Powered by Real Times Media
www.AtlantaDailyWorld.com
from ADW Family May 8 -14, 2014
Volume 86 • Issue 39
Education Officials Make Major Testing Changes
Following the largest school cheating scandal in the nation’s history, members of the state Board of Education recommended that the state hire an unnamed company to develop the new test at their monthly meeting in Atlanta. The proposal would make some sweeping changes to statewide testing in Georgia, making the tests more difficult and moving all testing online within five years. State officials said procurement laws in Georgia prevent them from naming the company until the Department of Administrative Services publishes the award and other bidders have a chance to respond. The cost also won’t be revealed until that time. The state committed to rolling out a new test during the 2014-15 school year in return for a waiver from the federal No Child Left Behind act. Pressure to meet that deadline increased in July when Georgia dropped out a multi-state consortium that is building a test to meet the rigid standards of Common Core. State officials, including Gov. Nathan Deal and State School Superintendent John Barge, said then that Georgia
could find a more affordable rate than the consortium’s predicted cost of $29.50 per student tested. Melissa Fincher, director of testing for the Department of Education, said the tight timeline to build a new test isn’t ideal but added that the state isn’t starting from scratch. Dana Rickman, policy and research director for advocacy nonprofit the Georgia Partnership for Excellence in Education, said getting the exam right is essential to every piece of education reform underway in the state. Student performance is based on statewide testing and is central to new teacher evaluation standards and judging the success of Common Core’s curriculum changes, she said. “We’re moving into an area of greater transparency and accountability, but all of that is based on the assessment,” Rickman said. Forty-one educators were indicted in the APS cheating scandal. While parents of Atlanta’s school children, the most damaged victims in the school cheating scandal, were outraged and demanded harsher punishments and stronger safeguards to ensure fairness in testing and restore the APS system’s in-
tegrity, some legal experts say compassion is a better course. “I feel so bad for these poor teachers. They are out of work and don’t have any money to fight these charges,” said Richard Deane Jr., attorney for whom many believed was the target of the investigation, former APS superintendent Beverly Hall. But following the nationally publicized scandal and the enormous pressure to restore teachers’ and the school system’s credibility, parents say they will continue to scrutinize every move APS officials make. Those involved in the infamous cheating scandal say they were pressured to provide standardized test answers to students to improve test results. School funding and teacher compensation are based on students performances on standardized tests. The state’s budget for the coming year includes an additional $8 million for testing students, bringing the total pot of money for testing to around $23 million.