In 2009, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution scrutinized test score gains in the city’s public schools and discovered a number of schools where the gains seemed improbable. The story triggered intense scrutiny by the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. Eventually nearly three dozed educators were charged with changing answers on the standardized tests from wrong to right in hopes of winning a bonus and pleasing their superintendent Dr. Beverly Hall, who put pressure on all teachers to raise scores or be humiliated.
During Beverly Hall’s tenure, the Atlanta district was celebrated for its miraculous test score gains, and she won recognition as Superintendent of the Year. She was the poster educator supposedly proving the “success” of No Child Left Behind. What she actually proved was that NCLB created perverse incentives and ruined education.
The facade of success came tumbling down with the cheating scandal.
After the investigation, Beverly Hall was indicted, along with 34 teachers, principals, and others. All but one of those charged is black. Many pleaded guilty. Ultimately, 12 went to trial. One was declared innocent, and the other 11 were convicted of racketeering and other charges. Beverly Hall died before her case went to trial.
The case was promoted by then-Governor Sonny Perdue. Ironically, the rise in Atlanta’s test scores was used by the state of Georgia to win a $400 million Race to the Top award.
One of those who was punished for maintaining her innocence was Shani Robinson, who was a first-grade teacher. She is the co-author with journalist Anna Simonton of None of The Above: The Untold Story of the Atlanta Public Schools Cheating Scandal, Corporate Greed, and the Criminalization of Educators.
I reviewed their book on the blog. While reading her book, I became convinced that Shani was innocent. As a first-grade teacher, she was not eligible for a bonus. Her students took practice tests, and their scores did not affect the school’s rating. Yet she was convicted under the federal racketeering statute for corrupt activities intended to produce financial gain. The Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO), was written to prosecute gangsters, not school teachers. Her conviction was a travesty.
Investigators offered Shani and other educators a deal: Plead guilty and you can go free. Or, accuse another teacher and you can go free. She refused to do either. She maintained that she was innocent and refused to accuse anyone else. Shani was accused by a teacher who won immunity. Despite the lack of any evidence that she changed scores, she was convicted.
Two Atlanta lawyers wrote a blog post in 2020 describing the Atlanta cheating trial as a legal outage:
The Atlanta Public Schools (APS) “cheating” scandal is a textbook example of overcriminalization and prosecutorial discretion gone amok, compounded by an unjust sentence of first-time offenders to serve years in prison. It is a glaring illustration of a scorched-earth prosecutorial mindset that has sparked a movement of reform-minded prosecutors nationwide — one which has yet to be embraced in Atlanta.
Just this past week, the six remaining educators who have insisted on their innocence went before the same judge who found them guilty. Their public defender asked to be excused from the case because he thought it was a conflict of interest to represent all six defendants. The original prosecutor, Fani Willis, continues to believe the six educators should be imprisoned. Willis is now prosecuting the case of whether former President Trump interfered in Georgia’s election in 2020.
The six educators who insist they are innocent have lived in a state of suspended animation for more than a decade. They have not gone to prison, yet. They have lost their reputations, their jobs, their teaching licenses.
They hoped that Judge Baxter might use the hearing to dismiss their case. Shani asked me to write a letter supporting her. I did.
It didn’t matter. Judge Baxter decided that the defendants should get a new public defender and return for another hearing. The case has already cost millions of dollars and is the longest-running trial in the history of the state.
The judge ordered them to return to court with their new lawyers or public defenders on March 16. At that time, the entire appeals process might start again and take years to conclude.
I contacted my friend Edward Johnson in Atlanta to ask him what he thought. Ed is a systems thinker and a sharp critic of the Atlanta Public Schools‘ leadership, which is controlled by corporate reformers who make the same mistakes again and again instead of learning from them.
Ed wrote me:
Prosecuting teachers and administers was morally wrong to begin with. Continuing to prosecute any of them is doubly morally wrong. Teachers and administers were the real victims of Beverly Hall. So prosecuting them means being willfully blind to ever wanting to learn truths about anything that would help Atlanta avoid doing a Beverly Hall all over again.
I agree.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Thank you for your efforts on behalf of these teachers, Diane!
It is long past time to end the federal testing mandate, which has done nothing but effect the devolution of K-12 curricula and pedagogy, encourage cheating, and stressed out our kids to the point that suicide rates among high-school kids are at an all-time high.
Good morning Diane and everyone,
Back in the good old days I used to take my regents exams home and correct them. It took me hours. If I were to do that nowadays, who knows what would happen! I would probably be crucified. So I’ve been having a good chuckle with all these classified documents being found in politicians’ homes. Who are the rules for? Why the little people, of course.
WaPo had a political carton recently: a couple of passersby are walking near the Capitol as documents seeping from half-open cartons marked “top secret” blow around the street. One remarks, “If China wanted top secret information, I’m not sure why it thought it needed a balloon.”
Years ago standardized testing was a litmus test for parents to see how their children compared to grade level expectations. There were no high stakes or dire consequences attached to them. Since NCLB, punitive high stakes like holding students back, firing teachers and putting whole schools and districts at risk of state takeovers that are also doomed to fail have made public schools and teachers the nations’ ‘whipping boys.’ We need to learn from these mistakes. In this politicized climate nobody wants to learn, they simply want to plunder and vandalize public schools for the sake of errant ideology or private interests. Haven’t these former Georgia teachers suffered enough and hasn’t the state already extracted its pound of flesh? Any further action isn’t justice, it is vindictive, especially since the wealthy that lie, cheat and steal often get a fine and continue to enjoy their freedom.
Can I have an Amen up in here?
“Years ago standardized testing was a litmus test for parents to see how their children SUPPOSEDLY compared to grade level expectations.”
Those tests were just as invalid then as they are today. They didn’t do what they purported to do back then just as they don’t today.
The invalidities of the standardized testing process have never been addressed.
As I read this I was seething about our “injustice system.” Teachers have little choice but compliance when brow beaten by district leadership to take action in regard to perceptions that have little relationship to reality, i.e. test scores to actual school performance. If teachers or principals challenge these edicts from on high, then too often they are forced to leave their jobs. If you don’t have tenure, and in many states principals no longer have tenure at all, your livelihood is perpetually at risk. Teachers certainly shouldn’t cheat, but they shouldn’t be chastised for test scores that are impacted by socio-economic, emotional, and intellectual deficits beyond their control. Add to this the current circumstances in regard to who gets punished and who gets off related to the 1/6 insurrection. While those who physically participated in the insurrection are getting justice, the scores of plotters are getting off, and in many cases, profiting from their infamy. The great irony, I guess, is that Fani Willis, the chief prosecutor in the Atlanta cheating scandal, is in charge of the investigation of those who brazenly attempted a coup. Despite her reputation as an aggressive prosecutor, it took her over a year to set up the special grand jury that took another year to finish its work. Now we are waiting her decision about indictments along with a possible RICO charge and given the track record of federal and New York prosecutors I am not holding my breath in regard to justice for those with power, money, and fame. The powerful are very good at pretending they are about justice when persecuting groups with little power like teachers, minorities, and LGBTQ. I guess prosecuting the rich and powerful gets too close to home.
Diane, Thank-you for keeping this incident on our radar. I was just talking to a friend about the Atlanta cheating scandal and its relationship to the billionaire boys cartel how they captured government at every level. This tragedy has a direct through-line to the systemic failures of DoEd & Congress who are complicit with these billionaire bullies. Together, they’ve turned our education system & its teachers & children into a commodity exchange.
Congress & DoEd chose to punish teachers & administrators. They chose to scapegoat public schools. They chose to punish & discipline public school educators. They chose to completely deregulate special education & abandon kids they don’t think deserve an education. They chose to target for punishment the cities & districts with the most black & brown people. They chose to undermine a profession that is 75% female, represented by union leadership that is ossified & captured, with a pack of lies.
I hope these educators are able to get reparations for their suffering & loss.
I wish the scales would fall from the eyes of too many Democrats who try to play the middle by supporting Charters and choice. They have a great political opportunity if they would go in whole hog for public schools and, particularly, teachers.
Thank you Diane: brilliant synopsis of an almost forgotten episode and the attacks on public education. Some of us have always known that Fani Willis was is the prosecutor in this case, The person with whom so many desperate Americans have placed their hopes for accountability for Trump, given Garland’s apparent cowardice.
very good at pretending…
Pretending is a peculiar thing.
Like symbolic language,
out of which pretending is built,
it’s what sets us apart from the
“lower” animals.
“The body is with the king,
but the king is not with the body.”
He puts on a crown, sits on a throne,
and BINGO, he’s in charge.
The credential is with the graduate,
but the graduate is not with the
credential.
He puts on his thinking cap and
sits at his desk, and BINGO,
the pretending continues.
My symbolic credential, backed
by my symbolic achievement,
determined by the symbolic
gate keepers, empowered by
pretending, backed by symbolic
language…
As the relationship with Bloomberg disintegrated his administration “investigated” cheating in NYC schools, I was assigned to represent one of our members, the case was heard by an arbitrator, the member was exonerated, the importance of a strong union, in many years of union work one of my proudest moments
Alsa, those of us in the South have no Union Support. Both NEA affiliates in North Carolina and Alabama bent over backward to play nice with the education establishment. We were always told that membership in these professional organizations protected us from district malfeasance. It didn’t, and doesn’t. Why The NEA allowed the teachers in Atlanta to be served by public defenders instead of funding powerful lawyers is beyond me.
A basic question is whether they were union members. Unions don’t represent non-members. If they were members, the next question is how the insurance works. The insurance policy may not pay legal fees if the employee has been found guilty.
I don’t know the membership numbers in the Atlanta case, but I do know of cases where NEA members were basically ignored during challenges from district leaders. My point is that the credibility of the NEA and AFT have suffered because they have not acted as advocate for teaching or the school house in none-union states. Although they are not “unions” in these states, they charge significant dues for membership. I did not participate with NEA while in North Carolina, because the elected state leadership was feckless. I did join while in Alabama at a significant cost where the best they could offer was a good deal at a Gulf Shores Resort. As with Democrats on the coasts, the teacher unions don’t make much of an effort advocating for public education in the American “heartland”.
Awesome, Peter!
Why do the teachers have a public defender instead of union provided attorneys?
The New Yorker wrote about this several years ago, with a focus on a young man from Oakland, who became a math teacher and worked in Atlanta. He lost everything, including his marriage and a job he loved. The penalties laid on these teachers were so much heavier than those of the celebrities who gamed the SATs and bribed college admissions officers a few years ago.
or tried to overthrow a duly elected government on January 6th
Shani Robinson still faces a year in prison unlike the celebrities in the SAT bribing scandal. I think they got a few weeks in jail. They were under no pressure to cheat.
Thank you, Diane! Now this…
https://mailchi.mp/398158b258ba/atlanta-board-of-education-your-superintendent-is-out-of-control
We spend a significant amount of time bemoaning the existence of charters, vouchers, and privatization, and deservedly so. However, what we don’t challenge is the the misguided culture that drives much of the leadership within public school bureaucracy. I have read untold articles, attended conferences, and sat through meetings with my superiors where the validity of school boards is questioned. I have watched politically tone deaf school board members, politicians, and citizens question the role of superintendents. I have heard little from elected or appointed leadership that shows real concern for the needs of individual schools. The circular firing squad comes to mind. Superintendents across the country along with School Boards should take some blame for the rise of privatized initiatives. Citizens get frustrated because the district apparatus too often comes off as aloof and disengaged from the issues facing communities. The disjointed efforts of school policy makers has given an opening to corporate interests who see the chance to make a buck through lobbying district leaders and various politicians because, too often, school districts seem incapable of carrying out their mission to serve children. Where are parents to turn? Finland famously turned their schools around by focusing on preparing and providing for teachers. We in the US continue to organize through top down bureaucratic models that contribute to the profound inequality of student opportunity while perpetually searching for the Superintendent who can fix it. The wasted resources spent on the ongoing dance in large city districts with failed superintendents, as evidenced by an average service time of 3.76 years (k12insight.com), will only continue if policy makers focus on “the one best system” over investment in the foundation of teacher driven instruction. Data clearly reveals that superintendents have almost no impact on individual student achievement, whereas teachers given the tools to establish relationships with students and their parents have a life long impact.
“There can no longer be any doubt that America’s justice system is not blind. Indeed, as today’s report from the nation’s oldest, largest and most diverse civil and human rights coalition reveals, ‘lady justice’ sees skin color all too well. The report documents that black and brown Americans are routinely shunted to ever harsher treatment at every stage in the criminal justice system while their white counterparts are handled preferentially.”
https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/justice-not-blind
I posted this to OpEd News https://www.opednews.com/Quicklink/The-Atlanta-Cheating-Scand-in-Best_Web_OpEds-Diane-Ravitch_Schools-230214-115.html