Jury selection in the trial of 12 former Atlanta educators accused of participating in a test-cheating scheme starts Monday, but scores of others have already been sanctioned outside the courtroom for violating ethics rules.
A third of the 185 teachers, administrators and other Atlanta Public Schools employees implicated in a 2011 test-cheating investigation have been sanctioned by the state commission that polices teacher ethics, according to records obtained by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Two others have died and 33 have been cleared.
That leaves 89 cases pending. In most of them, the Georgia Professional Standards Commission, which oversees educator licensing, voted for sanctions but the educators appealed and are awaiting hearings.
Nine educators either under investigation or with cases under appeal are currently employed by APS, according to the district, including three teachers. The district reinstated them after internal investigations or personnel hearings. A tenth was employed at an Atlanta charter school last year, according to commission records, but the school could not be reached to confirm whether that person was still employed.
In response to questions about the decision to employ those nine educators, the district issued a statement that said it would take “appropriate action” if the commission “takes action against an employee, such as a suspension or decertification.”
The initial state investigation swept up some educators who had not committed crimes or violated teacher ethics rules, said Michael Kramer, a lawyer who represented educators implicated in the 2011 investigation, which was commissioned by the governor's office. He expects many of the educators with pending cases to get no, or significantly reduced, sanctions.
“It’s like a big fishing net,” he said of the 2011 investigation. “You’re going to catch a lot of innocent people you didn’t intend to.”
The accused faced three possible punishments, each with its own process of hearings and appeals: firing; teaching certificate loss, suspension or lesser license sanction; and criminal conviction.
Lawyer Quinton Washington represented two teachers the state commission cleared and APS ultimately reinstated. Even though his clients are back in the classroom, the accusations took their toll, he said.
“Their concern was that this would follow them for the rest of their teaching careers,” he said. Even today, “If you Google their names, you will see they were accused of cheating in more instances than you will see they were exonerated of cheating.”
Of the 61 sanctioned so far, four lost their licenses and 30 had their licenses suspended for two years, said Paul Shaw, director of the commission’s ethics division. Three received reprimands and the rest suspensions of a year or less.
Shaw said cheating harmed students who didn’t learn material and were moved along in the educational process anyway. Educators who lost the right to teach deserved their sanctions “because of the effect it’s had on kids, basically for their lifetimes,” he said. “It certainly put a black eye on the state of Georgia and it certainly is very serious when you start tampering with test scores.”
Educators named in the state investigation were accused of a variety of improprieties, including tipping off students to correct answers on high-stakes state tests or even changing the answers themselves, using erasers. Unlike the dozen educators facing trial Monday, most were not indicted. The criminal charges include racketeering and false statements.
Three of the defendants have already been sanctioned by the state commission. Their two-year suspensions will be over by fall 2015, Shaw said.
That means they’ll be eligible to return to the classroom, assuming they are not behind bars.
About the Author
