In the wake of yesterday’s announcement that the reading test results of American students on the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) have been invalidated, Bob Wise, president of the Alliance for Excellent Education and former governor of West Virginia, has sent a letter to the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Education and the Director of the Institute of Education Sciences. He urges them to work together to re-administer the reading section “so that 15-year-old U.S. students’ reading performance can truly be compared to their counterparts’ around the world.”

In his letter, Gov. Wise observes that “having the most recent PISA reading performance data would permit policymakers and educators to evaluate efforts in the United States and in countries throughout the world much more thoroughly to determine what is, and is not, working to improve reading performance.”  He also notes that “without the reading results, our understanding of the nation’s ability to remain economically competitive in an increasingly global economy will be considerably diminished.”

The full text of Gov. Wise’s letter is available at: http://www.all4ed.org/files/PISALetter_DeptEd_112007.pdf

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The Alliance for Excellent Education is a Washington-based policy, research, and advocacy organization that works to make every child a graduate, prepared for postsecondary education and success in life.

For more information about the Alliance for Excellent Education, please visit: www.all4ed.org.