Two fourth-grade teachers in Spokane, Washington were caught cheating on the state's WASL standardized test. One of the teachers was "reprimanded" (she is still teaching), the other resigned -- to enhance her career as an educator by going back to school for a master's degree. Both of the teachers and their union blame the government and its enforcement of standards for causing the teachers to cheat:
The Spokane Education Association "never condones cheating -- by students, or teachers -- it's wrong," said Spokane Education Association president Maureen Ramos. "BUT when the state and now the federal government decide to use only one test to measure student progress and publish the school and class results, there is an incredible amount of pressure on teachers and students to perform well on that single measure."This is yet another example why I support charter schools for Washington. Charter schools are not a panacea, but among other things, they liberate a portion of the schools from the teacher union extortion mafia and make it easier to rid the schools of teachers who set poor examples for our children, or worse. Posted by Stefan Sharkansky at December 22, 2003 04:39 PM