Another massive cheating scandal in Georgia

[illram]

We've been moving over the past decade towards more and more merit-pay programs for teachers (and that is going to continue, no matter who is running the DOE in 2012, since there are no substantive differences in education policy between Obama and Romney)...and when so much of your salary depends on these numbers, and cheating is still fairly easy to do, I don't see how we can avoid problems like this. The rest of the Georgia is being audited right now...we may still catch another 40 people.

Merit pay for teachers, when the "merit" is based on these tests, would be compounding the problem I'm admittedly struggling to properly articulate. So much is tied to these tests that I think very crucial elements of our education system are being pushed to the side in favor of this one size fits all education. These tests, as well as the incentives and punishments tied to them, focus on the wrong things IMHO. For instance is there any way, even a highly circuitous one that only arrives at this via sheer luck, that any of the punitive measures for bad scores would wind up reducing class sizes and allowing teachers to teach rather than simply perform crowd control all day?

 

[timtofly]

I'm sorry, but I have no idea what you are trying to say.

Spoiler :

And dishonest administrators. Let's not forget that many of the 200 caught statewide are principals...who are either actively cheating, or creating a culture of cheating.

We've been moving over the past decade towards more and more merit-pay programs for teachers (and that is going to continue, no matter who is running the DOE in 2012, since there are no substantive differences in education policy between Obama and Romney)...and when so much of your salary depends on these numbers, and cheating is still fairly easy to do, I don't see how we can avoid problems like this. The rest of the Georgia is being audited right now...we may still catch another 40 people.

Yes. Georgia could refuse NCLB funding and go it alone (and 2 states have threated to do just that until Sec.Duncan gave them waivers this year), but they're unlikely to do so. The law is in the process of getting a major rewrite, since it's about to expire, but tests aren't going away.

A new batch of felons have been created that will later be released. Their open positions allowing the un-employment rate to go down.

 

[warpus]

cheating is still fairly easy to do, I don't see how we can avoid problems like this.

Fire anyone involved, don't just put them on administrative leave, stop paying them, make sure it'd be hard for them to get a similar job, repeat.

 

[Murky]

The Bush era "No child left behind" created the whole standardize testing mess. There still is no excuse for school officials being involved with cheating. Anyone who is supposed to be administering the tests needs to have enough integrity not to allow any cheating.

 

[Slobadog]

Oh I totally agree that "teaching to the test" is detrimental to education, as it doesn't really *teach* the students all that much. Memorization is not education.

But still, national standards seem to make sense, at least to me.

Oh I totally agree that "teaching to the test" is detrimental to education, as it doesn't really *teach* the students all that much. Memorization is not education.

But still, national standards seem to make sense, at least to me.

Of course, also teaching to the test is also flawed in in that it only promotes short term memory. Also whats the point of having libraries if all information is supposed to be stored in the brain? It would be far better if students were taught how to find information than to teach them to use their brain as a library. A external source of information will always outperform a internal source. Why are we using the less effective of two options?

 

[downtown]

Thats a good point. Interestingly enough, there has been a lot of movement on adding "information resources" to standardized tests. My students were tested on their ability to find resources in the library and on the internet, and how to read and understand reference material. I applaud that movement...I know other states do it too.

 

[Ayatollah So]

It seems to me that you could reduce (not eliminate) the perverse incentives of merit pay by (A) having a large battery of very different tests, not all of them standardized, and selecting any given year's tests randomly among these; and (B) having peers or superiors evaluate teaching. Option (A) costs money - tough noogies; stupidity is even more expensive. Option (B) has its own problems, but maybe its evils are lesser.