How Nashville and Houston responded to AJC investigation of test data

All of the public school systems profiled in the AJC series on testing knew that they were being profiled for this series.  From the AJC story on how the articles were researched:

"Our analysis identified districts nationwide with clusters of suspicious score changes. So our team visited schools and parents in a half-dozen urban districts on that list, while we presented our findings by phone and email to officials in problematic districts for response."

Houston ISD issued this statement before the AJC article on their school system was even published.


Nashville Metro Schools also issued a statement minutes before the AJC article on their school system was published.


On Saturday, April 28th at 12 PM the AJC article on MCPS was online. 


MCPS, however, waited until April 30th to release this statement.

Crash Testing the MCPS Hype

Joseph Hawkins

Senior Study Director, Westat. Former evaluation specialist, MCPS.

At this Montgomery County Public Schools website, MCPS proudly points out that it is the home of 34 National Blue Ribbon Schools.
Blue Ribbon Schools are awarded by the U.S. Department of Education—the feds. The award is a prestigious award denoting high quality schools. Back in the day, I did Blue Ribbon school site visits for the feds, and so, I believe winning denotes that something special is truly present. Click here to read more about the award.
I think it is fair to say that MCPS likes the Blue Ribbon program. And because we have so many winning schools, it is probably also fair to say that MCPS believes that the feds know quality schools when they see them.
So, many of us MCPS-watchers are somewhat surprised when MCPS rejects the suggestion that Jerry Weast-era programs be submitted to the U.S. Department of Education’s What Works Clearinghouse (WWC) for review. In fact, when making this suggestion, some of us have been told by MCPS officials that the feds don’t have a clue about how to conduct research. Really!...

Patch article continues here.