Memo: Students who skipped test were intentionally excluded

NORFOLK

The principal of Dreamkeepers Academy, a lauded alternative elementary school, has been cited by the school division as intentionally excluding students from taking mandatory standardized tests used to earn accreditation.

Doreatha White has fired back, saying the division has misrepresented and misquoted her.

The flap focuses on an in-house report by Norfolk school officials that said the principal calculated she could skip testing some students and still meet a federal testing benchmark.

White told division investigators that "she reviewed her numbers before testing and determined that she could not test some students and still make the AYP participation benchmark of 95 percent," the memo states.

Adequate Yearly Progress, enacted by federal law, measures student performance and requires every school to test at least 95 percent of its students. Performance is assessed through the state Standards of Learning tests.

However, schools are not allowed to exclude students from testing, even if the required minimum of 95 percent of the student body participates.

"If 100 percent of the students are there on testing day, they have to be tested," said Julie Grimes, a state education spokeswoman.

The Virginian-Pilot reported Feb. 10 that 16 Dreamkeepers students weren't tested on some SOL exams in June and that test answer forms for them weren't filed as required by the state. The division belatedly submitted the forms.

A former Dreamkeepers teacher told The Pilot that the school intentionally cheated by not testing low-achieving students on the mandatory exams and shunting them to another room. Keeping low-scoring students from testing could raise a school's test pass rate, which is vital for accreditation.

Superintendent Stephen Jones and administrators told The Pilot earlier this month that the Dreamkeepers testing problems were a simple error, and Jones scoffed at questions about the missing tests.

But the division's own investigation concluded that local and state testing procedures were violated at Dreamkeepers, according to a division memo dated Aug. 31. The Pilot obtained a copy of that memo this week from the state Education Department through the Freedom of Information Act.

Jones said that because it was a personnel matter, he could not comment on whether White faced disciplinary action. However, he stated Tuesday that White was "mistaken" in excluding students, "and she and her staff have been corrected on that point."

White was out of her office Tuesday and could not be reached for comment. However, she vigorously defended herself in a letter dated Monday, saying the division's findings were wrong. The letter was sent to the division's testing office.

White said she never told division investigators she had calculated how many students could be kept from testing. "Let the record reflect that I did not at the time, nor have I ever, made such a statement," she said.

White denied that she excluded pupils from being tested and asked that the division's investigative report be corrected.

Norfolk reported the missing test forms to the state in June, but it withheld its investigation memo from the state Education Department until the state asked on Feb. 11 for information on Dreamkeepers.

Department spokesman Charles Pyle said the memo's contents should have been provided to the state within 30 days after the division first reported the missing answer sheets.

"At some point between June and August of last year, Norfolk public schools determined that the situation at Dreamkeepers Academy went well beyond an error in the collection of answer documents, and when that was established it should have been reported to the department," he said.

Instead, Norfolk sent its Dreamkeepers memo to the state on Feb. 14 after the department asked for documents on irregularities at the school.

Responding to a Pilot query, Jones said Tuesday in a written statement that the division was not obliged to send the memo to the state, because the document was for internal use on a personnel matter.

Norfolk School Board Chairman Stephen Tonelson said he did not get a copy of the memo until Monday night. He said he expects the board to discuss Dreamkeepers in a closed meeting next month.

Asked if the division checked whether Dreamkeepers had committed similar violations in previous years, Jones said only that procedures for principals would be tightened for this year.

"One of the gaps we have learned about as a product of last year's testing is that principals need to keep accurate records of student attendance during the testing window," Jones said.

Students who miss tests need to have an opportunity to make up tests during the exam period, he said.

The division's investigation recommended that White get "intensive training" on local and state testing practices. The school's assistant principal, test coordinators and teachers also were to be trained.

White will also have to give the division's central office a list matching the school's enrollment to the students who will be tested.

The division also recommended monitoring Dreamkeepers for three years during mandatory testing to ensure compliance with local and state practices.

The division changed the school's name from J.J. Roberts Elementary to Dreamkeepers Academy in 2003 as part of an overhaul to improve instruction and performance.

In 2004, the school failed to achieve the AYP standard because a handful of fifth-graders were absent on test day. However, the school has been fully accredited by the state for at least three years.

Students - 76 percent of whom are lower-income - get two extra hours of class daily, as well as character and career awareness education. They wear uniforms and, with their families, sign a commitment to meet the school's standards. Admission is open to any Norfolk child. Close to 400 students attend pre-kindergarten through fifth grade.

The school received a Virginia State School of Character award for excellence in character education last month, a state VIP Competence to Excellence award in 2008 and a 2010 Virginia State School of Change award.

White has been the school's principal since 2003.

Steven G. Vegh, (757) 446-2417, steven.vegh@pilotonline.com