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Cheating Is On Georgia's Mind

“More Georgia Schools Accused of Cheating”
by Alan Schwarz
New York Times
December 21, 2011

Investigators who this year found rampant cheating among Atlanta public school teachers and principals released another report on Tuesday detailing widespread wrongdoing in another Georgia county.

Cheating by officials on 2009 state standardized tests was found in each of 11 schools investigated in Dougherty County, which includes the city of Albany about 200 miles south of Atlanta. The report described dozens of cases of adults giving students answers during tests or correcting their mistakes afterward. One fifth-grade teacher passed students who could not read, the report said, resulting in their not receiving extra help.

The details of the report echoed results of similar investigations this year in Atlanta, Philadelphia and Washington, underscoring a widespread debate about the reliance on high-stakes test results, which are used to evaluate students and teachers and to measure improvements required by the federal No Child Left Behind Act.

The findings “paint a tragic picture of children passed through with no real or fair assessment of their abilities,” Gov. Nathan Deal of Georgia said in a statement. “To cheat a child out of his or her ability to truly excel in the classroom shames the district and the state.”

The report by investigators, working at the governor’s request, said district officials were not directly involved in the cheating, yet “should have known and were ultimately responsible.”

Mr. Deal, a Republican, said the findings would be sent to the Dougherty County District Attorney’s Office. In Atlanta, law enforcement officials have yet to determine whether people involved with cheating there will be prosecuted.

Eighteen educators admitted to cheating in Dougherty County, the report said, adding that at least 31 others were involved. At one Albany elementary school, the principal instructed a teacher to correct students’ wrong answers, the report said; another teacher “gave students the answers and reviewed sections of the test before it was administered.”

The superintendent of the Dougherty County School System, Joshua W. Murfree, could not be reached by phone on Tuesday. Schools in Dougherty County are on Christmas break, with classes resuming on Jan. 5.

“I’m so angry I don’t know what to do today,” Michael J. Bowers, the lead investigator in both the Dougherty County and Atlanta inquiries, said in a telephone interview. “I don’t care what your politics are, your station in life, the color of skin. This is an American tragedy.”