Cheating test scores to receive big bonuses in a school system? I hope they throw the book at these scumbags. The ones who get screwed in the end are the kids.

Indicted educators surrender in Atlanta school testing scandal

A parade of Atlanta educators trooped to the county jail beginning in the early hours of Tuesday morning and surrendered to officials on criminal charges stemming what is believed to be the biggest testing scandal in American education.

By early morning, at least four of the 35 teachers, principals and school officials had turned themselves in and were expected to post bonds ranging from hundreds of thousands of dollars to more than $1 million. All were named in a 65-count indictment released last week by Fulton County Dist. Atty. Paul L. Howard Jr.

“The four principal crimes that are charged in the indictment are the statements and writings, false swearings, theft by taking, and influencing witnesses,” he told reporters. The maximum penalty, if convicted, could be as high as 20 years in prison for most defendants.

Still to be heard from is Beverly Hall, Atlanta’s retired school superintendent. On her watch the hard-pressed school district earned a national reputation for improving test scores. She was also given performance bonuses totaling more than $500,000 for her efforts.

Investigators allege she pressured teachers and principals to cheat, and punished those who refused to bend the rules. A grand jury recommended her bail be set at $7.5 million. She faces up to 45 years in prison.

Hall has denied all of the charges

The Atlanta scandal is considered the largest to hit a school district in recent years. About 200 educators have admitted to a variety of improprieties, including tampering with students’ standardized tests, erasing wrong answers and correcting them by inserting the correct ones. The goal was to increase test scores and it apparently worked: At one middle school, 86% of eighth-graders scored proficient in math, compared to 24% a year earlier.

The bonds are set pretty high.

$2 million — Principals
Armstead Salters, Gideons Elementary School
Christopher Waller, Parks Middle School
Willie Davenport, D.H. Stanton Elementary School
Clariettta Davis, Venetian Elementary School
Dana Evans, Dobbs Elementary School
Lucious Brown, Kennedy Middle School

$1 million – Testing coordinators
Theresia Copeland, Benteen Elementary School
Lera Middlebrooks, Dunbar Elementary School
Donald Bullock, Usher-Collier Heights Elementary School
Francis Mack, D.H. Stanton Elementary School
Sandra Ward, Parks Middle School
Sheridan Rogers, Gideons Elementary School

$1 million — Assistant principal
Tabeeka Jordan, Deerwood Academy
Gregory Reid, Parks Middle School

$500,000 – Teachers
Angela Williamson, Dobbs Elementary School
Derrick Broadwater, Dobbs Elementary School

$400,000 – Teachers
Wendy Ahmed, Humphries Elementary School
Starlette Mitchell, Parks Middle School
Ingrid Abella-Sly, Humphries Elementary School
Sheila Evans, Benteen Elementary School
Shayla Smith, Dobbs Elementary School

$300,000 – Teachers
Dessa Curb, Dobbs Elementary School
Gloria Ivey, Dunbar Elementary School
Lisa Terry, Dunbar Elementary School
Diane Buckner-Webb, Dunbar Elementary School
Pamela Cleveland, Dunbar Elementary School

$200,000 — School improvement specialist
Tameka Goodson, Kennedy Middle School

$200,000 — Teachers
Kimberly Oden, Parks Middle School
Shani Robinson, Dunbar Elementary School

$200,000 — Secretary
Carol Dennis, Kennedy Middle School