In Bronx, a Possible Case of High
School Cheating, but Not by Students
By MICHAEL WINERIP
February 8, 2006
The New York Times
FOR 34 years, Morris Schulgasser was a high school English
teacher and administrator. He has a doctorate from Columbia, was head
of the English department at John F. Kennedy High in the Bronx for
seven years, and in 2002 was named a Bronx high school supervisor of
the year.
As Kennedy's assistant principal for English, Mr. Schulgasser oversaw
the grading of more than a dozen administrations of the state English
Regents test that New York students must pass to graduate. In that
time, there were no significant complaints or problems.
The state's Education Department routinely reviews Regents grading at
New York high schools and, twice in recent years under Mr. Schulgasser,
the state audited Kennedy's English department and gave a good review.
After the English Regents test in January 2005, Mr. Schulgasser and his
30 English teachers spent several days correcting about 500 exams,
following the same procedures they had always used, Mr. Schulgasser
said, as did eight veteran English teachers interviewed by this
reporter. By early February 2005, Regents scores were posted. Failing
Kennedy students were assigned to English classes and to tutors to
prepare them for the next Regents exam in June.
On Feb. 18, Mr. Schulgasser, 64, retired.
Then, in mid-May, teachers felt the aftershock. With Mr. Schulgasser
gone, at least 16 students who took the January exam had their English
Regents grades changed from failing to passing by the new assistant
principal, with the principal's approval. The teachers said they did
not learn of the changed scores from the administration; they learned
from the students, who said that their grades had suddenly been
switched to passing months after taking the test, and that now they
would not have to retake the Regents exam.
Several veteran English teachers interviewed, including Eileen
Sokoloff, (26 years), Dianne Stillman (10 years), Sheryl Mitzner (32
years), Marlene Kawalick (32 years) and Basil Apostle (13 years), said
the changes were unethical and made to inflate the Regents scores, and,
therefore, the graduation rate, at Kennedy, a school that has been
perilously close to landing on New York State's failing schools list.
"The administration never meant for us to discover this," Ms. Sokoloff
said. "They never told teachers."
Last May, articles in The New York Times and Newsday described the
changing of Regents scores, and the city's Education Department began
an inquiry.
David Cantor, a city Education Department spokesman, said there had
been two investigations at Kennedy by the chancellor's office of
special investigations. The first, into whether the Regents grades had
been improperly raised, was "fairly narrow," he said; no report was
written; and the conclusion was that the complaint was
"unsubstantiated." He said that the inquiry had looked only into
whether the principal, Anthony Rotunno, had the right to change the
Regents grades and found that he did.
Mr. Cantor said it did not look into whether the changes were
appropriate or whether scores had been improperly inflated to improve
the school's academic ratings. That is part of a second investigation,
Mr. Cantor said, which will center on whether the Kennedy school
administration improperly changed transcripts to improve the graduation
rate. He said he could not comment on that inquiry because it was
continuing.
The Regents scores were raised to passing at the behest of the new
assistant principal for English, Rhokeisha Ford, 31, who arrived at the
school in February. Until then, Ms. Ford had never corrected an English
Regents test, and had never taught high school English. At the time,
she was not certified to teach English.
She began her career as a substitute teacher in 1999 at Middle School
391 in the Bronx, and in 2001 became full time with certification in
special education. She then taught special ed at Middle School 391
until 2004; held a manager's job in Region 1 for a few months; and,
four years after becoming a full-time special ed teacher, came to
Kennedy as assistant principal for English.
She was assisted in the Regents scoring changes by the assistant
principal for administration, Rashid Davis, who is certified in
English. The principal said Ms. Ford and Mr. Davis, along with a third
assistant principal, Terry Ballard, were acting with his support.
Copies of 16 sets of student transcripts that had been changed between
mid-March and mid-April 2005 were given to this reporter by a teacher
at the school who asked not to be identified for fear of retribution.
The transcripts have the students' names blacked out, but otherwise are
extremely detailed.
In many cases, the new raised English score is the highest or
near-highest Regents grade the student ever received. For example, one
girl's transcript shows an English Regent grade of 60 in mid-March; by
mid-April, it had been lifted to 71. Her other Regents exam scores
include 38 in global history; 39 in United States History; and 58 in
Earth Science.
Ms. Sokoloff, who served as No. 2 in the English department under both
assistant principals, said that when she questioned the changes, Mr.
Davis showed her the school's performance statistics and talked about
how much they would be improved by raising the scores. "I asked if they
looked at any papers with grades of 70 to see if they were graded
inaccurately," Ms. Sokoloff recalled. "Rashid said, 'Of course we
weren't going to lower any grades.' "
Mr. Rotunno confirmed in an interview that after the review, 16 Regents
exam scores were raised to passing marks and none were lowered. He said
Ms. Ford had initiated the review after routine complaints from
parents, the type made every year. He said Ms. Ford had looked at some
tests and decided the grading had not followed the state scoring
standards known as the rubric.
Asked whether the scores were raised to improve graduation rates, Mr.
Rotunno said, "Absolutely not."
Mr. Rotunno said that he told his assistant principals in April to
include teachers in the process to regrade the Regents, but that the
teachers refused.
Ms. Sokoloff, who retired at the end of last school year, said: "That's
absolutely false. When we found out about the changed grades in May we
were shocked. We knew nothing."
The teachers said they were upset because Mr. Schulgasser had worked so
hard to build a fair Regents scoring process.
They explained that under his process, they started by spending several
hours discussing the state's grading rubric, matching sample essays
that ranged from a low score of 1 to a high of 6, until every teacher
understood the quality of writing that each score represented.
Two teachers scored each essay, and when there was a disagreement, a
third scorer was used. This meant that the four essays on each
student's exam were read by at least eight teachers and sometimes more.
AS a final step, when the multiple choice and essay scores were
tabulated, any test that just missed passing was reread by four veteran
teachers, known as the "salvage committee," as required by the state.
They spent hours reviewing all exams with scores from 60 to 64 to see
if they could legitimately add a few extra points, Mr. Schulgasser said.
"The bias in the salvage committee was to raise scores," he said.
Indeed, during the state audits in past years, the only criticism was
that a few essays were marked too easy. Never was the Kennedy English
department criticized by the state for scoring students too hard or
failing too many students.
At an Oct. 13, 2004, meeting with guidance counselors who were
concerned that grading standards at Kennedy were being lowered, Mr.
Davis, the assistant principal for administration, talked about the
need to keep Kennedy off the state's failing school list, known as the
"SURR" list.
"The reality is that Kennedy High school is a 'School in Need of
Improvement,' " he said, according to minutes of the meeting that were
recorded by the principal's secretary, Linda Faughnan. "This is our
third year with this designation. If J.F.K. does not improve, among
other things, the graduation rate and the passing Regents rate, Kennedy
will become a SURR school. The state takes over a SURR school."
Through Mr. Cantor, the city spokesman, Mr. Davis and Ms. Ford declined
to be interviewed.
Jonathan Burman, a State Education Department spokesman, said the state
relied on local districts to investigate accusations of cheating, and
depending on the results of the local inquiry, may then conduct its own
investigation.
Teachers question whether the city will aggressively investigate
itself, and there are some disturbing signs. So far, only one person
has been punished, Maria Colon, Kennedy's union representative, who was
the first to speak out publicly about the changed scores. She was
removed from Kennedy and assigned to a holding room pending a hearing
on her case. Her crime? She allegedly used a school fax to send a
Newsday reporter documents revealing the scoring changes.
Also discouraging is the fact that no city investigator has interviewed
Mr. Schulgasser, the longtime department head. When I asked Mr. Cantor,
the city spokesman, why, he agreed that investigators should have and
said they would now.
Mr. Schulgasser said there was an easy way to resolve the
investigation. He suggested that an independent panel of veteran
English teachers be formed to reread and regrade all the Regents exams
that had scores raised by Ms. Ford and Mr. Davis.
"It's simple," he said, "if the city and state really care about
getting at the truth."