geek.teacher

Apparently, you can solve the problem of teachers cheating on state tests with prosecution.  The problem rampages across the state:

Fear of retribution and negative media attention to a cheating scandal serve as disincentives for teachers and administrators to report unethical behavior. Over a six-year period (1998-03), only 21 teachers were tagged for cheating on state assessments in New York. With more and more testing being mandated, this handful of cheaters surely represents but a fraction of the actual total. 

Emphasis mine, of course. My question: How big a fraction?  The “surely represents” part of that quote makes it sound like there must be hundreds, if not thousands, of teachers out there cheating right now!  Stop them before those kids get test scores they don’t deserve on assessments that eat up precious instructional days!

Ethically, of course teachers shouldn’t cheat.  There is a public trust there that these teachers violate.  It gets my goat when somebody assumes that the actions of a few teachers reflect on the quality of the many.

That being said, the piece brings up some good points about a couple of the more ridiculous ways New York violates basic standardized testing protocol:

New York allows schools and teachers to score portions of their own students’ exams…(useless quote redacted)… Allowing New York’s public schools to grade their own assessments is a clear conflict of interest that should be prohibited.

Parts of the state assessments are multiple-choice, with students filling-in “bubbles” on answer sheets. These bubble-sheets are scored electronically at regional centers. Amazingly, schools and districts are allowed to keep these answer sheets for two weeks before they are due to the scanning center. To limit the opportunity to illegally alter test answer sheets, schools should be required to deliver them directly to the scoring centers the same day exams are administered.

That first one blows my mind.  Standardized tests graded by the teachers shows that the state’s interest lie in saving a few bucks (and adding more work for teachers, of course) than in making sure they secure their testing system. I’m sure most teachers treat the scoring seriously, but I’m also sure the state just broke the “standardized” part of “standardized testing.”  If the state doesn’t take the tests seriously enough to follow proper protocol, can they honestly be surprised when some teachers don’t?