Date: 5/24/04 1:06 PM
From: Condelli, Larry
Hi David -

Computer literacy is an important skill and recognized as such by most people in the field, including the Division of Adult Education and Literacy staff at the Department of Education.  We have struggled for several years (and continue to do so) about ways to incorporate these skills into the NRS at the national level.  
To add them to the NRS we need three components: (1) a recognized, accepted hierarchy of computer or technology skills appropriate for ABE students, (2) a way to assess these skills, and (3) a policy for tying the assessments into the NRS educational levels to define advancement. When the NRS was first planned in 1996-97, the department did not think that any  of these components existed in a strong enough way to allow the inclusion of the skills into the NRS. However, since that time there has been a lot of work on defining the skill set related to technology and computer use at different levels of proficiency and some assessments have been developed.  We have currently begun reviewing some of these skill sets and approaches toward assessment for the NRS and there are other Department of education-funded projects that are looking at these issues. The Department is also planning to refine and broaden the educational functioning level descriptors in the future and the incorporation of technology skills into the descriptors will be considered.  So at some point there may well be some inclusion of these skills in the educational levels.

Of course, states may include technology-related skills into their local and state accountability systems and several have already done so.

Larry Condelli

-----Original Message-----
From: David Rosen [mailto:djrosen at comcast.net]
Sent: Sunday, May 23, 2004 1:49 PM
To: Condelli, Larry
Subject: Re: [NIFL-PLI] Using NRS Data for Program Improvement


From: David Rosen <djrosen at comcast.net>
Date: Sun May 23, 2004  1:39:29  PM US/Eastern
To: nifl-pli at literacy.nifl.gov
Subject: Re: [NIFL-PLI] Using NRS Data for Program Improvement

To Larry Condelli:

Sandy Strunk posted a message to the NIFL-PLI list  on May 10, 2004 from Larry Condelli, Managing Director in the Education and Human Development Division of the American Institues for Research, leader of the adult education team, and project director for the National Reporting System,  in which Larry  asks:

"What data do you need that NRS does not collect?"

The context of this and other questions in that message was using data for program improvement.

I have recently been asked by a practitioner -- and not for the first time -- if there are valid and reliable assessments for measuring computer literacy -- that is,  basic computer competence and comfort.  These are skills needed to use computer-assisted instruction, to word process writing and to search for information on a CD or on the Web.

My understanding -- Larry please correct me I am wrong -- is that computer literacy is not an area which is now measured through the NRS.   If it were, I am not sure we have valid, reliable, standardized assessments.  Do we?

Yet, I would argue that these skills are now as important to adult learners as reading, writing and numeracy.  They are required for many jobs, and for participation in computer-based distance learning. Many programs offer these skills because students have asked to learn them.  Programs, students, and employers wonder how programs are doing in helping students learn these skills.

Can the NRS include these skills?

David J. Rosen
djrosen at comcast.net


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