ATLANTA (CBS ATLANTA) -
State education officials released the results of the 2012 Criterion-Referenced Competency Test Thursday.
Results show more students are exceeding the standards than last year, said state officials.
Results showed a one-year improvement in the percentage of students meeting and exceeding on 20 of the 30 content-area tests.
"The best news in the 2012 CRCT report is that more of our students are exceeding the standards," said State School Superintendent Dr. John Barge. "Teachers are doing a great job teaching the more rigorous Georgia Performance Standards and they are to be applauded for raising expectations for all students."
The results, however, don't carry with them the weight they carried in years past. CRCT results are being de-emphasized as Georgia backs away from federal No Child Left Behind measures and begins to adopt a new accountability system.
"What we're
saying with our new accountability system is that testing is not the only thing
that we do to prepare students for the next level," said Barge.
Since 2000, the No Child Left Behind mandate meant that schools that had low scores on the CRCT could be closed or taken over by the state. Teachers whose students performed poorly on the standardized test found their jobs in jeopardy.
Some educators said the pressure to perform well on the CRCT led teachers to cheat. An analysis of the 2009 CRCTs, along with a state investigation, showed that dozens of teachers in Dougherty County and Atlanta Public Schools changed students' answers on the test.
Since then, the state put monitors in each schools when students were testing.
"I'm very
confident that we have corrected a lot. Can I say without a doubt that there is
not one teacher out there, that maybe wasn't the most honest? I can't say that,
but for the most part we have corrected most of the egregious errors with the
cheating scandal," Barge said.
Earlier this year, Georgia was successful in its application to opt out of the federal No Child Left Behind accountability system. State education officials agreed to implement a new accountability system of their own design, which relies less on the CRCT and more on areas such as graduation rates, Advanced Placement test scores and reading levels.
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