Hello, everyone.

Thank you for your posting, George.  In response to your question about the electronic discussion lists,  no information is available yet.  When that information - or other information --  becomes available, I will certainly pass it on.

 

I'm curious: What might the effect be to the field - specifically to those of us working with adult English language learners - if the list is gone, or operating in a very different way?  

 

Miriam

Miriam Burt

Moderator, Adult English Language Learner discussion list

mburt at cal.org

 

 

 

From: englishlanguage-bounces at nifl.gov [mailto:englishlanguage-bounces at nifl.gov] On Behalf Of George Demetrion
Sent: Thursday, May 07, 2009 8:07 PM
To: englishlanguage at nifl.gov
Subject: [EnglishLanguage 4215] Re: NIFL's future?

 

NIFL was extremely active in the 1990s and during that decade accomplished a great deal.  NIFL through its Equipped for the Future Project, sought to provide that national framework.  No doubt there were limitations in the effort and any effort in the United States seeking to bring a sense of unity to a field that remains as fragmented as ever is going to come up against many dispersive pulls toward radical pluralism.  Then NIFL and EFF hit the brick wall of the administration of G.W. Bush.  NIFL survived, but a great deal was lost. To judge NIFL in 2009 by those 1991 standards as laid out in the statement below is like blaming the victim of an abusive political culture as experienced by NIFL between January 20, 2001-January 20, 2009.  A better framework to evaluate the potential of NIFL is to turn the clock back to around 2000 and see what could be reconstructed if legitimacy and a modicum of resources were provided to enable NIFL to in fact realize those goals.  I think the goal of the agency became diffused when NIFL became the repository for K-12 literacy as well as family and adult literacy
 
It needs to be recalled that much of the framework for NIFL came out of Forrest Chisman's important Jump Start and a great deal of thought and richly-informed policy advocacy went into the formation of an agency which never has been sufficiently resourced to have realized its far-end vision, even as much proximate good was achieved.
 
It may be the case that the adult literacy functions of NIFL could be absorbed within OVAE with more effective results with its K-12 functions being transferred to other Dept of Ed bureaus.  Though, I truly wonder how the current administration decision makers are thinking this through in an informed policy sense rather than making simply a seemingly rational decision based on a perception of economies of scale alone, and the need politically to cut some costs in in marginally viewed agencies that don't have much political clout.  It would be ironic again (considering the influence of Clinton/Gore on the WIA/NRS) if it were to be a Democrat again that becomes the agent through which NIFL becomes eliminated.
 
George Demetrion
 
PS what would happen to the listservs?
 

________________________________


Date: Thu, 7 May 2009 16:57:30 -0400
From: smcgilloway at ccbcmd.edu
To: englishlanguage at nifl.gov
Subject: [EnglishLanguage 4214] Re: NIFL's future?



I just read the document that outlines the reductions. Below is the exact wording in the document...

 

TERMINATION: NATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR LITERACY

Department of Education

The Administration proposes to eliminate the National Institute for Literacy (NIFL). NIFL has had

minimal success in fulfilling its mission to coordinate literacy services across the Federal Government.

Efforts to provide national literacy leadership could be coordinated more efficiently by the Office of Vocational

and Adult Education within the Department of Education.

Funding Summary

(In millions of dollars)

2010 Change

from 2009

2010

Request

2009

Enacted

Budget Authority........................................................................................................................................ 6 0 -6

Justification

The National Institute for Literacy (NIFL) was created in 1991 to provide national leadership on issues

related to literacy, coordinate Federal literacy services and policy, and serve as a national resource for adult

education and literacy programs.

However, NIFL's activities have had limited value in providing national leadership on literacy issues.

Although one of NIFL's major responsibilities is to coordinate Federal literacy policy, a report produced by

the Interagency Adult Education Working Group found that there was no unified Federal research agenda

for adult education, and that each agency, including NIFL, appears to invest in research studies addressing

its individual programmatic needs without considering holistically what educators and policymakers need

to know about adult learning.1 In addition, NIFL's programmatic funding is often spent on low value-added

activities, such as printing brochures and reports, which NIFL spent over $2 million on from 2007

appropriations.

NIFL's structure and status as an entity that operates somewhat independently from the Department of

Education have also led to inefficiencies. NIFL's statute requires that it maintain separate offices from the

Department of Education. Based on this requirement, NIFL has chosen to rent space in a building separate

from the Department of Education's headquarters and spends nearly half a million dollars in rent annually

for an office of only 11 people. In all, nearly half of NIFL's 2009 appropriation will support expenses for

personnel and overhead. NIFL's isolation from the larger Department has also resulted in NIFL needing

its own administrative processes to handle such routine matters as travel management and employee

performance evaluation. A 2005 Organizational and Management Study of NIFL found deficiencies in these

and other administrative matters.2

Under the Administration's proposal, the Office of Vocational and Adult Education would take primary

responsibility for the adult literacy agenda at the Department, and would absorb the resources now

appropriated to NIFL. All of those resources would fund national program activities rather than Federal

staffing and overhead.

Citations

1 U.S. Department of Education, Office of Vocational and Adult Education, Bridges to Opportunity: Federal Adult

Education Programs for the 21st Century, Report to the President on Executive Order 13445 (2008).

2 Booz Allen Hamilton, Final Recommendations Report, Organizational and Management Study, the National

Institute for Literacy (May 2005).

Susan McGilloway

CAFL Career Advisor/VIP Coordinator

Center for Adult and Family Literacy

CCBC

443-840-3933

smcgilloway at ccbcmd.edu

 

________________________________

From: englishlanguage-bounces at nifl.gov on behalf of Martin Senger
Sent: Thu 5/7/2009 3:00 PM
To: The Adult English Language Learners Discussion List
Subject: [EnglishLanguage 4213] NIFL's future?

I just got this on the AAACE ListServ:

 

Holy Mackerel!  I am right this minute listening to the President, and he just specifically mentioned the National institute for Literacy as one of the programs on his list to cut or eliminate! (He spoke of a $6 million cut and that the functions could be done within the Dept. of Ed.) Since I support this administration, on the face of it I assume there are good reasons for this and the overall mission of NIFL will be maintained.  ProLit people, did you see this coming, and what comments do you have about it?  Thanks, Debbie Yoho 

 

Division Director

Turning Pages/VOAC

Columbia, SC

office:  803-765-2555

_______________________________________________

AAACE-NLA mailing list: AAACE-NLA at lists.literacytent.org http://lists.literacytent.org/mailman/listinfo/aaace-nla

LiteracyTent: web hosting, news, community and goodies for literacy http://literacytent.org

 

 

Martin E. Senger

Adult ESL / Civics Teacher

   Greater Erie Community Action Committee (GECAC) / R. Benjamin Wiley Learning Center

   1002 W.10th St.

   Erie, PA 16502

   (814) 490-8510

   MSenger at GECAC.org

Co-Director

   ESL Special Interest Group

   Pa. Assoc. for Adult Continuing Education (PAACE)

 

From: englishlanguage-bounces at nifl.gov [mailto:englishlanguage-bounces at nifl.gov] On Behalf Of Figen Tabakci
Sent: Wednesday, May 06, 2009 10:31 AM
To: The Adult English Language Learners Discussion List
Cc: Mary Mulvaney; Marilyn MacDonall; Ghazala Nomani
Subject: [EnglishLanguage 4207] Re: Question about assessment

 

Hello all,

 

My name is Figen Tabakci and I work for Bergen County Community Action Partnership in Hackensack, NJ. 

 

We are a member of the Bergen Consortium in ABE/ESL Title II Grant Program, by DOLWD, along with Bergen County Technical Schools and Bergen Community College.

 

We used CASAS (Comprehensive Adult Student Assessment System) for our ESL programs until this year (2008-2009 grant year). 

 

And now, we are mandated to use BEST Plus. So, we are familiar with BEST Plus this year. 

 

You have to go through an all day training and get 'certified' to be able to administer BEST Plus. Almost all of our teachers have been trained. 

 

Although BEST Plus maybe a great tool for some programs, we are having a lot of difficulty with it.

 

It's a one-on-one test so it is very time consuming. It may take between 5 minutes and 25 minutes per person, depending on the student's English proficiency level and responses. The software generates the questions according to the scoring you do when you test the students. 

 

Also, it only tests students' oral proficiency, not reading or writing. So, we find that placement in the appropriate level is a bit challenging with BEST Plus. 

 

Posttesting is challenging as well. The teachers have to arrange for an activity for the rest of the class while they are posttesting. Or there have to be two teachers; one to teach the class and one to posttest.  

 

Again, it might be a great tool for some programs, but not for programs with high number of students. We serve over fifteen hundred students a year (our consortium combined). 

 

At one of the trainings last year, we had heard that there would be an ESL component of the TABE in the upcoming months. I'm not sure if it is available now.

CASAS was a good assessment tool. Although there is not one 'great' assessment tool, schools/agencies have to make decisions as to what would work best for their particular ABE or ESL programs, I guess.

 

Regards,

 

Figen Tabakci
Education & Training Center
Bergen County CAP
Phone: 201 968 0200 ext. 7035
Fax: 201 968 0243
tabakci.figen at bergencap.org

 

 

----- Original Message ----- 

	From: Mona Curtis 

	To: Adult English Language Learners List ; Assessment Discussion List ; The Learning Disabilities Discussion List 

	Cc: brownj at hawaii.edu ; kathi.bailey at miis.edu ; lfb at humnet.ucla.edu 

	Sent: Monday, May 04, 2009 1:14 PM

	Subject: [EnglishLanguage 4196] Re: Question about assessment

	 

	Do you know anything about BEST-plus? 

	 

	From: englishlanguage-bounces at nifl.gov [mailto:englishlanguage-bounces at nifl.gov] On Behalf Of Michael A. Gyori
	Sent: Saturday, May 02, 2009 6:49 PM
	To: Adult English Language Learners List; Assessment Discussion List; The Learning Disabilities Discussion List
	Cc: brownj at hawaii.edu; kathi.bailey at miis.edu; lfb at humnet.ucla.edu
	Subject: [EnglishLanguage 4194] Question about assessment

	 

	Greetings to all,

	 

	I am cross-posting a question related to assessment and hope to benefit from your expertise!

	 

	For the past 10 or so years, I have mainly been using the Adult Measure of Essential Skills (AMES - published by Steck Vaughn) as a standardized norm-referenced test for both L1 (mainly Hawaii Creole English) & L2 speakers of English.  This test is no longer being published or supported; further, the NRS (National Reporting Service) recently dropped this as one of the tests it accepts for reporting purposes.  I intend to stop using AMES, the immediate (but by no means primary) reason being to maintain the appearance of currency vis-à-vis third party student sponsors. 

	 

	At this time, the vast majority of my students are NNES adults with academic English learning goals (either GED or college preparation).  My students commonly have 6 to 9 years of formal education. The AMES is not a test designed for NNES learners, but it provides a snapshot of English language reading comprehension, communication, computation, and applied problem solving skills (along with an array of sub-skills). The raw scores can be converted to scaled scores, percentiles, stanines, and GLEs (however measured against a norming population from ca. 12 years ago). 

	 

	I have encountered numerous instances in which the scores are clearly biased towards L1 English speakers, not to mention a rather low correlation across the five levels of the AMES.  The starkest example of the latter is a student of mine who scored at 4.7 GLE in reading upon intake, and at 5.9+ GLE two months later as measured by Level B Form 1 and then alternate Form 2; when I administered the more difficult Level C after yet another two months, she scored at 1.2 GLE in reading.   (I knew it wasn't her "true" score, re-administered the test two days later, at which time she scored at 3.1 GLE.  After doing an item response activity together with her, she scored at 6.5 GLE when I added her self-corrected responses to her raw score.)

	 

	This leads to my question:  given that I provide content-based instruction (integrating language with academic subject development), which norm- or criterion-referenced tests or combination of tests would you recommend I explore to replace AMES that may be more suited for L2 English learners?  To inform instruction, I need to continue to measure the four aforementioned skills areas. I am considering TABE Online or TABE-PC 9&10.  I have in the past also used TABE 8, the TerraNova CTBS Basic Battery (neither any longer published) and CASAS, which I am certified to administer.  Although both CASAS and TABE have ESL measures, when you purchase them together with ABE/ASE measures, they are very costly. 

	 

	Finally, now that I am self-employed, I am free to choose any assessment tool - I simply want as much demonstrated test validity and reliability as only possible.

	 

	Thank you very kindly for any advice or recommendations you are willing to share with me!

	 

	 

	Michael

	 

	 

	 world10<http://gfx1.hotmail.com/mail/w3/ltr/i_safe.gif> 

	 

	Michael A. Gyori, M.A. TESOL

	Owner-Teacher

	Maui International Language School

	Phone 808.205.2101 (U.S.A.)

	Fax 808.891.2237 (U.S.A.)

	E-mail mgyori at mauilanguage.com

	Website www.mauilanguage.com

	 

________________________________

	----------------------------------------------------
	National Institute for Literacy
	Adult English Language Learners mailing list
	EnglishLanguage at nifl.gov
	To unsubscribe or change your subscription settings, please go to http://www.nifl.gov/mailman/listinfo/englishlanguage
	Email delivered to tabakci.figen at bergencap.org

________________________________

NOTE: This message was trained as non-spam. If this is wrong, please correct the training as soon as possible. 
Spam
Not spam
Forget previous vote

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://www.nifl.gov/pipermail/englishlanguage/attachments/20090508/ac054394/attachment.html