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Three Houston Independent School District employees are among the five people charged in connection with a scheme to help hundreds of people cheat on state teacher certification tests, Harris County prosecutors said Monday.

Prosecutors said longtime Booker T. Washington High School boys basketball coach Vincent Grayson led a cheating ring in which people typically paid about $2,500 for help fraudulently obtaining a teacher license. As many as 400 people might have illegally obtained a teacher certification in Texas since 2020 through the cheating ring, which netted the organizers about $1 million, prosecutors said.

The scheme involved conspirators taking and administering tests on behalf of aspiring certified teachers, prosecutors said. Investigators believe the hundreds of participants are spread throughout the state, with some likely still in classrooms. The licenses likely helped school employees get promotions, earn higher salaries and keep their teaching jobs, prosecutors said.

“To me, the damage is not just to the education system, which is under great duress right now, but it’s actually to the families of the children who go to those schools, who trust the government to educate their kids and keep them safe for eight hours a day,” Harris County District Attorney Kim Ogg said during a press conference Monday.

Grayson did not immediately respond to a text or phone call from the Houston Landing. His lawyer, Cheryl Irvin, declined to comment, telling the Landing that “I don’t know hardly anything” about the details of the indictment yet.

The arrests come amid a rise in uncertified teachers getting hired in Texas public schools. Fewer people enter the teaching profession through traditional college education programs. Certified teachers must complete a bachelor’s degree, a Texas university education preparation program and a state certification exam.

In a statement Monday, Texas Education Agency spokesperson Jake Kobersky wrote that the department “will review any and all information shared by law enforcement and pursue appropriate action against any educator involved in this scheme.” The State Board of Educator Certification will decide on any punishment, Kobersky said.

The alleged co-conspirators

The two other HISD employees charged in the case are Washington High Assistant Principal Nicholas Newton and Yates High School employee LaShonda Roberts. Prosecutors said Roberts is an assistant principal at Yates High, though district payroll records show her working as a special education chair at the campus as of early September.

Prosecutors said Newton took exams for aspiring certified teachers, while Roberts “recruited and referred” an estimated 90 teachers and collected about $267,000 in payments. Newton, who was paid over $188,000 for his role as a test taker, was “caught red-handed taking tests for two teachers at once and gave a full confession,” prosecutors said.

Roberts and Newton did not have lawyers listed in court records as of Monday afternoon.

The two other defendants are a Houston Training & Education Center staffer and a test proctor. The five defendants each face two felony charges of engaging in organized criminal activity.

HISD became aware of the allegations “shortly” before the arrests and placed the three employees on paid leave Monday, HISD Communications Chief Alexandra Elizondo said. District leaders are “still learning information” related to the case, Elizondo said.

Grayson earns a salary of roughly $90,000 annually as an athletic coach at Washington High, according to district payroll records from September. He has totaled more than 200 wins in his 18-year tenure as the school’s boys basketball coach, The Leader reported last year. Newton receives a yearly salary of $129,000, while Roberts earns $92,000, according to September payroll records.

Elizondo said HISD did not yet know whether any teachers in the district had fraudulently obtained their licenses. HISD will work with law enforcement and the Texas Education Agency to identify any teachers involved in the cheating scandal and will terminate their contracts, Elizondo said.

“The conduct in question is completely unacceptable and completely against every one of HISD’s values, what we believe about teacher certification,” Elizondo said.

“Suddenly were passing”

Prosecutors said their investigation started in mid-2023 when the Texas Education Agency received a tip about testing irregularities at the Houston Training & Education Center. State education officials and the testing company Pearson noticed applicants who had previously failed their teacher certification exams were driving from Dallas, Fort Worth and other far-away areas to take their tests in Houston.

“They then drove sometimes four or more hours to the Houston area and suddenly were passing the tests with flying colors,” Michael Levine, the felony chief in the District Attorney’s Office Public Corruption Division, said Monday.

In court records, Levine described Grayson as the “organizer and kingpin” of the scheme. Levine wrote that Grayson identified Tywana Mason, a staffer at the Houston Training & Education Center, willing to take bribes.

Prosecutors said the aspiring certified teachers would arrive, show identification, sign in and leave. Meanwhile, Newton would take the exam for the aspiring certified teacher, investigators said.

Prosecutors said teacher certification candidates would typically pay $2,500 to Grayson, who would send roughly 20% to Mason to allow the cheating to occur.

As part of the investigation, authorities have received thousands of bank and phone records, Levine said. About 20 teachers have given “more or less complete confessions,” Levine wrote in court records.

Disclosure: Pearson has been a financial supporter of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune's journalism. Find a complete list of them here.

This article originally appeared in The Texas Tribune at https://www.texastribune.org/2024/10/29/texas-harris-county-teacher-certification-cheating-ring/.

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