Where We Live: Cheating Schools
The state is investigating teachers and staff at a Waterbury elementary school
The state is investigating teachers and staff at a Waterbury elementary school about suspected cheating on the 2011 Connecticut Mastery Tests.
This follows widespread cheating scandals uncovered in the District of Columbia, Baltimore and Atlanta…just this year. In a story this month, the magazine Education Week put it this way:
“As long as test scores are used in any field to make decisions on rewards or punishments, including for schools or educators, a small percentage of people will be willing to bend the rules - or break them.”
Today, where we live, we’ll find out the latest on the Atlanta scandal that’s made national news...and we’ll talk to a professor who says the rise in cheating by teachers and school staff parallels the rising pressures kids face with high stakes testing. What does this say about our education system, and what does it mean for your child’s education?
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Listener Email from Mark
I want to describe something that is occurring with my ten-year-old, who is now transitioning from a Catholic grade school to a public middle school.
In the Catholic school, there was no NCLB requirement. Math teaching methodology has been all about understanding concept. For example, 3 plus 4 equals 7 -because- 7 minus 3 equals 4.
With the Public school, we are being require to teach rote memorization. Our daughter was given some 30 pages of timed tests in multiplication and division for summertime study, where we have to time her taking tests.
Mind you, this is a very good public school that has no issues passing NCLB. But I have to wonder if rote memorization of multiplication and division facts sets our daughter up for Calculus in the future and prepares her for a computer desktop environment where you can pop open a calculator in a second.
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