Weslaco superintendent denies TAKS cheating

WESLACO - Two complaints filed last month with the Texas Education Agency allege Weslaco school district personnel violated testing procedures to try to boost state test scores.

The complaints - both sent to the TEA anonymously - focus on Memorial Elementary and Raul Gonzalez Elementary.

One complaint says Memorial teachers falsely coded some poor-performing students' Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills tests so they would not be included in the statewide testing data.

The complaint goes on to allege students knew the test's essay prompts - the topics on which they were to write - before the students were tested.

Another complaint accuses teachers at Raul Gonzalez Elementary of sharing answers with students during this year's tests. It also says students were allowed to retake tests after turning them in.

TEA spokeswoman Suzanne Marchman said the agency is not investigating either school, since TEA typically does not investigate anonymous complaints.

Superintendent Richard Rivera said TEA informed him of the allegations at Memorial but that the district found no wrongdoing when it investigated the charges there.

Memorial Principal Ana Oliveira said she and her staff strictly follow testing protocols. She vehemently denied there had been any irregularities at the school and said her teachers would not jeopardize their careers by cheating on tests.

Oliveira, who also is the district's assistant superintendent of curriculum and instruction, further asserted the allegations were unfair to students, parents and teachers who worked to get high test scores.

Memorial students' test scores are among the highest of the district's elementary schools. Gonzalez scores, in contrast, are among the lowest.

Gonzalez Principal Yolanda Cuellar deferred comment to Rivera, who said he was unaware of the allegations at the school and has not heard from TEA regarding the complaint there.

TEA's response to the Gonzalez complaint notes the school was investigated in 2006 for alleged TAKS irregularities. That investigation was initiated after a study revealed unusual patterns in the test data; however, no findings of intentional wrongdoing were found. The state agency did not address this year's allegations of testing irregularities.

The agency declined to release the complaints immediately after it received them, but it later provided copies in response to an open records request. TEA did not provide audit working papers related to investigations of testing irregularities.

One of the anonymous complaints alleges teachers at Memorial are allowed to code students as "other" on test day if the school suspects the student will not perform well on the test. The complaint states that those children are then sent home on false pretexts such as feeling ill.

A school can code a student as "other" for reasons such as illness, disruptive behavior and suspicion of cheating. A student's score is not counted if it receives the "other" code.