The mythology spun by the nation’s top backers of corporate-education reform received another rebuke this week following the resignation of Florida’s top education official after reports surfaced that he had pressed for a private charter school to be given a passing grade despite poor performance.

In an exclusive report on Monday, the Associated Press revealed that former Indiana and current Florida schools chief Tony Bennett—though he built a national reputation by promising to hold “failing” schools to account—was seemingly quick to renege on this pledge when “an Indianapolis charter school run by a prominent Republican donor” was on the verge of receiving a less than pleasing grade.

“How much more fraud and miseducation will be tolerated until thinkers and leaders step forward and admit that test-based accountability IS the problem?” -Diane Ravitch

According to AP, “Bennett’s education team frantically overhauled his signature ‘A-F’ school grading system to improve the school’s marks.”

The “A-F” approach is just one of the signature proposals fostered by rightwing think tanks and corporate-school reformers which has allowed state officials to use a broad brush to paint schools as either “failing” or “passing” on a range of metrics. Critics of the approach say it is an arbitrary and misguided tactic, but one that serves corporate reformers by creating conditions in which schools are forced to accept corporate-friendly reforms.

As education expert Diana Ravitch explains, the “A-F” system is designed to set up public schools for failure and privatization. “Once a school is labeled D or F,” she writes, “it goes into a cycle of decline that is usually irreversible as families leave, good teachers leave, funds and programs are cut, and the school dies, a victim of failed policies and malign neglect.”

The Bennett resignation follows on other scandals involving high-stakes accountability schemes across the country that, according to Ravitch and other critics, shows how hollow the corporate-backed agenda truly is.

“The evidence is now overwhelming,” argues Ravitch, “that test-based accountability encourages a slew of negative behaviors, including teaching to the test, narrowing the curriculum, cheating, and gaming the system.”

The Washington Post’s education correspondent Valerie Strauss picks up on the AP investigation, and writes:

MSNB’s Chris Hayes covered the story during his evening news hour on Thursday:

As Strauss observes, this storyline is becoming “all too familiar” when it comes to backers of the corporate-education reform movement:

And Ravitch, citing related scandals in New York, Georgia and Texas, concludes:

________________________________________________