Massive screw-up on New York City tests 

By George N. Schmidt

A January 18, 2006, article in The New York Post reminded anyone paying attention once again that the companies that produce high-stakes tests make more mistakes than the average classroom teacher, but never have to say “We’re sorry” because the tests themselves are considered sacrosanct.

“Stressed-out seventh-graders taking a standardized exam to determine whether they’ll be promoted got an unusual English lesson yesterday,” the Post reported. “A means F, B means G, C means H, and D means J. The lecture was repeated by teachers for about 72,000 pencil-gnawing city students who sat for the state English Language Arts test — and were given answer sheets rife with errors.”

The problem? For five of the exam’s 26 multiple-choice questions with answer options of A, B, C and D, the bubble sheet for answers offered students choices of F, G, H and J.

“The mistake was magnified by the fact that the test for the first time is being used by the city to determine whether a student should be elevated to the eighth grade,” the Post reported.

Students across the state took the test, but the answer sheet blunder was confined to New York City. The city, like other school regions, devised its own answer sheet and got approval to use it from the state. State and city education officials said testing coordinators in the city caught the error about a half hour before the 50-minute test was to begin at 9:15 a.m. In most cases, they said, teachers were told of the error in advance of the exam.

“Randi Weingarten, president of the United Federation of Teachers, said the error wouldn’t be so significant if the exam wasn’t so important, and called on the city to end high-stakes testing,” the Post reported. Every state and city that has closely examined high-stakes tests has found major problems, but the tests remain sacred and, in most cases, secret from the public.