a count of schools within the percent range indicated that had at least one classroom where uncommon, non-random occurrences of students’ answers were detected to have been changed wrong-to-right. Overall, at least one classroom in 73 of the 80 APS elementary and middle schools was detected. Moreover, the fairly uniform distribution of the counts cannot possibly or rationally be attributed to just school-level behavior.
00-00.9 percent: *********9
01-09.9 percent: ************12
10-19.9 percent: **********10
20-29.9 percent: ***********11
30-39.9 percent: *****5
40-49.9 percent: **********10
50-59.9 percent: ***3
60-69.9 percent: ****4
70-79.9 percent: ********8
80-89.9 percent: *******7
90-100 percent: *1
So why did the test cheating crisis happen? What was the root cause?
Truth be told, reading the New Yorker article hurt my heart and soul all over again, and I would cry again but for the anger resurfaced. The article reminds me of just how easy it was to predict and warn of horrible consequences APS would experience from Beverly Hall’s behaviorist control of the district that was much like B.F. Skinner’s behaviorism and operant conditioning experiments on animals.
Soon after, if not before, becoming superintendent, in 1999, Beverly L. Hall, Ed.D., set out to have the APS Charter changed to accommodate her behaviorist bent for urban school reform ideology. The preliminary draft of the changed APS Charter introduced the new Section 2-114, “Roles of Board and superintendent,” which included this new, horrific, stunting, stultifying, anti-learning role of the school board:
“Adopting district-wide policies that provide incentives for progress and consequences for failure for all decision-makers in the district, as well as for students. These policies must meet or exceed the state policies that provide incentives for progress and consequences for failure.”
The inhumanity this new role of the school board demanded was quite unbelievable. That any sane person could deliberately set out to so horribly damage Atlanta children, let alone to also horribly damage the children’s teachers and other adults within APS, was also quite unbelievable. But then NAACP’s agreeing involvement with changing the APS Charter made the whole matter preposterous in the eyes of anyone who dared to see and hear past the accompanying fine sounding but insincere “All children can learn!” chant.
So I challenged Dr. Thomas Cole, President of Clark-Atlanta University at the time, on the matter. Dr. Cole was serving as chairperson of the Atlanta Board of Education Charter Review Commission that the 2001-2002 Session of the Georgia General Assembly had created by Senate Resolution 608. Without question, the commission was tasked to make the APS Charter accord with Dr. Hall’s behaviorist aim for control of APS.
My challenge of Dr. Cole included exposing him to W. Edwards Deming (1900-1993) on videotape and to Dr. Deming’s last book, “The New Economics for Industry, Government, Education.” From having exposed him to Dr. Deming, Dr. Cole then promised me he would lead the commission to think differently so as to craft more humanistic language for this particular new role of the school board.
Dr. Cole kept his promise, and the APS Charter came to state, in the new Section 2-114, paragraph (a)(5), a role of the Board is that of:
“Adopting district-wide policies that support an environment for quality improvement and progress for all decision-makers in the district, as well as for students.”
Today, for some unexpressed reason, the APS Charter exists as Atlanta Board of Education Policy AA, School District Legal Status. One might think Board policy would include the APS Charter by reference, but that is not the case. In any case, Atlanta Board of Education members are inarticulate as regards the APS Charter, Section 2-114, paragraph (a)(5) as well as most other stipulated roles of the Board.
For example, ask any Board member what are the roles of the Board and one will likely hear nothing beyond a three-part chant, something like: hire and fire the superintendent, approve the budget, and adopt policy. The fact that the APS Charter stipulates twelve (12) roles of the Board (and a similar twelve (12) roles of the superintendent) seems to escape the Board members. All roles of the school board should be understood as composing a system of interdependent roles and utilized accordingly. But that is not the case, either.
The root cause that drove APS to experience the massively systemic test cheating crisis that it did experience is, and remains, Beverly Hall’s behaviorist control of Atlanta Public Schools granted her via the APS Charter. And therein lies the opportunity and the challenge to free APS from that control, especially since the APS Charter, Section 2-114, paragraph (5)(a) allows that to be done.
Hopefully, prayerfully, Atlanta Public Schools’ new superintendent will be more attentive to the opportunity and the challenge more so than past and current school board members have been.
Hopefully, prayerfully, Atlanta Public Schools’ new superintendent will bring a style of servant leadership by which APS will start a never-ending journey toward continually becoming an ever-greater learning organization in service to the common good.
And to do so will not require APS to enter into any manner of “Flexibility” contract with the state.
Ed Johnson
Advocate for Quality in Public Education
Atlanta GA
Fascinating article. Its strength is the way it focuses on the slippery slope that teachers and administrators found themselves. This reminds me of “Quiz Show”. The pressures for me (now retired), though great, were never on the level this reached in Atlanta. I was still sickened by the endless test prep.
Oops…”found themselves on.”
A middle school in my city was investigated for cheating on statewide tests a few years ago. Several teachers and I believe an administrator were found guilty. I think one or two of the teachers simply agreed to resign. The Atlantic News Journal was responsible for claiming the need for the investigation. The school is inner city and NCLB’s need for AYP had gotten out of control for this school.
A tragic story. A must reading for every school administrator should be E. Edwards Deming–the founder of TQM (although he disavowed this designation after he saw the concept was being abused —look at Atlanta), A central point he makes: when you put people in an untenable situation —setting production outcomes that can’t be met, etc. (reference is to production organizations), people will cheat–its that simple. He also said, that his statistical techniques should never be applied to social service organizations, like schools—
However, in the end, the teachers cheated and lied. What kind of role model is that? And what does it say about what kind of support they expected from the community if they stuck to the principles they (I hope) teach?