Test Mess

We have a testing scandal brewing in our town. Three highly respected grade school teachers have been removed from their classrooms pending an investigation by the district attorney's office into illegal coaching during state testing in late April.

Details are sketchy but it sounds like some of the 504 kids were coached a little too much. ( Section 504 kids are in essence classified as needing what I think of as junior-level special education services. Kid 2 is classified as eligible for certain accommodations. He gets shorter tests, more time, a seat up-front---all the help that doesn't tend to require a lot more money.)

These tests were much more difficult than previous ELAs. This was the first set of state tests that included the federally mandated Common Core Curriculum standards imposed as part of the "Race to the Top" initiative. The "Core" standards are much higher than the ones in place in the schools until November. The teachers had to "catch the kids up" to the new standards teaching the new curriculum in under six months. At the last parent/teacher conferences, many teachers quietly acknowledged to parents that the challenge seemed impossible.

It was a situation tailor-made for trouble. It was a parent who made the cheating allegations. A little girl in one of the classrooms went home and told Mommy that that the teacher had quietly indicated to some students which questions were right and which were wrong. Mommy immediately got on the phone to the district office and called "foul!"

It is wrong to cheat but it is also wrong to level possibly career-ending charges over such a petty thing as test scores. This set of test scores is the first one that will be used as part of the teachers' performance evaluations and perhaps the aggrieved parent knew this and took particular umbrage. What it really highlights is the mess of standardized testing.

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