Dubious Distinction Award Goes to City of Richmond Public Schools!

The City of Richmond Public Schools system is now Number # 1 for percentage of VGLA assessments per ADM!  Buchanan County, which led the list last year, is at 3.6%, just above the state average, this year. What happened, of course, is that they got caught cheating.

Unfortunately, the Buchanan Superintendent who admitted he had "encouraged the use of VGLA as a mechanism to assist schools in obtaining accreditation and in meeting AYP targets" still has his picture on the Buchanan County Schools Web page and, presumably, still has his job. But then, you already knew how feckless and pusillanimous VDOE is.

These data also let us measure the effect of the Buchanan (and, probably, Richmond next year) cheating: In English, the Buchanan score dropped four points from 2009 to 2010. The math score dropped six points. Indeed, if the the VGLA cheating had continued, we could expect the scores to have continued to rise, so the effect of the reduced VGLA participation probably is larger than the 4 and 6 points from that crude calculation.  ~ Hat-tip to John Butcher for the graph and the analysis above.