Return-Path: <nifl-assessment@literacy.nifl.gov> Received: from literacy (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by literacy.nifl.gov (8.10.2/8.10.2) with SMTP id j5LLgrG13387; Tue, 21 Jun 2005 17:42:53 -0400 (EDT) Date: Tue, 21 Jun 2005 17:42:53 -0400 (EDT) Message-Id: <008b01c576ab$18466940$0202a8c0@frodo> Errors-To: listowner@literacy.nifl.gov Reply-To: nifl-assessment@literacy.nifl.gov Originator: nifl-assessment@literacy.nifl.gov Sender: nifl-assessment@literacy.nifl.gov Precedence: bulk From: "Marie Cora" <marie.cora@hotspurpartners.com> To: Multiple recipients of list <nifl-assessment@literacy.nifl.gov> Subject: [NIFL-ASSESSMENT:1105] Response: Non-Lit in English and Below Basic X-Listprocessor-Version: 6.0c -- ListProcessor by Anastasios Kotsikonas Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook, Build 10.0.2627 Content-Type: text/plain; Status: O Content-Length: 3209 Lines: 68 Dear List Members, I am posting this on behalf of Judy Koenig (we seem to be having a couple of list glitches!). marie Hello, I'm writing to reply to Marie's opening questions about the differences between the Nonliterate in English and Below Basic Literacy performance level categories. When making plans for the 2003 NAAL, the Dept of Ed decided to design a special supplemental assessment (the ALSA) that was intended to evaluate skills of low-literate adults. The Dept. developed a set of screening questions that were to be used to get an initial idea of a participant's literacy skills. Based on their responses to the screening questions, participants were either assigned to take ALSA or the main NAAL assessment. The NRC Committee developed the Nonliterate in English category as a means for documenting the percentage of adults who's skills were so low that they could not "pass" the screening questions. This includes both the individuals whose skills were so low that they could not even attempt the screening questions as well as those who tried the questions but could not "pass" them and were assigned to ALSA. The Below Basic Literacy category is intended to document the percentage of adults whose literacy skills were sufficient to "pass" the screening questions but were still extremely low. This category includes the individuals who were assigned to take the main NAAL but whose scores were lower than the cut score for the Basic category. Having the two categories allows for finer distinctions among low literate adults than were possible with the 1992 NALS results. In the discussions that the NRC Committee had with stakeholders, some indicated a desire to know the percentage of adults in the U.S. whose literacy skills were so low that they would be regarded as "not literate." The Nonliterate in English category was designed to convey this type of information, since adults who are classified into this category have extreme difficulty reading in English. Stakeholders also indicated that it would be useful to know the percentage of adults who could read a little but not very well, and the Below Basic Literacy category is intended to respond to this information need. Because the ALSA was not available in 1992, it is not possible to identify the group of adults who should be classified as Nonliterate in English. So, for the 1992 results, all of the individuals whose scores were lower than the cut score for Basic were classified as Below Basic (that is, the lowest category for NALS is the Below Basic category). Therefore, when making trend comparisons (between the 1992 NALS results and the 2003 NAAL results), the 2003 percentages in Nonliterate in English and in Below Basic need to be combined. This will allow measuring growth over time in the percentages of individuals in the lowest category of literacy. I hope that this provides additional information to explain what the Committee intended by forming these two performance levels. I welcome this opportunity to further discuss this and other topics about our report. Sincerely, Judy Koenig NRC Study Director for the Committee on Performance Levels for Adult Literacy
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