WABE Responds to New York Times Article
We want to let our listeners know that we are aware of The New York Times story published on August 8, 2010 and posted online Saturday, August 7, 2010.
New York Times article: Scandal Haunts Atlanta's School Chief
This report says that we have incorrectly reported important facts in the Criterion-Referenced Competency Test scandal as it relates to the Atlanta Public Schools.
Although we are a broadcast service of the Atlanta Public Schools, we are an independent organization and we have been extremely careful in our reporting of this story.
All of our reporting has been based on the report released August 2, 2010 by the Blue Ribbon Commission appointed to look into the problem. The report, to our reading, divides the 58 schools into three categories and calls for some degree of follow-up investigation into all of these schools.
2009 CRCT Erasure Investigation Report
When we have referred to the 58 schools we have either qualified that reference, such as "12 of the 58 schools flagged by the state," or broken the schools down into the categories used by the Blue Ribbon Commission. For example, in part one of a two part interview with Atlanta School Superintendent Beverly Hall that aired on August 4, 2010, Dr. Hall went into great detail on the categories and her position on them.
We have shared our concerns with the national editor of The New York Times. We take the integrity of our reporting very seriously and we stand by our reporting on this story. The only thing we take more seriously is our commitment to serve the people of Atlanta and our listening audience.
