OMB83C Change Memo

Memorandum United States Department of Education

Institute of Education Sciences

National Center for Education Statistics

DATE: May 3, 2017

TO: Robert Sivinski and E. Ann Carson, OMB

THROUGH: Kashka Kubzdela, OMB Liaison, NCES

FROM: Nancy Sharkey, SLDS Program Officer, NCES

Kristen King, SLDS Program Officer, NCES

SUBJECT: Statewide Longitudinal Data System (SLDS) Survey 2017-2019 Instrument Change Request (OMB# 1850-0933 v.2)

As authorized by the Educational Technical Assistance Act of 2002, Title II, the Statewide Longitudinal Data Systems (SLDS) Grant Program has awarded competitive, cooperative agreement grants to states since 2005. Through grants and a growing range of services and resources, the program has helped propel the successful design, development, implementation, and expansion of K12 and P-20W (early learning through the workforce) longitudinal data systems. These systems are intended to enhance the ability of States to efficiently and accurately manage, analyze, and use education data, including individual student records. The SLDSs should help states, districts, schools, educators, and other stakeholders to make data-informed decisions to improve student learning and outcomes; as well as to facilitate research to increase student achievement and close achievement gaps. The SLDS grants extend for three to five years for up to twenty million dollars per grantee, and grantees are obligated to submit annual reports and a final report on the development and implementation of their systems. All 50 states, five territories, and the District of Columbia are eligible to apply, and each state can apply multiple times to develop different aspects of their data system. Since November 2005, 97 grants have been awarded. In addition to the grants, the program offers many services and resources to assist education agencies with SLDS-related work. Best practices, lessons learned, and non-proprietary products/solutions developed by recipients of these grants and other states are disseminated to aid all state and local education agencies. The request to formalize the annual SLDS Interim Progress Report (IPR) as the SLDS Survey, intended to provide insight on state and U.S. territory SLDS capacity for automated linking of K-12, teacher, postsecondary, workforce, career and technical education (CTE), adult education, and early childhood data, and to conduct the annual SLDS Survey from 2017 through 2019 was approved in February 2017 (1850-0933 v.1). The SLDS Survey will help inform ongoing evaluation and targeted technical assistance efforts to enhance the quality of the SLDS Program’s support to states.

This request is to make small wording edits to the approved SLDS survey (revising “P-20W” to “P20W”) and to add an authorization citation at the beginning of the survey:

“The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), in the U.S. Department of Education’s Institute for Education Sciences, is authorized to conduct B&B by the Education Sciences Reform Act of 2002 (ESRA 2002, 20 U.S.C. §9543).”