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Bronx Pupils $core: Kids Paid for Taking Tests
By Yoav Gonen
November 8, 2007 -- It's payback time for the seventh-graders at MS 302 in The Bronx.
The Longwood students joined thousands of their counterparts across the city yesterday in enjoying cash rewards of up to $100 doled out by the city for their performances on two periodic assessment tests in English and math.
As participants in a new 61-school pilot program that pays fourth- and seventh-graders, students at the high-poverty school said the cash has been a serious motivator for them to study harder.
"I was thinking if I studied more, I'd get all the answers right, and I'd probably get more money," said Catherina Soto, 12, who's earned $73 so far. "For everything in life, you need money."
More than 200 students in the school had at least $20 - the minimum for simply taking both exams - deposited directly into no-fee savings accounts set up for them at Washington Mutual in the past week.
They received the good news - on white certificates bearing their names, test scores and the amount they earned - at a recent, smile-filled assembly.
"I felt like, wow, ecstatic!" Erika Santana, 12, said of her $89.10 haul, which she wants to put toward a digital camera.
Students in seventh grade can earn up to $500 per year, and fourth-graders can earn up to $250, in the program, which covers 10 tests annually.
The program, part of Mayor Bloomberg's Opportunity NYC initiative, is privately funded and run by the Department of Education. Started this year, that initiative pays low-income families for positive actions such as going to health checkups and parent-teacher conferences.
MS 302 Principal Angel Rodriguez said he had no qualms about signing on to the controversial plan to pay students for test scores, and that students and parents were just as excited to participate.
In a school where 22 percent of students met standards on state English tests last year, Rodriguez said he now has seventh-graders asking how soon they can take the next assessment, and sixth-graders impatient to advance a year.
"My seventh-graders are out-performing all my other classes," Rodriguez said - no small feat considering that students often come to the school with more baggage "than you could ever imagine."
The assessments don't count toward a school's progress report, on which MS 302 earned a B this year. Rodriguez refers to the program's creator, Harvard economist and Department of Education Chief Equality Officer Dr. Roland Fryer Jr., as "Dr. Hope."
Not everyone agrees.
"Paying children is about the worst thing I've ever heard," said Jane Hirshmann of the anti-testing group Time Out From Testing, who added that children from low-income homes have noted the pressure to contribute to family income.
But Fryer, in a speech last month, emphasized the need for new initiatives because the old way of doing things hasn't worked equally for everyone.
"It's a shame we have to give them something for academic improvement," said MS 302 parent-association president Madelyn Sanchez. "But if that's what it takes to get them to improve in this neighborhood, that's OK."
Several students said they've always tried hard at school, and that the money wouldn't change that. They'd like to stow the dough for college or for emergencies, they said.
yoav.gonen@nypost.com
— Yoav Gonen
New York Post
2007-11-08
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