Why Johnny can't cipher

Maybe the cliche needs updating, "close enough for government work..." or government schools:

When does 2 + 2 = 5?

When you're taking the state math test.

Despite promises that the exams -- which determine whether students advance to the next grade -- would not be dumbed down this year, students got "partial credit" for wrong answers after failing to correctly add, subtract, multiply and divide. Some got credit for no answer at all.

"They were giving credit for blatantly wrong things," said an outraged Brooklyn teacher who was among those hired to score the fourth-grade test.

Examples in the fourth-grade scoring guide include:

* A kid who answers that a 2-foot-long skateboard is 48 inches long gets half-credit for adding 24 and 24 instead of the correct 12 plus 12.

* A miscalculation that 28 divided by 14 equals 4 instead of 2 is "partially correct" if the student uses the right method to verify the wrong answer...

A year ago, Chancellor Joel Klein boasted that the city was making "dramatic progress" when 82 percent of city students passed the state math test and 69 percent passed in English, up sharply from 2002. And fewer kids have been left back in recent years.

What officials didn't reveal was that the number of points needed to pass proficiency levels has, in most cases, steadily dropped.

It's easier, of course, to say "close enough" and hand the problem up to the next grade. Doing otherwise involves bruises to self-esteem, and likely outraged parents or administrators worried about district statistics. What's lost in all of this is the fact these students are being crippled for life every bit as much as if someone took a baseball bat to their knees. Those who cannot think or reason will always be dependent on those who can. But then... maybe that's the point of this drill.