Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott announced this morning that 70 Stuyvesant HS kids will retake their Spanish regents in the wake of last month’s cheating scandal.
Students said last month that the alleged ringleader at the Battery Park City school — 16-year-old junior Nayeem Ahsan — was someone who regularly sent out photographs of test questions and answers to his classmates. He also got answers sent in return, they said.
Students have yet to be notified about the retake, but are expected to learn about it later today, Walcott said on WOR-AM’s John Gambling radio show.
The students, including Ahsan, will have a chance to retake the tests sometime this summer.
“Cheating has taken place for who knows how long,” said Walcott. “Now with technology, and that’s why we banned cell phones, people have the ability to use new technology to try to cheat.
“So people are always trying to think of new ways to do things. It’s not acceptable. We’re not going to tolerate it.”
Erin Hughes, a DOE spokeswoman, said, “Exams will be invalidated for all of these students and they will have to retake them at a later date. The student who was photographing exams will also face suspension. In addition, during the investigation, another student was found to have cheated on the Physics Regents by passing notes. This student’s physics exam will be invalidated and will also face suspension.”
The Post reported last month that Principal Stanley Teitel, who went through Ahsan’s text messages after catching him using a cellphone during last week’s exam, told parents of dozens of students that their kids “had engaged in text messaging involving the various June 2012 Regents with students taking the exam.”
He said their kids’ social privileges would be revoked in the coming school year — including being barred from school clubs and sports teams, and the senior perk of going off-campus for lunch.
Ahsan, by contrast, is being forced to transfer to another school this summer. He will not retake the test.
“As principal, I find this very disturbing,” Teitel wrote in a letter to those parents last week. “I find this breach of integrity very serious and hope you will talk with your child about the need to remain honest and preserve their academic goals at Stuyvesant and beyond.”
Yet some teachers complained that students aren’t disciplined consistently enough when it comes to cheating or having their cellphones in class.
“Cheating is a problem at Stuyvesant. On several occasions I have caught students cheating while I was proctoring an exam,” said Spanish teacher Milton Diaz. “There is a lack of consistency in disciplinary measures used to address this problem,” he added.