Cheating Scandal Involved Teachers and Administrators, Says Houston District
by Jim Brown
May 12, 2005
(AgapePress) - An internal investigation has found that teachers in four Houston, Texas, public schools assisted students in answering questions on the state-mandated test.The Houston Independent School District -- the largest in the Lone Star State -- sent teams of investigators into 23 schools that had unusually large swings in the standardized test scores last year. The investigators interviewed children and teachers, and examined testing documents. Following the probe, district administrators have fired six teachers, demoted two principals and one assistant principal, and reprimanded several other district employees. All those accused of cheating deny having done so.
According to an Associated Press report, four eighth-graders at one school were assisted by a math teacher after being moved from their regular classrooms. Those four students, says the report, answered all of the questions the same way, and incorrectly answered the same two questions. District spokesman Terry Abbott confesses it may never be known why the teachers who were involved cheated -- but he suggests possible motives.
"All teachers in all schools want to see the school's academic achievement ratings go up -- and of course, one way to do that is by assisting students on answering the test," Abbott says. "Of course, teachers and others on the school campus share in incentive money when schools do well, and part of that incentive is derived from test scores."
Abbott says as a result of the cheating scandal, there will be some policy changes.
"We're looking at ways right now of tightening up the test administration process, from doing a better job of securing the test materials to having different processes in place in the schools for how the test would be administered," he explains. "I think there are several things that we can do to improve that process, but most importantly, we've got to continue to say to our employees, publicly and privately, 'Don't cheat. If you cheat, we will catch you and we will fire you.'"
The internal probe of the schools was prompted in part by a Dallas Morning News report showing large swings in scaled scores for almost 400 of Texas' 7,700 schools. Examples included students earning some of the state's lowest scores in reading, but its highest in math -- and classes that, over the course of just one year, dropped from among the top ten percent in reading to the bottom ten percent.
Jim Brown, a regular contributor to AgapePress, is a reporter for American Family Radio News, which can be heard online.
