Allocating Federal Funds for State Programs for English Language Learners (2011) / Chapter Skim
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7 Decision Criteria and Recommendations
7 Decision Criteria and Recommendations
Pages 161-170
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From page 161... ...
Census Bureau with regard to the use of the allowable data sources for allocating Title III funds. DESIRED CHARACTERISTICS OF ALLOCATION FORMULAS It is useful to have objective criteria to assist in determining the appropriateness of a data source that is to be used in developing a formula for the allocation of federal funds.
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From page 162... ...
In a larger sense, however, considering the overall objective of the allocation of federal funds, a conceptually fitting data element would provide state and local governments with federal funding that is proportional to their need and circumstances. Level of Geographic Detail The Title III legislation stipulates that the federal funds for the ELL program should be allocated to the states.
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From page 163... ...
Even when existing data sources are used, it is desirable to avoid incurring significant costs of obtaining data in a format suitable for the allocation process. Fairness The allocation formula should be perceived as being fair.
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From page 164... ...
COMPARING THE ALLOWABLE DATA SOURCES In our judgment, both the ACS estimates and the state-provided counts meet each of these criteria to some extent, although each has strengths and weaknesses that need to be taken into account when considering their use for specific applications and at specific times. Table 7-1 shows our analysis of each of the 10 desired charac teristics for each data source, discussed above.
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From page 165... ...
State provided counts are based on administrative data and are not subject to sampling error, although there may be some different interpretation of the instructions for data collection. State provided counts on immigrant children and youth very much rely on LEA judgments, they and fall short of the quality of the ELL counts or the ACS estimates.
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From page 166... ...
We therefore believe that the DoEd should consider a new approach for the 80 percent of the funding that is based on the number of limited English proficient children in the state under Title III -- one that uses both data sources, building on the strengths of each of them and recognizing their unique contributions. Because the panel concluded that the allocation formula would gain strength by using data from both data sources in the allocation formula, we discussed various means of doing so.
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From page 167... ...
students into Title III formula allocation calculations. Initially, the state-provided data should be given a weight of 25 percent of the ELL allocation, with the remaining 75 percent weight given to the American Community Survey data.
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From page 168... ...
RECOMMENDATION 7-4 The U.S. Census Bureau should conduct re search on the accuracy of the American Community Survey language item for assessing population prevalence of English language learner children and youth, including the strength of its association with more comprehen sive English language proficiency (ELP)
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From page 169... ...
As a result, the ELP tests that are used by states to measure these standards will likely become more similar and will more easily lend themselves to defining comparable cross-state performance standards for "English proficient." With regard to improving the quality of state-provided data, there are several steps that the DoEd might explore. First, the department might consider asking states to provide documentation of the technical quality of their assessments, particularly information to document the procedures used to set the performance levels and to determine the "English proficient" level, as well as information to document the accuracy and validity of decisions based on the assessment.
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