High-stakes testing puts pressure on educators

So much rides on public school students' test scores.

They can make or break a principal's career. Awards, money and promotions often accompany high scores. Low scores can mean state takeover or intense public scrutiny. They can lessen neighborhoods' home values and desirability.

The increasing pressure on educators to post strong results on high-stakes tests has created ripe conditions for cheating.

Cases of educator-led cheating are cropping up across the country, from Virginia to Texas to Ohio. An analysis of seven years of test results for third- though seventh-grade Chicago public school students found evidence of teacher cheating in more than 200 classrooms per year, which was roughly 5 percent of the total, according to the book "Freakonomics" by Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner. Those in the lowest-scoring classrooms were most likely to cheat.

A number of scenarios, such as unusually large one-year gains or high numbers of eraser marks, can trigger suspicions.

The State Law Enforcement Division opened an investigation last week into Sanders-Clyde Elementary School in Charleston County after the high-achieving, high-poverty school saw its Palmetto Achievement Challenge Test scores plunge an average of 31 percentage points. The drop happened when officials put testing monitors there this spring, a first for the school.

The downtown school had become a shining spot for the county, and its unexplained slip has left many shocked and saddened.

While it's unclear whether the scores fell because of wrongdoing or some other reason, it's clear that the school's former principal, MiShawna Moore, like many of her peers, felt intense pressure to succeed.

Moore told The Post and Courier last year about her anxiety over her school's test scores. She worked so much that she didn't have time to have her nails or hair done, and she gave her sole companion, a Shih Tzu dog, to her mother because she didn't have time to take care of her. When she realized Sanders-Clyde missed an excellent rating by just 33 students, she cried for four days.

Moore left Charleston a few weeks after standardized testing finished this spring, and she's now working as an assistant superintendent in North Carolina. Six phone messages and four e-mails to Moore last week asking for comment were not returned.

South Carolina test security laws and regulations are among the most rigorous in the country, and other states often call officials here for advice because the regulations are so strict, said Liz Jones, director of the Office of Assessment at the state Department of Education. Tests are kept in locked areas, and no one is allowed to open or peruse test booklets. Teachers must wait in lines to check out test booklets, and they must return them when the day's testing is finished.

"Our state is so tight that it irritates the honest people," Jones said. "We do make them jump through a lot of hoops."

But that doesn't mean cheating would be difficult. For example, while tests must be kept in locked rooms, principals usually have keys to those areas. When asked what's to prevent principals from altering results, other than state law, Jones said, "it's an honesty thing."

Orange Grove Elementary Charter School Principal Larry DiCenzo said principals can get as close to standardized tests as they want and that it wouldn't be difficult to gain access to them to change students' answers. That, in part, is why DiCenzo said he makes a point to keep a distance between himself and the tests. He's never looked at the state exam.

State Education Superintendent Jim Rex said he would like to have more resources to put toward test security, but the state has other priorities in terms of funding. That's not at the top of the list, he said.

"I don't see that we have any kind of widespread problem," he said.

One of the state's main ways of catching cheaters is through tips from students, parents and teachers, Jones said. Most people are honest, so if they see something wrong, they call or write the state, she said.

The state also reviews an electronic database annually that chronicles how many eraser marks are on each test. Students generally don't go back to check their tests and change answers, so the average eraser marks per student is less than one, Jones said. If state officials see a higher than average number of eraser marks per student — typically four will raise a red flag — they look into the situation further, she said. A typical response would be to send state staff to the school unannounced to monitor testing the next year, she said.

Sanders-Clyde's test results from 2007 had a higher than average number of eraser marks. This year, the year monitoring occurred, eraser marks for the school have returned to the statewide average.

Once state monitors arrive at schools, their oversight is fairly limited for a number of reasons. The state has about 10 monitors for roughly 1,100 schools statewide, and they try to go to as many schools as possible. A site visit likely would involve one official and last one day. Monitors might visit classrooms and the test storage area, talk to the school's testing coordinator and check on whether teachers were paying attention to students taking the exam, Jones said.

In comparison, when Charleston officials decided to monitor Sanders-Clyde, they took the exams away from the school each night and brought them back in the mornings, put monitors in multiple classrooms and stayed at the school for three days.

"I think the process is cautiously deliberate," Jones said. "Before we confront or accuse, we want to make sure we've got something."

In the case of Sanders-Clyde, the investigation is just beginning.

And so is the fallout.

The Citadel's School of Education had planned to induct Moore into its inaugural class of outstanding educators and supporters of education this Friday. A banquet with 150-plus invitations will be held to recognize those who have contributed so much to the field.

The college decided last week not to present Moore with an award this year.

Reach Diette Courrégé at dcourrege@postandcourier.com or 937-5546.