13.5.3: Cheating

 13.5.3: Cheating The cheating I’m referring to is not what you might have seen in your social studies or math class in high school. I’m referring to cheating by teachers and school administrators. Listen to this: Computer scanners showed that teachers in 191 schools in Atlanta, Georgia, had erased students’ answers on reading and math tests and penciled in correct ones (Gabriel 2010). Thirty-five teachers were charged with conspiracy. Some were sentenced to probation and weekends in jail. Three high-ranking administrators were sent to prison for seven years (McWhirter and Porter 2014). The superintendent of Atlanta’s school system, who apparently led the cheating, was charged with theft for taking $500,000 in bonuses for producing good test scores. She died of cancer before she could be tried. The school district was facing pressure to show that their teaching had improved, and cheating was the way they produced the “improvements.” Now look at this: Mississippi keeps two sets of books: The one sent to Washington reports the state’s graduation rate at 87 percent. The other, which the state keeps, reports that 63 percent of its students graduate. Other states do the same. California reports its totals at 83 percent and 67 percent. (Dillon 2008) Why do high school administrators across the nation fake their graduation rates? The reason is that federal agencies publish these reports, and states don’t want to look bad. Also, Washington might reduce the money it gives them. It’s like a girl telling her parents that she received a B in English when she really received a D. She doesn’t want to look bad—and her allowance might be cut. 432 School administrators can be quite creative in faking their numbers. Some count the number of students who begin their senior year and report the percentage of these seniors who graduate. This conveniently overlooks those who drop out in their freshman, sophomore, and junior years. Some even encourage high school students who are doing poorly to drop out before they reach their senior year. This way, they won’t be counted as dropouts (Dillon 2008). The Solution to Cheating The solution to this cheating is fairly simple. Zero tolerance. Require all states to follow the same measurement of student performance and high school graduation and fire teachers and administrators who cheat. A simple measure is to compare the number of those who graduate from high school with the number who entered high school in the ninth grade, minus those who died and those who transferred out, plus those who transferred in. Federal officials can spot-check records across the nation. With loss of job the punishment, we could expect honesty in reporting to jump immediately. Knowing students’ real performance and real graduation rates can help pinpoint where the problems are, letting us know where to focus solutions. If you don’t know where it’s broken, you don’t know where to fix it. Let’s turn to the third problem.