You Can't Make this Stuff Up

In the wake of the NY State testing fiasco, the NY Post reports there will be a probe to find out what happened.  After all, this is the age of "accountability," and we've heard that word from Joel Klein, to Barack Obama, all the way up to top education dog Bill Gates.  State Education Chairwoman Suzi Oppenheimer is taking a no-holds barred look at what's happening:

But Oppenheimer said she didn't intend to haul in officials like former state education chief Richard Mills, who was in charge when test scores misleadingly shot through the roof in recent years.

"'I see no value in it," she said. "He did what was best back then."

Kinda makes ya wonder why there's a probe.  Obviously, if he did "what was best," there's no possibility of wrongdoing.  Don't you wish you could screw up something in a big way like that and have someone like Ms. Oppenheimer declare you innocent before any examination of the issues took place?  Manhattan PEP member Patrick Sullivan had a somewhat different take on things:

"I can’t believe they want to give everyone responsible for this debacle a free pass," said Panel for Educational Policy member Patrick Sullivan. "It is simply wrong to hold teachers and children accountable with testing while refusing to hold accountable those who were responsible for mismanaging the whole testing program."

But being "simply wrong" is pretty much status quo nowadays, in a world where teacher jobs depend on student test scores, with no basis whatsoever to suggest this is a valid measure of teacher quality.  Those in charge of the testing fiasco, on the other hand, are declared innocent before any hearing even takes place.  I'd debate whether children are any more accountable than they ever were.  In fact, with "credit recovery,"  it appears they're substantially less accountable.

But unionized teachers will lose their jobs for test scores, discredited though they are, while union leaders support and enable the applause of faux-Democratic President Barack Obama.