Article: Cleveland school officials wilt under fire over records

Cleveland Plain Dealer, December 14, 2005

Reginald Fields, Plain Dealer Bureau

Columbus -- Three Cleveland school officials offered up a well-prepared explanation for the district's error-riddled attendance data on Tuesday but wilted under a relentless line of questioning from the Ohio House Education Committee chairwoman.

The district was invited to explain to the committee how last school year, of an estimated 519,000 excused absences, all but 620 were reported to the state as "present" -- falsely lifting the district's attendance mark to among the best in the state.

Rep. Arlene Setzer, a suburban Dayton Republican and the committee's chair, blistered the school officials with questions that exposed contradictions in their testimony.

Lisa Marie Ruda, district chief of staff; Adrian Thompson, chief legal counsel; and Larry Johnston, internal audit manager; each testified smoothly, then fumbled for answers under questioning.

The school officials blamed the error on two central office supervisors who are no longer with the district, who directed computer programmers beginning in 2002 to change attendance coding on data sent from the district to the Ohio Department of Education.

They also vehemently defended outgoing Chief Executive Officer Barbara Byrd Bennett -- who did not attend Tuesday's hearing -- saying she had no clue of the false attendance records until The Plain Dealer inquired about it in October.

Ruda said an internal investigation began after The Plain Dealer article appeared. But Setzer pointed out to Johnston that his written testimony said the inquiry began in September.

Johnston offered a confusing answer that Setzer said didn't address her question. Ruda also failed to explain the contradiction. Thompson finally told the chairwoman that the September reference was "a mistake."

Setzer also wondered how the problem could have festered so long without Byrd-Bennett or other top administrators learning of it.

She also questioned why no one raised a red flag within the district over how the school system was showing such marvelous attendance gains while continuing to struggle academically.

The school officials said an internal audit is under way. Though no firm figure is yet known, they told the committee that the corrected attendance data would most likely show that the district did not reach the state's 93 percent attendance mandate, as it has been credited with doing.

The school officials said that this school year, excused absences are being counted as absent.

The Ohio Department of Education is considering new attendance reporting procedures and penalties for districts that submit inaccurate data.