Emily Le Coz

The Clarion-Ledger

Students whose high test scores sparked the meteoric rise of a Clarksdale elementary school from an F- to an A-rated institution in just two years have seen their academic levels plummet since leaving, prompting questions about the validity of those earlier scores.

When Oakhurst Intermediate School welcomed rising fifth- and sixth-graders from Heidelberg Elementary School in August, teachers immediately recognized a problem. Many of the children who had tested above grade-level on the May 2013 Mississippi Curriculum Test now could barely read or do basic math.

On their first nine-week assessment in October, some of those same students failed altogether, according to data obtained by The Clarion-Ledger.

The schools are part of the Clarksdale Municipal School District, a predominantly black district of some 3,115 students in the Delta.

"The irregularities are very clear," said Oakhurst teacher Alberto Aquino. "I am not saying there is cheating going on (at Heidelberg). I am saying that the scores are not matching up, and every teacher in this school knows it. Every teacher in this district knows it."

Heidelberg Principal Lowanda Tyler-Jones denies any cheating occurred on the Mississippi Curriculum Test, called the MCT2. She attributes her students' success to the positive attitude and rigorous teaching that occurs at her school, which this year runs from pre-kindergarten to fourth grade.

If there's a problem, she said, it's at the intermediate school.

Oakhurst used to be a junior high school but was reorganized this academic year to serve all the district's fifth- and sixth-graders, who come from its five elementary schools.

Eighty-three of those students came from Heidelberg. Of them, 42 had scored advanced in reading and 41 had scored advanced in math on last year's MCT2s, data show. Advanced is the highest achievement level possible and indicates a student performs above grade level.

But when they were assessed three months later, only six of these advanced Heidelberg students tested on or above last year's grade level for reading and 23 for math.

Some tested two or three grade levels below where they should have performed, including one sixth-grader who was reading on a first-grade level despite having achieved one of the best scores in his class on the MCT2 in English language arts.

The same child had the worst possible score — minimal minus — on his first nine-week reading assessment at Oakhurst.

One former Heidelberg student told The Clarion-Ledger her English teacher, Frances Smith, had read the answers aloud to the class during testing last year.

"She would say, 'C for cat. D for dog. B for ball. A for apple,'" the now sixth-grade Oakhurst student said, describing how Smith provided students the correct multiple-choice response to each question.

That student had scored advanced in math and proficient in reading on the MCT2 but tested below grade level in each subject at Oakhurst.

The Clarion-Ledger is not naming students to protect the privacy of their test scores.

Smith, who now teaches at Oakhurst, denies any knowledge of cheating in her class or any other class at Heidelberg.

Another former Heidelberg student scored advanced on last year's MCT2's English language arts test even though she said she left about 20 bubbles blank on her Scantron sheet, which is the machine-readable paper on which students mark answers.

Answers not bubbled in are counted wrong. There are 60 questions total on the ELA portion of the fourth-grade test, meaning one-third of the student's answers would have been marked wrong.

"I thought I wasn't going to get advanced, but I did," said the now fifth-grader, who in August tested on a second-grade reading level at Oakhurst.

Oakhurst Principal Valencia Rhodes said she first became aware of the inconsistencies after teachers raised the red flag. The school had to reorganize its entire schedule to accommodate students previously slotted in advanced classes who actually needed remedial help.

Some students who otherwise would qualify for additional educational services due to this year's low performance aren't getting those services because their MCT2 scores were too high, Rhodes said.

"It's a great disservice to students," Aquino said. "Parents are so shocked. They say, 'I had no idea my child was this low.'"

Clarksdale Superintendent Dennis Dupree called the allegations baseless and unfair and lauded Tyler-Jones as a visionary leader who motivates the children to do their best.

The inconsistencies between last year's MCT2 scores and this year's student performance, he said, follows a well-known trend where student achievement dips in intermediate and middle school.

Dupree also dismissed the low scores on the October nine-week assessment, called the Case 21 test.

"Case 21 is a predictor," he said. "It won't give you a true assessment. We use Case 21 to help us and guide us, but it's not an exact test."

But in emails obtained by The Clarion-Ledger, Dupree has stated that Case 21 indeed is important because it's so closely aligned with what the MCT2 scores should be.

The independent vendor offering Case 21 also recently alerted the district that some of its elementary school scores on the March assessment were significantly higher than what other schools statewide were scoring. Because of this, the vendor was going to examine erasure patterns to rule out any cheating.

That was the assessment on which 100 percent of Heidelberg fourth-graders scored proficient or advanced in English.

The school wasn't always so successful. It had been failing for three consecutive years by the time Tyler-Jones was tapped as its new principal in January 2012.

She previously had taught third grade at another failing school in the district, George H. Oliver Elementary.

Tyler-Jones said she reorganized the teachers and set high expectations for the students who, four months later, scored so high on their MCT2 tests that they launched the school from an F ranking to a B.

After another year of hard work, the school achieved an A, the highest accountability status in the state. Its achievements helped lift the entire district from an F to a D and played a role in it winning a $10 million federal Race to the Top grant in December.

Clarksdale was one of five districts nationwide and the only one in Mississippi to win the coveted grant from the U.S. Department of Education.

The state Department of Education noticed Heidelberg's scores last year, too. They were among those flagged as "unusual" by internal data analysts, said James H. Mason, the department's director of student assessment.

Rather than conduct an investigation, though, the department asked the Clarksdale School District to perform its own internal review to make sure nothing inappropriate had happened.

Dupree said he did this and found nothing suspicious.

Anyone can report tips about possible cheating to the Department of Education, Mason said, but nobody submitted anything within the past two years about Heidelberg. He said he was unaware of the allegations and the inconsistent testing data.

"I would encourage any educator who has any concerns about the validity and integrity of any assessment results to let us know," Mason said. "That is very compelling and important for our office in conducting investigations."

MDE placed monitors this week at several schools that had been flagged, but Mason declined to say which schools were being monitored.

MCT2 testing began Tuesday and continues through Thursday for third- through eighth-grade students statewide.

Their scores will help determine schools' accountability ratings, which typically are released near the start of the next academic year.

Schools throughout the Clarksdale School District held pep rallies Monday to motivate students to do their best.

Children who packed into the auditorium at Heidelberg wore T-shirts that said, "Keep Calm, We Rocked the MCT2." They danced and rapped original songs about how they'll ace the test and maintain the school's A rating.

Several parents also attended the Heidelberg rally and staunchly defended the school and its principal.

"My child has excelled since she's been here," said Kenisha Shelton about her third-grade daughter. "It's a rigorous program. She's tired when she comes home."

Said Richard Mathis, who has a first-grade daughter in the school: "Any doubters who think the test scores are wrong should come watch these kids work."

But parent Linda Wortham said her children had a different experience when they attended Heidelberg.

"My kids came home last year and said, 'Mama, don't you know when the kids got the Scantrons they were all bubbled in already.'"

Both scored better than she would have predicted, given that they're struggling learners with a history of poor grades. Wortham said she reported the cheating allegations to the state education department but that nothing was done.

"There's no way," said said, "they scored advanced on the MCT."

Contact Emily Le Coz at (601) 961-7249 or elecoz@jackson.gannett.com. Follow @emily_lecoz on Twitter.