A federal audit confirms several schools in El Paso cheated on high-stakes accountability tests during the tenure of now-convicted superintendent Lorenzo Garcia. The Department of Education audit released Friday says the district prevented some students from taking the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills tests.
During Garcia's administration, district officials encouraged low-performing students to drop out or held them back in the 9th grade so they would not take the TAKS test in the 10th grade.
The audit took about 2 ½ years to complete and it says that while most of the cheating took place in Bowie High School, a school with a large number of underprivileged students, there was also wrongdoing at Coronado High School, located in a wealthier part of El Paso.
Copyright 2013 The Associated Press.