Justification For Emergency Information Clearance Process from OMB

February 23, 2007,

TO: Rachel Potter

OMB Desk Officer

THROUGH: Katrina Ingalls

Kathy Axt

Lee Eiden

Regulatory Information Management Services

THROUGH: Ray Simon, Deputy Secretary

FROM: Kerri Briggs, Acting Assistant Secretary

Office of Planning, Evaluation and Policy Development

Tyrrell Flawn, Executive Director

National Mathematics Advisory Panel

SUBJECT: Justification for Emergency Information Clearance Process from OMB

Background: The National Mathematics Advisory Panel (Panel) was established within the President’s American Competitiveness Initiative through Executive Order 13398, dated April 18, 2006 (Appendix A). Contained in the Executive Order is a requirement for the Panel to issue a Final Report to the President through the Secretary of Education not later than February 28, 2008.

The Panel was established because there is a growing national concern over the mathematical proficiency of young people who are now emerging from our schools or will emerge in the next decades. Our world is a world of ideas, a world of innovation, where national well-being rests largely on economic competitiveness, which inevitably and increasingly depends on broad respect for and command of mathematics in the workforce. Present evidence strongly suggests that the United States is not renewing its workforce with adequate rigor and foresight. The Panel is charged to advise the President and the Secretary to effectively make recommendations to meet this national need.

The Office of Planning, Evaluation, and Policy Development (OPEPD) manages the work of the Panel and this work has the highest priority in this office and is directly supported by the Deputy Secretary of Education, Ray Simon, who reports to the Secretary. Both Ray Simon and Kerri Briggs (Acting Assistant Secretary for OPEPD) are in support of this expedited clearance process.

Description of Information Collection: To meet the mission as stated in the Presidential Executive Order, the Panel requires the collection of information during the spring semester of 2007 from teachers currently teaching algebra. Because learning algebra is so often a turning point in a student’s math education – when the student either thrives and moves forward or struggles and perhaps gives up on math – algebra teachers can offer a unique perspective on math education that is well worth understanding in some detail. The Panel intends to conduct a national survey of public school algebra teachers to illuminate the experiences of algebra teachers in various kinds of school systems including, for example, low-income, minority, higher income, or ethnically diverse or non-diverse schools.

To obtain information and study this information to present findings for the Final Report, the Panel must conduct this survey immediately. Therefore, the Math Panel must survey algebra teachers this school term of 2007 by the beginning of the month of April to mid June of 2007, allowing teachers several weeks to respond to the survey before the end of the school year (that typically occurs in June). The Panel selected a company to develop the survey instrument and conduct this survey. This contractor was hired by February 8, 2007. A survey instrument was prepared and ready for OMB clearance on the February 28, 2007. The Department requires OMB approval of the collection by March 29, 2007.

The contractor will obtain the survey results from the teacher survey and present this information to the Panel by early May 2007. The Panel intends to study the survey responses, in-depth. Then, the Panel will construct research questions and obtain new research and evidence to address teacher-identified issues. The Panel will review results of the research and will summarize their findings. These findings will under-pin recommendations presented by the Panel in the final report.

Below is a timeline of activities that must occur in order for the Panel to submit its findings and recommendations in the Final Report. This timeline is wholly depended upon the survey of algebra teachers occurring in March and April of 2007. It is not possible to obtain teacher survey results in the fall of 2007, study these findings and research educational studies to respond to the survey findings, and present new research to the Panel for their recommendations for the Final Report. From the timeline presented here, it is essential that the survey is conducted at the beginning of March 2007 so that teachers have enough time to respond to the survey and the contractor can present the results of the survey and obtain additional research information responding to teacher responses. The Panel requires time to determine findings from the new research information obtained by the contractor. Please see the timeline below:

National Mathematics Advisory Panel

Algebra Teachers Survey

Timeline

Critical Task	Current Status	Start Date	Absolute End Date
Award Contract with Gift Funds	Final Proposal Review	2/8/2007	2/8/2007
Review Teacher Survey Questionnaire	Panel Reviewing Questions	2/5/2007	2/8/2007
OMB Review of Teacher Survey Questionnaire and public comment.	No Action As Yet	2/28/2007	3/29/2007
Launch Teacher Survey Questionnaire in Schools	No Action As Yet	4/7/2007	6/15/2007
Review Results of Teacher Survey Questionnaire	No Action As Yet	5/15 2007	6/30/2007
Provide Survey Results to National Math Panel	No Action As Yet	6/30/2007	7/30/2007
Obtain Panel’s Response to Survey Results and Obtain New Research Questions	No Action As Yet	7/4/2007	8/4/2007
Conduct New Research Responding to Research Questions	No Action As Yet	8/4/2007	9/30/2007
Present Research Findings to Panel	No Action As Yet	7/30/2007	9/5/2007
Panel Task Groups Write Responses to Research Finding	No Action As Yet	8/30/2007	9/30/2007
Task Group Reports Presented to Entire Panel	No Action As Yet	9/6/2007	9/6/2007
Panel Writes up Survey Findings for Final Report	No Action As Yet	9/10/2007	10/10/2007
Author of Final Report Rewrites Findings for Final Report	No Action As Yet	10/10/2007	12/10/2007
Final Report Findings Completed and Preliminary Approval Obtained by Panel	No Action As Yet	12/21/2007	12/21/2007
Text for Final Report is Completed by Author of Final Report	No Action As Yet	1/15/2007	1/30/2007
Final Report is Reviewed by Department	No Action As Yet	1/30/2007	2/15/2007
Final Report Approved by Panel, Sent to President and Secretary and Available on Internet	No Action As Yet	2/25/2008	2/25/2008

Justification for Emergency Information Clearance Process:

1) Condition of Missing a Statutory Deadline: As mandated in the Presidential Executive Order 13398, the work of the Panel must be completed by February 28, 2008. It is critical that the Panel obtain information from the national survey of public school algebra teachers by spring of 2007 in order to conduct research on the results of this survey. This research resulting from the survey data will inform the findings of the Panel and will be included in the Final Report of the Panel to be submitted the February 2008 to the President and the Secretary. The Panel’s work must be completed by the end of 2007 for publication in the Final Report in February 2008.

2) Condition of an Unanticipated Event: The Department did not anticipate the formation of the Panel and, therefore, could not have anticipated this information collection. As stated above, National Mathematics Advisory Panel (Panel) was established April 18, 2006, by the President through Executive Order 13398. The first Panel meeting took place May 22, 2006. Further, the need for the national survey of public school algebra teachers has resulted from the current work of the Panel that took place during the September, 2006, meeting. Neither the formation of the Panel nor the resulting need for a national survey was anticipated.

Composition of the Panel and Process of Work

The National Mathematics Advisory Panel comprises 22 members designated by the Secretary of Education, of whom 17 are experts not employed by the Federal Government and five are ex officio designees from Federal agencies. The members were sworn into service, and the Panel began its work on May 22, 2006. The list of panel members follows:

Members from outside the Federal Government:

Larry R. Faulkner, Chair
President, Houston Endowment
President Emeritus, The University of Texas at Austin

Camilla Persson Benbow, Vice Chair
Dean of Education and Human Development,
Peabody College, Vanderbilt University

Deborah Loewenberg Ball
Dean, School of Education and William H. Payne Professor,
University of Michigan

A. Wade Boykin
Professor and Director of the Graduate Program,
Department of Psychology,
Howard University

Francis "Skip" Fennell
Professor of Education, McDaniel College
President, National Council of Teachers of Mathematics

David C. Geary
Curators' Professor, Department of Psychological Sciences,
University of Missouri at Columbia

Russell M. Gersten
Executive Director, Instructional Research Group
Professor Emeritus, College of Education, University of Oregon

Nancy Ichinaga
Former Principal,
Bennett-Kew Elementary School, Inglewood, California

Tom Loveless
The Herman and George R. Brown Chair

Senior Fellow, Governance Studies,
The Brookings Institution

Liping Ma
Senior Scholar for the Advancement of Teaching,
Carnegie Foundation

Valerie F. Reyna
Professor of Human Development and Professor of Psychology,
Cornell University

Wilfried Schmid
Dwight Parker Robinson Professor of Mathematics,
Harvard University

Robert S. Siegler
Teresa Heinz Professor of Cognitive Psychology,
Carnegie Mellon University

James H. Simons
President, Renaissance Technologies Corporation
Former Chairman, Mathematics Department, State University of New York
at Stony Brook

Sandra Stotsky
Independent researcher and consultant in education

Member, Massachusetts State Board of Education
Former Senior Associate Commissioner, Massachusetts Department of Education

Vern Williams
Mathematics Teacher,
Longfellow Middle School, Fairfax, Virginia

Hung-Hsi Wu
Professor of Mathematics,
University of California at Berkeley

Ex-Officio Members from Federal agencies:

Daniel B. Berch
Associate Chief, Child Development and Behavior,

Director, Mathematics and Science Cognition and Learning Program,

National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, National Institutes of Health

Diane Jones
Deputy to the Associate Director for Science,

White House Office of Science and Technology Policy

Thomas W. Luce, III
Former Assistant Secretary, Office of Planning, Evaluation, and Policy Development, U. S. Department of Education
(May 22, 2006 through November 1, 2006)

Kathie L. Olsen
Deputy Director, National Science Foundation
(May 22, 2006 through January 11, 2007)

Raymond Simon
Deputy Secretary,
U.S. Department of Education

Grover "Russ" Whitehurst
Director, Institute of Education Sciences,
U.S. Department of Education

Over the past eight months, the Panel has met five times at institutions chosen to symbolize high educational expectations. In the remaining time before the President’s charge expires on April, 18, 2008, there will be at least five additional meetings.

3) Condition of Harm to the Public: Because the Presidential Executive Order instituting this Panel results from a national concern of economic competitiveness, the work of the Panel is directly linked to the public’s well-being. Moreover, the findings of the Panel will influence the implementation of mathematics instruction across the nation. The importance of this Panel obtaining the information that it requires is essential in order to effectively inform the public. The absence of reliable, effective information will adversely affect the findings of the Panel and its report to the nation.

Specifically, the information obtained through this survey will be the only information of its kind and is critical to inform the Panel of current issues ongoing in schools in the teaching of algebra. Without this key information, the Panel will not have correct information upon which to base the Panel’s findings. Therefore, the recommendations of the Panel (based on inaccurate, false information) will be incorrect and policies resulting from these incorrect recommendations will be inaccurate. The implementation on the national level of false policy built on false information will disseminate to the public false information. This has the potential to lead the public into a direction that is completely incorrect. Clearly, the public will be harmed by dissemination poor information and implementation of poor policy and inaccurate leadership at the national level. Further, it is essential, as stipulated in the executive order that the Math Panel provide recommendations to improve the condition of mathematics education in the nation for the purpose of ensuring American competitiveness.

Conclusion: Because the requested information collection meets all three criteria for an expedited information clearance process through OMB, the Deputy Secretary and the Acting Assistant Secretary of the Office for Planning, Evaluation, and Policy Development strongly and urgently requests approval from OMB for a expedited clearance process.

Contact: Marian Banfield

202-401-7767

Appendix A

Presidential Executive Order

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