Another Example Of Academic Fraud

It seems every month there is an article in the newspapers dealing with academic fraud and this month there is an article by Susan Edelman of the New York Post about school administrators at Parkside Preparatory Academy, a middle school in Brooklyn as the latest example of cheating in the New York City public schools.

If you read the article there appears little doubt that academic fraud is occurring at the school but despite the evidence the DOE's OSI found no evidence.  Unbelievable!

Until the DOE seriously addresses the academic fraud issue, stories like this will continue to be written about and makes real academic achievement impossible. Read the New York Post's editorial page on the city's lack of effort to curb bullying and academic fraud.

Maspeth High School In The News Again

Maspeth high school which has been identified for a massive cheating scandal, finds itself in the New York Post as a Dean and Math teacher was quietly removed from the school in December.  The teacher was identified by the New York Post as Danny Sepulveda.  According to the DOE, Mr. Sepulveda was removed for reasons unrelated to the academic fraud at the school.

According to the article by Susan Edelman, Mr. Sepulveda was identified as one of the teachers that supplied students with answers to the Regents.  He was alleged to have sent a text message to another teacher and wrote the following:


 “Having someone fail and not graduate HS because of a state exam that colleges never look at is more of a failure than anything else. I look at state tests as the anti-christ,” Sepulveda wrote.

In the Maspeth cheating scandal no administrators have been punished so far and no teachers who were identified as part of the cheating scandal were removed.  One would think the DOE has basically closed their collective eyes to the academic fraud at Maspeth high school and the many other schools in New York City  In fact, the FBI has started an investigation on the widespread academic fraud of the NYC school system as OSI and SCI has failed to seriously investigate the academic fraud issue

You can read my articles on Maspeth high school Here and Here.

Principal Henry Shandel Of Marie Curie Middle School In Queens Proposes A Questionable Grading Policy

Principal Henry Shandel of Marie Curie middle school in Bayside Queens has sent teachers a proposed grading policy that allows students who fail to complete assignments to make up the work or get an alienate assignments up to the grading deadline.  According to the Daily News article here is what the Principal wrote to the teachers about his proposed grading policy.

: “For late/missing work due to student failure to complete an assignment on time, students must also be given multiple opportunities to make up or turn in work regardless of due date and without academic penalty, up until the end of the current marking period."

To me Principal Shandel's letter to the teachers is just another example of academic fraud to jack up the passing and graduation rate of the school and push undeserving students into the next grade or high school without the academic tools to legitimately advance in grade. 

Teachers were understandably upset since they knew that the Principal was not interested in giving students a quality education but simply wanted to pass as many students as possible. According to the article  The Principal's grading policy removes student accountability and weakens teacher control of student grades.  Not surprisingly, the DOE supports the Principal and their public relation mouthpiece hypocritically said the following according to the Daily News article.

“We are laser-focused on students mastering academic content and the draft policy as written is academically sound and was distributed to teachers to solicit their feedback," Education Department spokeswoman Danielle Filson said Thursday.

This is just another example of academic fraud proposed by a Principal that weakens teacher control and reduces student accountability,and supported by the DOE that hurts student academic achievement to make them look good statistically,  plain and simple.

DOE Ignores Academic Fraud

Councilman Robert Holden has asked the federal government to investigate the ramped grade fraud at the New York City schools.  The clearly frustrated Councilman has tried to convince DOE officials, including Chancellor Richard Carranza to seriously investigate the academic fraud but was ignored.  I have written many posts on the widespread academic fraud and you can find those posts under "academic fraud". 

Why doesn't the DOE investigate or punish schools for academic fraud?   Simple, the DOE rather have a higher graduation rate and an illusion that academic progress is being made when the truth is far different. The DOE allows schools to cheat by ignoring the use of easy credits, blended learning, and allowing principals to require that teachers pass as much as 85% of their students.

Will the Federal government investigate the academic fraud?  I doubt it but if they do, it will be easy to prove.  Read James Eterno's ICEUFT blog for the actual letter to the U.S. Attorney..

Academic Fraud At Maspeth High School - Part 2

It seems that Mayor De Blasio was informed of the academic fraud at Maspeth high school and failed to take action.  Worse, the Mayor did not remove the school administrators before the school year started but told the district councilman not to go to the press if he wanted to be on the Mayor's good side.   Susan Edelman of the New York Post wrote an article that explains it all.

Can you imagine if a teacher was caught committing academic fraud?  He or she would be removed from the school and the DOE would file 3020-a termination charges.  Yet, despite the many whistle blowers and their allegations, the DOE kept all the school administrators and only reluctantly started an in house investigation, while dragging their collective feet. This is just another example of the DOE's double standard.

You can also read the article of why a teacher quit Maspeth high school due to alleged corruption.

To read more about Maspeth high school read my blog Here.

NYC High Schools Practice Academic Fraud To Jack Up The Graduation Rate

Most high school teachers in New York City know that academic fraud is practiced in most, if not all the schools.  Be it scholarship requirements, easy credits, blended learning, grade inflation, or administrative pressure to pass failing students.  The New York Post has an article dealing with the widespread academic fraud practiced in the New York City high schools.

Maspeth high school is just an extreme example of the common practice of academic fraud.  If your an untenured teacher and you dare fail too many students, look to be discontinued.  For tenured teachers, look for poor observations and a 3020-a termination hearing. It doesn't matter that these students did not deserve to pass, they want you to pass them anyway.

The DOE will claim that they do not tolerate academic fraud but they put intense pressure on school administrators to pass as many students they can or risk negative consequences for the Principal and the school.  Hence, academic fraud is encouraged while the DOE looks the other way. No wonder there is a disconnect between the graduation rate and being "college ready" at many of the NYC high schools..


Rather than going into detail of the academic fraud that goes on in the New York City high schools please read my academic fraud articles from my blog.  In addition, you can also read my numerous graduation rate articles as well and they will give you a complete understanding how academic fraud is practiced in the New York City high schools.

Schools Still Practicing Academic Fraud

I have been posting about academic fraud for years, you can read them Here.  Now the esteemed columnist, Susan Edelman of the New York Post, wrote an eye opening article about the grade inflation tha goes on in most of the New York City public schools.

As a high school teacher, I used to get many of these middle school students who could not do simple Math and had no clue what commonly used words meant.  Even worse, because these students were academically unable to do high school course work, they would act up and become discipline problems.

Of course the Department Of Education (DOE) would blame the high schools and the teaching staff for their failure to improve student academic achievement when these students do not have the academic tools to succeed in yhe first place.

Teachers have often complained that school administrators pressure teachers to pass undeserving students and the DOE supports school administrators in artificially inflate grades and passing rates. In the high schools many poorly performing schools require teachers to have a "scholarship requirement" that forces the teacher to pass up to 85% of their students.

Unfortunately,  if the teacher is not tenured, the teacher will not go against the administrator and pass the students, despite their academic failure.  Let the next teacher or school deal with the low performing student.

Despite a new Chancellor who is attempting to "clean house", the DOE mentality is to still punish schools who have low graduation rates. Therefore, principals are encouraged to pass and graduate students despite their academic shortcomings.  

The Disconnect Between The Graduation Rate And The College Readiness Rate - 2018

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High schools that have a ratio less than "1.2" are in blue and giving their students a world class education while high schools with ratios greater than "1.5" are listed in red and yellow and are simply diploma mills. Parents should make sure their academically achieving students should stay away from them.  This year's metric was lowered since the CUNY college readiness metric was lowered and the Algebra Regents rubric and cut scores were made easier to achieve higher grades and the English Regents was found also to be easier than previous years.  It appears the "college ready" scores went up  again by an average of fifteen points, primarily due to the lower cut scores in Math and an easier test in English.

We all know that principals can and do manipulate the graduation rate.   Credit recovery, grade changing, administration pressure on teachers, and school scholarship requirements (80% or more passing per class) or a combination of them all.  The result is an artificially bogus graduation rate as far too many schools graduate students unprepared for the real world.  Therefore, to determine if  unscreened Queens high schools are really diploma mills or truly giving their students a real world class education, I have developed the annual metric for the 2017-18 school year that takes the graduation rate and divides it by the college readiness percentage.

The list is based on the 2017-18 school year.

School...........................Graduation Rate.....College Ready

Cambria Heights Academy........83%....................39% 
Academy of Medical Tech..........73%....................27% 
Fredrick Douglas Academy VI....43%....................11%
Epic HS South...........................67%....................32%
Benjamin Franklin.....................80%....................44%
QIRT........................................82%....................50%
Rockaway Park.........................67%....................36%
Humanities and Arts.................80%....................43%
August Martin...........................72%....................28% 
Rockaway Collegiate.................67%....................26% 
Martin Van Buren......................72%....................28%
 Flushing..................................62%....................32%
Pathways College.......'.............69%....................28%
Hillside Arts & Letters...............88%....................52%
Law Enforcement.....................79%....................38%
Science, Research, and Tech.....71%....................47%
Excelsior Prep..........................81%....................52% 
 George Washington Carver.......75%...................39%
 John Adams............................72%....................42%
Queens Prep............................67%....................39% 
Grover Cleveland.....................63%....................40%  
Epic HS North..........................88%....................57%
Richmond Hill..........................71%....................42%
Long Island City......................76% ...................46%
Applied Communications..........87%....................56%
 Hillcrest.................................71%....................44%
 Queens HS of Teaching............91%....................53%
 Community Leadership...........91%....................47%
Queens Collegiate...................88%....................56%
 William Cullen Bryant..............71%....................52%
 Newtown...............................73%.....................57%
 Robert  H. Goddard.................97%....................71%
 Robert Wagner.......................91%....................65%
John Bowne............................77%....................55%
Channel View..........................97%....................76%
Writers Academy....................89%.....................62%
Information & Technology.......79%.....................60%
Robert F. Kennedy..................80%.....................60% 
Robert Wagner.......................91%.....................66% 
Arts & Business......................94%....................79%
World Journalism....................97%....................75%
Queens Vocational..................86%....................70%
TV & Media.............................98%....................73%
Metropolitan HS......................91%....................84% 
Middle College HS....................91%...................77%
Civic Leadership......................92%...................82% 
Maspeth HS............................98%....................86%
Forest Hills.............................91%....................81%
Bayside..................................99%....................87%
East-West..............................93%....................81%
Cardozo.................................89%....................74%
Thomas Edison.......................92%....................82%
Francis Lewis.........................88%....................80%
Finance & Enterprise...............97%....................84% 


 The citywide "college ready" average is 53%. "college and career readiness rate"  as defined by New York City  The more stringent New York State rates are lower.

 Obviously, the lowest rated schools are "diploma mills" and for the most part, are located in Southeast Queens or are "Renewal schools".  By contrast the best schools are located in two areas  Northeast Queens and the Long Island City/Astoria area.  The Bloomberg small schools in the Far Rockaway and Beach Channel campuses inhabit most of the top positions with the worst matrices on the list, while the worst school metric is by Fredrick Douglas Academy VI with a metric of 3.9.. By contrast, the best two schools Bayside and Francis Lewis, when it comes to the metric.

The takeaway is that all the high schools in the Far Rockaway, Beach Channel, and Campus Magnet campuses are academic failures and the Springfield Gardens campus is not far behind.  Moreover, the Jamaica Educational Complex is showing gradual deterioration with two school already failing and the one of the other unscreened school showing a significant drop.

While my metric is not perfect it serves as a useful guide for parents who want the right Queens high school for their academically proficient student. You can see the metrics for the last three years  Here, Here and Here.

The Disconnect Between Graduating High School And Graduating College - Case Study Newark, New Jersey.

The Department Of Education (DOE) in urban areas brag how their high school  graduation rate is increasing.  The problem is that most educators know that the high school graduation rate is bogus as it's artificially inflated by phony credit recovery courses, administrative pressure to pass undeserving students and grade fixing.  Of course when some of them end up in college, an unpleasant surprise often awaits them.  First, they are required to take no credit remedial courses.  Second, they quickly find out that college is a "sink or swim" environment with no hand holding by the professor.  Either you do the work or fail and many end up dropping out.

A case study is Newark New Jersey.  The data shows that Newark's graduation rate has skyrocketed to 73.47% .  Unfortunately, only 13.7% of those high school graduates actually got a degree of any kind, according to New Jersey's Open Data Network.  According to Chalkbest, 51% of Newark's high school graduates who went directly to college, did better but still disappointing with only 39% of them receiving a degree of any kind.

The Mayor's goal is that 25% of all high school graduates receive a college degree by 2025  he hopes to do this by adding "rigor" to the high school curriculum but if the high schools still use phony credit recovery and grade fixing, the Mayor's goal is simply wishful thinking.

Academic Fraud Is Common In The New York City Public Schools.

I have written previously that academic fraud is quite common in the New York City public school system.  Be it bogus credit recovery, scholarship, changing grades, or administrative pressure, academic fraud is ignored by the DOE.

In today's New York Post there is an article dealing with the academic fraud issue and the newspaper brings up one example that shows how OSI substantiated the test cheating but since the teacher was a favorite of the Principal and Superintendent, instead of the DOE filing 3020-a charges, the teacher merely ended up with a counseling memo.

Apparently the New York Post will be covering the academic fraud issue this week,  I can only laugh that the  newspaper never addressed the issue under Bloomberg or read Susan Edelman's articles most every Sunday.  The funnest quote from today's article is by a DOE spokesman who said the following.

“We treat academic misconduct seriously and take immediate disciplinary action as necessary. We have created an academic integrity task force to enhance training and support to ensure our policies are followed,” said department spokesman Doug Cohen.

The DOE claims that they have zero tolerance for academic misconduct and that is probably true for most teachers but when it comes to administrators and their favorite teachers, the DOE seems to look the other way.  The double standard continues no matter who the Chancellor is. Here are two other examples.  Here and Here.

Academic Fraud Is Pervasive In The NYC Public School System.

One of the challenges the new Chancellor must address and correct is the "academic fraud" issue.  While graduation rates keep going up, the "college and career readiness" rates are abysmally low, with 3 out of every 4 high school graduates are  subject to no credit remedial course work and many employers complain that the high school graduates are found lacking in academic skills to do the job properly.

The academic fraud is due to DOE pressure on schools to raise their graduation rate "by any means possible".  That includes "credit recovery" programs that lack any rigor or even an instructor!, scholarship quotas that require up to 85% of the students in the classroom to pass, and Principal pressure to pass failing students or get a negative evaluation.

In yesterday's New York Post there was an Opinion piece by a retired teacher who worked at John Dewey High School and described how the DOE stubbornly refused to take action against the Principal for her "easy pass" program that skyrocketed the graduation rate but hurt students academically.  You can read it Here.

Academic fraud is pervasive throughout the school system and is a running joke.  Until and unless the new Chancellor addresses the academic fraud issue, all other changes will not alter the educational landscape where students graduate unprepared for the real world.

Bogus High School Graduation Rates Are Nationwide.

 





It's common knowledge that the New York City's high school graduation rates are bogus and few students make it through college or obtain high paying jobs that can support a family.  Unfortunately, the bogus graduation rates are not confined to New York City.  It's a nationwide problem.  Take Washington D.C.  public schools for example.

On Oct. 28, 2015, the D.C. Public Schools district put out a statement lauding itself with this headline: “DC Public Schools Continues Momentum as the Fastest Improving Urban School District in the Country.”  That tale is looking a lot less remarkable in the wake of revelations that educators and administrators, feeling pressure from their bosses to boost graduation rates and student performance, allowed many students who did not have the requisite qualifications to graduate. An example is Ballou High School.

 A city study — undertaken after media reports revealed the situation — found that more than 900 of 2,758 students who graduated from a D.C. public school last year either failed to attend enough classes or improperly took makeup classes. At one campus, Anacostia High in Southeast Washington, nearly 70 percent of the 106 graduates received 2017 diplomas despite violating some aspect of city graduation policy.

This was the result of the education reform movement that pressured school administrators to commit academic fraud to show the "miracle"   Reformers refused to admit, at least publicly, that there are no “miracles” in education. Student success takes hard work by young people and their teachers and parents, and it takes work not just around school policy but also with housing and health and fiscal and transportation policy.

In Washington D.C. like all urban school districts, standardized test scores — which are highly correlated to Zip code and family income — did indeed dramatically rise over the past decade. But officials didn’t like to mention that proficiency rates of D.C. students would still be considered failing in a high-performing district or that a wide achievement gap persists between white students and black and Hispanic students. Some in the District also say that test scores rose because the percentage of white students — who traditionally do better on standardized tests — has grown in District schools in recent years.

In Washington D.C. there was a cheating scandal and academic fraud goes hand in hand with education reforms and while scho0ol districts nationwide report higher graduation rates, the "miracle" is just a mirage as these students drop out in college do to their lack of educational ability.

You can read the Washington Post article Here.

When Statistics Lie.

Mark Twain once said "there are lies, dammed lies, and statistics".  The DOE, principals, and teachers have taken that saying to heart to falsely show student academic progress.  Let's look at how each group uses statistics to show student academic achievement when the truth is otherwise.

Department Of Education::
The DOE is the biggest abuser of false statistics.  For example, the DOE budget increases every year but more and more of the money goes to the Central Bureaucracy and not to the students.  The schools still suffer from the recession era budgets and are underfunded by between 10%to 13% of their fair funding, while the DOE's budget increase every year.  Until recently, they had a motto called "children first...Always" when the truth is the schools are starved for resources and many schools are overcrowded with the largest class sizes in the State.  Moreover, the DOE will falsely claim that all their teachers are certified but far too many are teaching subjects they are not certified to teach.  Finally, they will loudly program they have the highest graduation rate ever but they ignore the fact that only one in five ever complete an associates degree in college and even less for a four year bachelor's degree.

Principals:
Probably the biggest abuser of fake statistics.  They are the reason so many students graduate unprepared for higher education or the adult world.  They run "diploma mills" where many students are pushed out by massive doses of credit recovery courses, pressuring teachers to pass failing students with a 65%, or change grades, despite objections from the teachers. Academic fraud by these principals are ignored by the DOE and most principals realize their are no consequences for their actions.

Teachers:
Teachers in many of these diploma mill schools must meet scholarship goals, passing 80% of their roster and must show that they kept a running log to demonstrate how hey contacted the parent and other steps taken to get the student to pass the class.  This administrative pressure forces the teacher to take the easiest road possible to achieve an effective rating, that is to pass as many st6udents as possible to meet the school's administrative goals.  Furthermore, in many Living Environment classes, teachers can artificially raise their Regents passing rate by barring struggling students from taking the Regents.  The result is that many of the students pass the class but gets no Regents credit.  Finally, in some schools teachers will pass the student if they just show up to class since the teacher must meet the above mentioned scholarship goal.

Can statistics lie?  you better believe they can.

The Disconnect Between Graduation Rates And College Readiness - 2017

We all know that principals can and do manipulate the graduation rate.   Credit recovery, grade changing, administration pressure on teachers, and school scholarship requirements (80% or more passing per class) or a combination of them all.  The result is an artificially bogus graduation rate as far too many schools graduate students unprepared for the real world.  Therefore, to determine if  unscreened Queens high schools are really diploma mills or truly giving their students a real world class education, I have developed the annual metric for the 2016-17 school year that takes the graduation rate and divides it by the "college and career readiness rate"  as defined by New York City  The New York State rates are lower..

High schools that have a ratio below "1.5" are in blue and giving their students a world class education while high schools with ratios greater than "2" are listed in red and yellow and are simply diploma mills. Parents should make sure their academically achieving students should stay away from them.  This year's metric was lowered since the Algebra Regents rubric and cut scores was made easier to achieve higher grades and the English Regents was found also to be easier than previous years.  It appears the "college ready" scores went up by an average of between ten and fifteen points, primarily due to the lower cut scores in Math and an easier test in English.

The list is based on the 2016-17 school year.

School...........................Graduation Rate.....College Ready

Cambria Heights Academy........86%.....................27% 
Academy of Medical Tech..........73%.....................27% 
Fredrick Douglas Academy VI....47%.....................13%
QIRT.........................................81%.....................25%
Rockaway Park.........................72%.....................16%
Humanities and Arts.................68%.....................19%
August Martin...........................63%....................20% 
Rockaway Collegiate.................66%....................23% 
Martin Van Buren......................61%....................31%
 Flushing..................................60%....................22%
Pathways College.......'.............66%....................26%
Hillside Arts & Letters...............84%....................36%
Law Enforcement.....................80%....................20%
Science, Research, and Tech.....71%....................26%
Excelsior Prep..........................71%....................25% 
 George Washington Carver......78%...................35%
 John Adams............................71%...................32%
Newtown.................................71%....................36%
Queens Prep...........................70%....................36%
Channel View..........................93%....................55% 
Grover Cleveland.....................63%....................32% 
 Richmond Hill..........................69%...................38%
Long Island City.......................66% ..................37%
John Bowne............................77%....................40%
Applied Communications.........82%....................42%
Robert  H. Goddard..................93%....................56%
Hillcrest..................................73%....................38%
Queens HS of Teaching............91%....................51%
Writers Academy.....................90%....................51%
Information & Technology.......84%....................46%
Community Leadership............91%....................47%
Queens Collegiate...................80%....................51%
Robert F. Kennedy...................81%....................47% 
Arts And Business...................90%....................59% 
William Cullen Bryant..............72%....................49%
 Queens Vocational..................84%....................54%
 TV & Media.............................98%....................63%
Metropolitan HS......................86%....................68% 
Middle College HS...................73%.....................56%
World Journalism....................97%....................61%
Robert Wagner........................93%....................66%
Civic Leadership......................96%...................66% 
Maspeth HS............................98%....................63%
Forest Hills.............................88%...................71%
Bayside..................................97%...................78%
East-West...............................93%...................72%
Cardozo..................................91%...................72%
Thomas Edison........................89%...................70%
Francis Lewis..........................89%...................78%
Finance & Enterprise...............97%...................84% 


 The citywide "college ready" average is 46%.

Obviously, the lowest rated schools are "diploma mills" and for the most part, are located in Southeast Queens or are "Renewal schools".  By contrast the best schools are located in two areas  Northeast Queens and the Long Island City/Astoria area.  The Bloomberg small schools in the Far Rockaway and Beach Channel campuses inhabit most of the top positions with the worst matrices on the list, while the worst school metric is by Rockaway Park Environmental Sustainability with a metric of 4.5.. By contrast, the best two schools remain Finance and Enterprise and Francis Lewis, when it comes to the metric.

The takeaway is that all the high schools in the Far Rockaway, Beach Channel, and Campus Magnet campuses are academic failures and the Springfield Gardens campus is not far behind.  Moreover, the Jamaica Educational Complex is showing gradual deterioration with one school already failing and the one of the other two unscreened schools showing a significant drop.

While my metric is not perfect it serves as a useful guide for parents who want the right Queens high schools for their academically proficient student. You can see the metrics for the last two years Here and Here.

A Tale Of Two Schools And Their Cellphone Use.

When Mayor Bill de Blasio consolidated his control of the New York City Public Schools he eliminated the cellphone ban and gave principals the option to impose their own rules of cellphone use.  The result was that some students obeyed the rules and others did not.  This post is a tale of two schools.  School A is a high achieving specialized school while school 2 is a high poverty low achieving school.  How has the cellphone policy worked at both schools?

First, the reason Bill de Blasio lifted the cellphone ban was that his son, who went to Brooklyn Tech convinced him that students only would use their phones when absolutely necessary. Of course we teachers know the truth, that cellphones are a distraction and harms academic achievement.  Most Principals tried to set up reasonable cellphone use, limiting them to school cafeterias.   However, this policy quickly changed to prohibiting cellphone use in classrooms and relied on the teachers to enforce the rules as the administration failed or refused to do their job when it came to cellphones.  The result is that in most high schools cellphone usage is a failure, be it in the hallways or the classrooms.

In school A, a specialized high school, students follow the cellphone rules and only use them in the school cafeteria, seldom does one see a student walking in the hallways with a cellphone and rarely does a teacher need to tell students to put their cellphones away in class. Obviously, these high achieving students care about their grades and realize that using a cellphone in class could result in reduced grades and lower academic achievement.

By contrast, school  B, the high poverty and low achieving student body, Renewal Schools are one example, have their cellphones out almost all the time.  Be it in the classroom or the hallways.  Any rules the administration imposed on student cellphone use are ignored once the school let''s the student with the cellphone into the building, and students realize that their is little or no consequences to violating the cellphone rules.  Moreover, with far too many administrations relying on teachers to enforce the rule, the teacher must spend countless minutes of instructional time disciplining students for using their cellphone.  Eventually, the teacher tire of this battle and simply goes on with the lesson while the students continue to look at at their cellphone and are distracted by what they see.  The result is the student fails to take proper notes and learn the subject/

The bottom line the New York City Public Schools should reimpose the banning of cellphones in the schools.  Read my previous posts Here,  Here and Here.

Don't Hold Your Breath In Expecting SCI To Investigate Administrative Academic Fraud.

Most knowledgeable educators know that the investigative units of SCI, OSI, and OEO are not fair and impartial.  If a teacher is charged with a potentially serious accusation you can bet the three investigative agencies will pull out all the stops to substantiate the accusation and recommend the terminat6ion of the teacher.  By contrast, accusations against administrators are usually buried and no action is usually the result. Now the New York Post published some actual numbers dealing with academic fraud against school administrators and shows how little the investigative agencies care to file charges.

According to the New York Post, SCI received 704 cases since August 2015 of grade tapering or fixing,  trey investigated only 22 of the cases or 3% of all accusations, and substantiated only 3 cases or 0.04% of the total accusations.  Unbelievable, but true!  It seems that SCI does not take academic fraud seriously and maybe that's why principals are willing to commit academic fraud, knowing full well that the DOE and the investigative agencies will not investigate it and will look the other way/ A prime example is Principal Howard Kwait of John Bowne High School who has been accused multiple times of grade fixing and is still in charge.  Read the ICEUFT blog on the latest.

How many principals have actually lost their position when caught committing academic fraud?  A handful at most.  Yet, if you look at my list of bad principals and my academic fraud articles you will find numerous examples of principals acting badly and have been accused of grade fixing or tapering yet they are still in charge of their schools.  Here is the most recent case.Yet if teachers are accused, they are removed from the classroom and are assumed guilty of the accusation, even before its investigated.

If you have any question about the fairness of the investigative units that work with or are part of the DOE please read my articles on corrupt investigations.

Academic Fraud Cointinues As The Common Core Algebra I Regents Cut Scores Are Reduced Again.

New York State Education Department, instead of making the Regents exam a test that measures a student's academic proficiency,  has made the gateway Math test easier to pass by artificially lowering the "cut scores" for the second year in a row.   According to the New York Post article the 2017 Algebra I Regents cut scores were lowered to 27 correct answers out of 86 questions or only 31.4% to receive a passing grade of 65%.  Last year the cut scores were 30 out of 86 or 34.9%.  Compare that to the first year of the Algebra 1 Common Core Regents exam when the cut scores were set at 31 correct answers out of 86, or 36.1%  to achieve a passing grade of 85%.  See one Math teacher's comparison Here.

Last year the lower cut scores resulted in a 10% increase in the New York City passing rate and its expected that an even larger percentage increase is expected this year since the 2017 cut scores are significantly lower.  The New York State Regents used to be the "gold standard" of student proficiency in a subject.  However, the political influences that affect the State Education Department has interfered with the educational process and is seen in the changing cut scores to achieve a certain passing percentage of the Regents exam.

If there is a silver lining for the lower cut scores, it's that Math teachers who have their student growth measures affected by the Math Regents exam will get a higher growth score factor since more of their and the school's students will have received a passing grade.

While I understand that the gateway Regents exams of Algebra 1, Living Environment, and Global were dumbed down to get more students to pass.  The continued lowering of the cut scores to meet an academic goal is simply political and is academic fraud as the State practices perception over reality when it comes to real academic progress.

DOE Wastes Money On Questionable Mandates And Ignores Student's Educational Needs.

Its no secret that the DOE puts pressure on school administrators to meet questionable metrics rather than have students meet real and relevant academic goals that best represent actual academic achievement.  The DOE's pursuit of the "holy grail" of meeting the questionable metrics has resulted in administrators committing academic fraud, be it "credit recovery", grade changing, or pressure on teachers to pass failing students. Presently, the average school  is funded at between 89% to 92% of their fair funding and as the DOE's budget increases year after year and the City has a 6 billion dollar budget surplus, schools are still underfunded as if the recession still exists. To appease their DOE overloads, school administrators resort to sacrificing real student learning to meet the questionable goals that the DOE demands.

For example, the DOE places great emphasis in the graduation rate of a school.  To the DOE it doesn't matter what tricks are played to achieve that goal, as long as they meet it.  Sure enough, every year the school graduation rate inches up and the Mayor and Chancellor proclaim that the schools are improving.  However, the real educational metric is the "college and career readiness" metric has shown little improvement and every two out of three New York City graduates are not ready for the adult world.

Another example of the warped DOE priorities is how they give schools credit for enrolling students in Advanced Placement courses.  To the DOE it matters little if the students eventually fail the test and get no college credit for the course.  The more students taking the Advanced Placement courses the higher the DOE grades the school.  Passing or failing is irreverent.  The result is that school administrators stuff 34 students, many of them not capable or uninterested in being in the Advanced Placement courses just to get a higher school score from the DOE.

In Science, the DOE gives a higher grade to schools who emphasis the harder Sciences of Chemistry and Physics.  Then again, the DOE cares little if the students actually pass or take the Regents for these two Sciences.  Just taking the course gives the school a higher grade by the DOE.   Therefore, quite a few schools force struggling students to take the harder Science courses, knowing full well, that these students will probably fail and certainly not pass the Regents.  While Earth Science and its Regents is the perfect Science course for students who struggle, schools rather get a higher grade from the DOE than do what's right for these students.  Bayside high school is a prime example of this flawed thinking.

In Math, far too many struggling Math students are forced to take Algebra II (Trigonometry) because the DOE gives the school a higher grade.  Here again, it matters little if the students pass or fail the Regents.  Just taking the course gives the school the higher grade from the DOE.

The bottom line as schools suffer from tight, recession like budgets and school administrators try to meet the questionable metrics imposed on them by the DOE, real student academic achievement is sacrificed but then its children last...Always at the DOE.

The DOE's Scholarship Scam

I have written about the massive academic fraud that many schools practice to artificially raise the graduation rate, especially the diploma mill high schools, that push out otherwise, failing students, unprepared into the adult world of high education or business.  I wrote about the "credit recovery" courses that are simply a packet or an online course that allows students to take the test as many time as necessary until they pass.  I also wrote about how some high schools gave double credits for the same course like what happened in Flushing High School or how about the infamous William Cullen Bryant High School?  However, the worst abuses, practiced by most every high school in the City is called "scholarship".

What is scholarship you ask?  Scholarship is when the Assistant Principal or Principal calls the teacher in for a meeting and goes over the teacher's grading book and ask why student A, B, C, and D are failing?  In the school I was in last year, the Assistant Principal had teachers follow the procedures listed below:

• How many times did you call the parent, is it documented?
• Do you keep an online grading book so parents are kept up to date?
• What supports did you provide the student with?
• What do you do when a student is absent?
• Do you supply make-up work or extra credit?

Simply stated scholarship is how many students did you fail this semester and what are you, as the teacher. are doing about it?  In today's New York Post we have yet another Principal who was accused of pressuring teachers to change failing grades by the scholarship scam.

Many high schools require a 80% passing percentage,including no-shows, and if the teacher is untenured, anything less will probably result in their discontinuance.  For tenured teachers, especially veteran teachers who are targeted due to salary and seniority, look for the administration to give the teacher either a "developing" or "ineffective" rating.  The result is that teachers will pass the failing student rather than put their job in danger.  To the school administration good scholarship percentage is more important than actual student learning and teachers know this. In fact, students are not held accountable for their academic achievement only the teachers.

Is scholarship academic fraud?  Well if you are passing students simply to please the school administration, knowing full well that these students will fail at the next level then yes, its academic fraud.

School Discipline Issues Rise As Suspensions Fall.

Since Bill de Blasio became Mayor of New York City in 2014. one of his priorities was to reduce the student suspension rate.  He and the Chancellor, Carmen Farina, implemented new student discipline policies that required that principals get DOE Central approval before suspending students.  Another layer of bureaucratic bloat, just what an already bloated organization needs.  As spring break ends, the de Blasio/Farina administration will be further weakling the student discipline code as student insubordination  and elementary school suspensions will virtually be eliminated.

A study done by Chalkbeat found that 22% of all Principal recommended suspensions were rejected by DOE Central under the new student discipline policy last year.  The numbers are probably higher since many principals who may have wanted to suspend students for repeated insubordination and school disruptions didn't bother to fill out the paperwork, knowing that DOE Central would not agree to the suspension.  Instead, many of these students were sent right back to the classroom to interfere with instruction

The Bill de Blasio administration's lax student discipline policy that has reduced  suspensions by 36%  has also seen a corresponding rise in student misbehavior.  The alternatives to suspension has been restorative justice, warning cards, and mediation.  Few teachers have been trained in alternative techniques, since it costs time and money for the training.  The result is that many schools suffer from chaos as misbehaving students are pushed back into the classroom to distract, disrupt, and destroy instruction.

Add the ever weakening student discipline policy with the ill-advised cellphone policy especially in high poverty urban schools,and is it any wonder that schools must resort to academic fraud to jack up their graduation rate while pushing out academically unprepared students into high education or the job market?

I'm glad I am near the end of my career and feel really sorry for the "newbies" entering the system as they will be blamed for the student's lack of academic achievement when its our progressive Mayor and his disappointing Chancellor that is the real blame  for the school's failure to provide a real educational experience.