Testimony claims fraud in school performance scores

The debate in the Senate Education Committee Wednesday was supposed to be about amending the constitution in order to elect the state superintendent of education. That became a side issue as witnesses described allegations of fraud in the State Department of Education and laid bare Superintendent of Education John White’s sparse credentials to hold the office.

When the dust settled, the committee rejected SB 41 by Sen. Bob Kostelka (R-Monroe), but only time will tell how much damage was inflicted on Superintendent White and his department by supporters of the bill.

The first blood was drawn by Sen. Kostelka, who said the superintendent of education is in charge of the biggest single state budget item, totaling $5.35 billion per year. He said the state “should have a superintendent who is accountable to the people and not a rubber stamp for the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education.”

Under White’s regime, Kostelka said, the public has been denied access to information about the department. Numerous lawsuits have been filed under the freedom of information act in order to view what should be public records.

Noting that most of the education overhauls pushed by White and the Jindal administration last year have been ruled unconstitutional by district courts, Sen. Kostelka said a new direction is needed, and “a clean break is the best way.”

Sen. Kostelka ticked off a laundry list of abuses by the department, including a plan to divulge personal student data to a company that would share it with for-profit organizations, the “utter failure” of the Recovery School District to turn around failing schools, and reports of overpayments and lack of supervision involving millions of dollars spent by the RSD.

The senator said that White’s credentials to head the department are sketchy at best: “We have a 30-something superintendent with a degree in English who spent six weekends at the Broad Academy,” a business-oriented organization that issued White the only certification that qualifies him for the job.

Devastating testimony was presented by Herb Bassett of Grayson, a highly qualified math teacher and band director. Bassett said that he has sent evidence to lawmakers revealing “deceit, distortion manipulation of scores and data suppression.”

Bassett documents what he called “the gross inflation of the high school performance scores. The Department covered up the inflation by intentionally mislabeling an important column of data in the initial public release of the scores.”

“The Transition Baselines,” he said, “showed that the GEE (Graduation Exit Exam)—which was being phased out—and the new EOC (End of Course) tests were mis-calibrated by 7.5 points. That’s half a letter grade. Had it been correctly labeled, the inflation would have been obvious.”

Bassett said that BESE was given a different set of scores than was shown to the public. Because the scores given to BESE were the correct ones, he said, “This shows intent to deceive.”

Bassett was interrupted by Sen. Jack Donohue (R-Mandeville), who said that these allegations are very serious, and that he would expect someone from the department or BESE to answer the charges.

Later, BESE President Chas Roemer (R-Baton Rouge) appeared in opposition to the bill. When asked about the allegations of fraud, he said that he had no knowledge about them, but that he would “look into it.”

Committee Chairman Conrad Appel (R-Metairie) asked Roemer to investigate the charges and report back to the committee.

Louisiana's indispensable investigative journalist, Tom Aswell, has much more on the story in this blog post.

Roemer (Jr.) splits sheets with Jindal, sticks with Pastorek

BESE member Chas Roemer is attacking Gov. Bobby Jindal for playing political games with the state's education system. Roemer, a Baton Rouge Republican, says that Jindal, a Baton Rouge Republican, is unwilling to "risk some political capital" to improve schools, according to Advocate reporter Will Sentell.

The cause of the split is a pair of legislative bills aimed at creating a separate diploma track for students at risk of dropping out and who obviously have no intention of going to college. The plan by Sen. Bob Kostelka and Rep. Jim Fannin has some legs - it's been endorsed by education committees in both houses. The two lawmakers say a separate track is necessary to bring down the state's unacceptably high (as high as 50%) school dropout rate.

The issue has apparently driven a wedge between the governor and State Superintendent of Education Paul Pastorek. While Jindal and Pastorek have been inseparable on school issues this year, the governor is now apparently supporting the Kostelka/Fannin plan.

Could Pastorek, whose popularity with legislators is in the cellar, wind up in a political wilderness with only Chas Roemer to give him comfort?

Lawmakers say state is lowballing dropout rates

Louisiana's school dropout rate is much higher than has been reported by the State Department of Education, according to lawmakers trying to create a separate diploma track for students who don't intend to go to college.

Sen. Bob Kostelka of Monroe and Rep. Jim Fannin of Jonesboro have introduced identical bills that would allow struggling students to choose a career major for high school instead of a college prep curriculum.

The lawmakers contend that if students see a practical application for their studies - and the possibility of a job - they would be more inclined to stay in school and graduate.

Superintendent of Education Paul Pastorek is sticking with an old tired argument about the necessity for rigor in our schools. The logic proceeds something like this: too many students are dropping out of school, so we need to make it harder to graduate. He's apparently forgotten that, once upon a time, relevance was considered as important as rigor in defining a curriculum.

And if Kostelka and Fannin are right, relevance is desperately needed, because the true number of dropouts has been lowballed by the State Department of Education.

DOE contends that about a third of ninth-graders never complete high school, which is pretty bad, considering that the national average is one in four.

What those figures leave out, though, is that a significant number of students struggle with the eighth grade LEAP test and drop out BEFORE ninth grade. That makes the actual dropout rate closer to 50%, say Kostelko and Fannin.

Obviously, we are dealing with a significant number of kids for whom college is not an option. But that does not mean they should be discarded (which is what happens now). They deserve an opportunity for a meaningful education that prepares them for decent jobs.

That's what the career course bills are all about. It's not watering down the curriculum - it's about making the education system work for all of our children.

Advocate reporter Will Sentell has a story about the issue here.