Ethical leadership has been legislated in the business sector and is enforced by numerous government agencies. But what about ethical lapses in education. And, for that matter, what about criminal activity by teachers and principals – how do we deal with this?
New revelations about 178 teachers and principals participating in a massive cheating ring to change answers on standardized test scores in the Atlanta area raise grave questions about leadership in the PreK-12 education in the United States. How widespread is organized cheating on standardized tests in our educational system and how do we find out? Should performance audits be required? This issue will not go away.
Teachers are leaders and they, not principals nor administrators, even if they ordered this cheating, are responsible themselves for their own actions. What do we do as a society to stop this cheating because its harm to our educational system is huge now and will only get larger in the future.