Petersburg’s School Cheating Scandal
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12 responses to “Petersburg’s School Cheating Scandal”
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Two thoughts:
1. If you are saying “all school districts inhabited by lots of low-income African-Americans have poor administration”, it seems like an awfully unusual coincidence.
2. Moreover, I don’t know of any way of proving (besides the occasional scandal) that school district A has worse administration than school district B. You could say that A’s bad results show it has worse administration, but it seems equally plausible that other causes (fatherless families, more resources diverted to special education in low-income districts, effects of poverty on parenting, etc) are a more prominent cause- especially since the latter causes tend to by definition exists in almost all similar districts, while bad administration might be less widespread.-
Mike, I’m not saying that “all school districts inhabited by lots of low-income African-Americans have poor administration.” But African-Americans live disproportionately in inner cities where the politics and machinery of government leave a lot to be desired. Chicago. Baltimore. Philadelphia. I could go on.
As for Petersburg, I doubt it’s made news outside of Virginia, but the city is digging its way out of a catastrophic revenue shortfall caused by inept fiscal administration. The city is a basketcase.
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You’re conflating again… statues have nothing to do with cheating on tests.
it adds nothing to the dialogue other than to divert attention from the real issue.
Henrico schools have had the following schools denied accreditation: Glen Lea, Montrose and Ratcliffe elementary schools, along with Elko, Fairfield, John Rolfe and L. Douglas Wilder middle schools were denied accreditation by the Virginia Department of Education.”
how can one of the best school districts in Virginia have the same problems that Petersburg has … ???
Give Henrico credit for not cheating…. but they too have schools that have been denied accreditation.
so why is that? does Henrico have “bad” teachers or “bad parents” also?
don’t be yammering about statues.. that’s just a diversion..
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I guess you can call it a diversion if you want, Larry. As usual with so many most of your posts, it’s merely argument by assertion.
In 1967, Justin Hayward commented,
“But we decide which is right
And which is an Illusion?”I think he had it right. You could look it up.
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I don’t have much tolerance for cheating but in terms of Administration , do we say that Henrico’s Administration is bad also because it has about 20 schools that are not fully accredited?
what explains Henrico having some of the best schools and some of the worst in the same district?
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it’s more conflation and diversion and …misrepresentation because they’re ONLY talking about the folks who fought to defend slavery – not the slave holders…
You guys are suffering from white-mans disease.. you remember history from a white man’s perspective not the black mans.. which is partially understandable but what’s not is that you won’t admit it.
Statues that went up during Jim Crow at the same time blacks were being lynched is not history the white guys want to remember but it’s history black folks cannot forget. You have to reconcile that are admit we’re never going to heal..
and Jim demonstrates it by bringing it up again – in the middle of another subject.. not good.
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In total fairness to the Petersburg community, cheating by school administrations and staff is not peculiar to poor districts like Petersburg. See http://www.nytimes.com/1992/01/01/education/cheating-scandal-jars-a-suburb-of-high-achievers.html.
The Cherokee elementary school in the Times story was in a part of town that commanded a rather high real estate premium over the rest of Lake Forest, mainly because of Cherokee’s “reputation” for academic excellence. I was totally naive about what this really meant. I had to learn that those wealthy parents may not have been as concerned about the cheating as you might think. During one of the hearings before the school board, one male parent got up and, to my surprise, asked what would happen to his property value if they fired the [previously] respected principal.
Petersburg probably does not have this element of the problem in the equation, but the incentive on the staff/school administration side of the problem is virtually the same: feathering of one’s own monopolistic nest.
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I don’t have much tolerance for cheating but in terms of Administration , do we say that Henrico’s Administration is bad also because it has about 20 schools that are not fully accredited?
what explains Henrico having some of the best schools and some of the worst in the same district?
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re: ” The Cherokee elementary school in the Times story was in a part of town that commanded a rather high real estate premium over the rest of Lake Forest, mainly because of Cherokee’s “reputation” for academic excellence. I was totally naive about what this really meant. I had to learn that those wealthy parents may not have been as concerned about the cheating as you might think. ”
well ..yes.. there is actually a company called Niche.. that specializes in fairly fully characterizing the qualities of schools AND the EXACT boundaries of the neighborhood it serves as well as the prices of the homes in that neighborhood.
take a look: https://www.niche.com/k12/d/henrico-county-public-schools-va/
the question I’ve always had and have asked frequently here how can one school district with one set of administrators ..have some really good schools and some really bad schools in the same district – like Henrico does.
do we think “bad teachers” are concentrated in some schools unbeknownst to the administrators? How about “bad parents”? Do we think the “bad parents” tend to gravitate to certain neighborhoods?
so what does explain these disparities?
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They weren’t as devious as Norfolk who just diverted students from even taking the tests … “recycled” was the clever term used.
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I agree with Larry the G. Cheating in school is always wrong, but what the hell does this have to do with Confederate statues?
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The Confederate statue controversy is a distraction from issues that matter.
Here’s what former Gov. Doug Wilder said in an op-ed this morning: “Will the removal of statues change any of this, we welcome as some might find it? Will it provide our young people a more recognizable version of the American Dream?”
That sentiment is identical to the one I expressed.
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