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- Http: //www.nde.state.ne.us/ReadingFirst/Nebraska%20RF%20Ex%20Eval%20Report%20Year%202.pdf
Rog ( Horace ) Lucido, Physics Instructor, Ret.
Program Evaluator
Adjunct Faculty, Fresno Pacific University
Educational Consultant
Educators and Parents Against Testing Abuse ( EPATA )
Assessment Reform Network Central Valley Coordinator
Phone: 559-277-1312
Cell: 559-355-4215
email: lucid4@cvip.net
Rog ( Horace ) Lucido, Physics Instructor, Ret.
Program Evaluator
Adjunct Faculty, Fresno Pacific University
Educational Consultant
Educators and Parents Against Testing Abuse ( EPATA )
Assessment Reform Network Central Valley Coordinator
Phone: 559-277-1312
Cell: 559-355-4215
email: lucid4@cvip.net
Rog ( Horace ) Lucido, Physics Instructor, Ret.
Program Evaluator
Adjunct Faculty, Fresno Pacific University
Educational Consultant
Educators and Parents Against Testing Abuse ( EPATA )
Assessment Reform Network Central Valley Coordinator
Phone: 559-277-1312
Cell: 559-355-4215
email: lucid4@cvip.net
----- Original Message -----
From: Susan Harman <susanharman@igc.org>
Date: Saturday, April 21, 2007 12:57 pm
Subject: Re: [ca-resisters] Key NCLB Initiative Under Federal Investigation
To: ca-resisters@interversity.org
> Nebraska does, and is a model for the rest of us.
> Susan
>
> On Saturday, April 21, 2007, at 09:31 AM, Horace B Lucido wrote:
>
> > Improved test scores could just mean better test prep, not
> genuine
> > comprehension. A one-time test on reading is not a valid
> measure of
> > comprehension. Each state uses a different assessment ( although
> some
> > may use the same-DIBELS? now under investigation ) and therefore
> a
> > different definition of what it means to read with
> comprehension. An
> > improvement in one dimension of comprehension scores on one
> state's
> > assessment, may correspond to a reduction in scores in another.
> > Even in this flawed assessment processes one cannont even utter
> the
> > word 'scientific' as there is no standardization in which to
> assume
> > that increases in percent proficient using one assessment can be
> > mathematically combined and/or contrasted to another. No states,
> to my
> > knowledge, use multiple measures either.
> > Rog
> >
> > Rog ( Horace ) Lucido, Physics Instructor, Ret.
> > Program Evaluator
> > Adjunct Faculty, Fresno Pacific University
> > Educational Consultant
> > Educators and Parents Against Testing Abuse ( EPATA )
> > Assessment Reform Network Central Valley Coordinator
> > Phone: 559-277-1312
> > Cell: 559-355-4215
> > email: lucid4@cvip.net
> >
> >
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: Peter Farruggio <pfarr@cal.berkeley.edu>
> > Date: Saturday, April 21, 2007 6:58 am
> > Subject: [ca-resisters] Key NCLB Initiative Under Federal
> Investigation> To: ca-resisters@interversity.org
> >
> >> First Krashen, then the Washington Post... The good news: the
> >> reading nazis are being exposed for their corruption. The bad
> >> news:
> >> Miller and Kennedy still buy the official propaganda that kill and
> >> drill teaching "works"
> >>
> >> Sent to the Washington Post, April 21
> >>
> >> According to The Post ("Reading first paying off,
> >> Education Dept. Says," April 19), the US Department of
> >> Education reported that the percentage of third
> >> graders meeting or exceeding the proficient level on
> >> tests of reading comprehension increased by 12%
> >> between 2004 and 2006, which they regard as strong
> >> support for the effectiveness of Reading First.
> >>
> >> I have examined this data (available on the Department
> >> of Education website). For the 30 states with test
> >> scores available, I found an average increase of 6.7%
> >> in the percentage of third graders scoring at the
> >> proficient level or higher between 2004 and 2006. This
> >> is considerably less than the figure reported by the
> >> Department of Education.
> >>
> >> Eight states had impressive gains, ranging from 10% to
> >> 26%, but these states combined contained only about
> >> 10% of the total number of students in Reading First.
> >> For other 22 states, the average increase between 2004
> >> and 2006 was only 3%.
> >>
> >> In other words, only a small percentage of children
> >> appear to have profited from Reading First. For states
> >> that include 90% of those in Reading First, gains were
> >> minimal.
> >>
> >> Children in Reading First get 100 extra minutes of
> >> reading instruction per week, and Reading First
> >> teachers get significantly more professional
> >> development. The Department of Education's own data
> >> shows that Reading First, for the vast majority of
> >> children, is not very efficient.
> >>
> >> Stephen Krashen
> >>
> >>> KEY INITIATIVE OF "NO CHILD" UNDER FEDERAL INVESTIGATION
> >>> Washington Post -- April 21, 2007
> >>> by Amit R. Paley
> >>>
> >>> The Justice Department is conducting a probe of a $6 billion
> >> reading
> >>> initiative at the center of President Bush's No Child Left Behind
> >>> law, another blow to a program besieged by allegations of
> >> financial
> >>> conflicts of interest and cronyism, people familiar with the
> >> matter
> >>> said yesterday.
> >>>
> >>> The disclosure came as a congressional hearing revealed how
> >> people
> >>> implementing the $1 billion-a-year Reading First program made at
> >>> least $1 million off textbooks and tests toward which the federal
> >>> government steered states.
> >>>
> >>> "That sounds like a criminal enterprise to me," said Rep. George
> >>> Miller (D-Calif.), chairman of the House education committee,
> >> which
> >>> held a five-hour investigative hearing. "You don't get to
> >> override
> >>> the law," he angrily told a panel of Reading First officials.
> >> "But
> >>> the fact of the matter is that you did."
> >>>
> >>> The Education Department's inspector general, John P. Higgins,
> >> Jr.,
> >>> said he has made several referrals to the Justice Department
> >> about
> >>> the five-year-old program, which provides grants to improve
> >> reading
> >>> for children in kindergarten through third grade.
> >>>
> >>> Higgins declined to offer more specifics, but Christopher J.
> >>> Doherty, former director of Reading First, said in an interview
> >> that
> >>> he was questioned by Justice officials in November. The civil
> >>> division of the U.S. attorney's office for the District, which
> >> can
> >>> bring criminal charges, is reviewing the matter.
> >>>
> >>> Doherty, one of the two Education Department employees who
> >> oversaw
> >>> the initiative, acknowledged yesterday that his wife had worked
> >> for
> >>> a decade as a paid consultant for a reading program, Direct
> >>> Instruction, that investigators said he improperly tried to force
> >>> schools to use. He repeatedly failed to disclose the conflict on
> >>> financial disclosure forms.
> >>>
> >>> "I'm very proud of this program and my role in this program,"
> >>> Doherty said in the interview. "I think it's been implemented in
> >>> accordance with the law."
> >>>
> >>> The management of Reading First has come under attacks from
> >> members
> >>> of both parties. Federal investigators say program officials
> >>> improperly forced states to use certain tests and textbooks
> >> created
> >>> by those officials.
> >>>
> >>> One official, Roland H. Good III, said his company made $1.3
> >> million
> >>> off a reading test, known as DIBELS, that was endorsed by a
> >> Reading
> >>> First evaluation panel he sat on. Good, who owns half the
> >> company,
> >>> Dynamic Measurement Group, told the committee that he donated
> >>> royalties from the product to the University of Oregon, where he
> >> is
> >>> an associate professor.
> >>>
> >>> Two former University of Oregon researchers on the panel, Edward
> >> J.
> >>> Kame'enui and Deborah C. Simmons, said they received about
> >> $150,000
> >>> in royalties last year for a program that is now packaged with
> >>> DIBELS. They testified that they received smaller royalties in
> >>> previous years for the program, Scott Foresman Early Reading
> >>> Intervention, and did not know it was being sold with DIBELS.
> >>>
> >>> Members of the panel said they recused themselves from voting on
> >>> their own products but did assess their competitors. Of 24 tests
> >>> approved by the committee, seven were tied to members of the
> panel.>>>
> >>> "I regret the perception of conflicts of interest," said
> >> Kame'enui,
> >>> former chairman of the committee, who now works at the department
> >> as
> >>> commissioner of the National Center for Special Education
> >> Research.
> >>> "But there was no real conflict of interest being engaged in."
> >>>
> >>> The intricate financial connections between Reading First
> >> products
> >>> and program officials extend beyond issues the committee explored
> >> yesterday.>
> >>> Another researcher, Sharon Vaughn, worked with Kame'enui, Simmons
> >>> and Good to design Voyager Universal Literacy, a program that
> >>> Reading First officials urged states to use. Vaughn was director
> >> of
> >>> a center at the University of Texas that was hired to provide
> >> states
> >>> advice on selecting Reading First tests and books.
> >>>
> >>> The publisher of that product, Voyager Expanded Learning, was
> >>> founded and run by Randy Best, a major Bush campaign contributor,
> >>> who sold the company in 2005 for more than $350 million. Now Best
> >>> runs Higher Ed Holdings, a company that develops colleges of
> >>> education, where former education secretary Roderick R. Paige is
> >> a
> >>> senior adviser and G. Reid Lyon, Bush's former reading adviser,
> >> is
> >>> an executive vice president.
> >>>
> >>> "I'm very disappointed and saddened by the information that was
> >>> provided at the hearing today," said Lyon, who had been a strong
> >>> defender of Reading First, which he said had nothing to do with
> >> his
> >>> new job. "The issues appear much more serious than I had been led
> >> to
> >>> understand."
> >>>
> >>> Despite the controversy surrounding Reading First's management,
> >> the
> >>> percentage of students in the program who are proficient on
> >> fluency
> >>> tests has risen about 15 percent, Education Department officials
> >>> said. School districts across the country praise the program.
> >>>
> >>> Members of both parties continue to support the goals of Reading
> >>> First even as they attack its management. Miller and Senate
> >>> education committee Chairman Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) joined
> >>> Republicans yesterday in pledging to tighten restrictions on
> >>> conflicts of interest in No Child Left Behind.
> >>>
> >>> Education Secretary Margaret Spellings, who declined to comment
> >>> yesterday, has said management problems with Reading First
> >> "reflect
> >>> individual mistakes." But Doherty said nearly every aspect of the
> >>> program was carefully monitored by the department and the White
> >>> House, where Spelling was Bush's top education adviser.
> >>>
> >>> "This program was always firmly under the watch and control of
> >> the
> >>> highest levels of the government," Doherty said.
> >>>
> >>>
> >>
> >
>