KHOU-11’s Mark Greenblatt has been breathlessly reporting that HISD lost THOUSANDS of test booklets — both TAKS and Stanford Achievement — which, Greenblatt helps the viewer conclude, means that HISD testing is suspect. And even testing nationwide is compromised, in the case of the Stanford Achievement Test.
These two stories are a first-rate example of how the media can distort a story by failing to provide context. What’s the context in this case? Yes, HISD has lost tests, but it’s a problem HISD has admitted to, and has been addressing — KHOU’s statistics showed a declining rate of test booklet losses — and HISD has one of the better test resolution rates in the state of Texas at 99%.
Greenblatt sort of whistled past those facts.
And in the case of the Stanford Achievement Test, HISD is one of the few districts that accounts for and returns the tests to Harcourt, the test’s publisher. Therefore, HISD is one of only a few districts that has documented losses (again, the percentage is small) because most other districts don’t even account for theirs! What an amazing bit of information Greenblatt chose to leave out!
In fact, Greenblatt spoke to a Harcourt spokesman who said that the lost testing materials don’t compromise the test. Greenblatt suggested that Harcourt said that because Harcourt doesn’t want to develop another test! Is it really Greenblatt’s place to suggest to viewers that Harcourt was lying? Is that what a professional journalist does? Well, apparently it is when said journalist doesn’t get the answer he wants.
As for the TAKS test, here’s what a Dallas Morning News story discovered:
According to Texas Education Agency data, 7,084 test booklets from this spring’s state testing in DISD have disappeared.
That’s many more than other large districts in the state. Houston lost 1,111, Austin lost 436, and Fort Worth lost 384.
Of the lost Dallas test documents, the largest number
