[AAACE-NLA] President's FY06 budget for AELS

[Bickerton, Robert P]

David and Tom, et al,

We need to put the "PART" (program performance) numbers for adult education
into context.  They did NOT arrive at most of these ratings by evaluating
the performance data submitted to the U.S. Department of Education by the
state ABE programs.  In several cases they simply gave the ABE program a
zero rating on the criteria leading to the scores David lists below because
the Department's strategic plan does not provide a specific numeric target.
For example, they mention that state's report:  of the students who had the
goal of obtaining a high school diploma or its equivalent, that 1/3 did so.
So, some might be tempted to ask, is this "good" or "bad" performance?  The
rating authority never dealt with this question, instead assigning a "0"
because the strategic plan for adult education, also developed by the feds,
does not have an "established target."  

In other words, what some are billing as "data based evidence" of inadequate
performance is nothing more than a bald attempt to stack the deck against
many programs to justify budget cuts.  To put it mildly, the claims are
incredibly misleading -- they buried state performance under a thinly
disguised "technicality" to force an alleged finding of inadequate
performance.  

We cannot and will not let this stand.
bob bickerton, MA director of adult ed & NCSDAE chair

-----Original Message-----
From: DJRosen at TheWorld.com [mailto:DJRosen at TheWorld.com]
Sent: Monday, February 07, 2005 3:54 PM
To: National Literacy Advocacy List sponsored by AAACE
Subject: Re: [AAACE-NLA] President's FY06 budget for AELS


Tom, and other colleagues,

It looks like the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) thinks Adult
Education State Grants have a very strong purpose and design,  but don't
demonstrate good results.

Program Assessment Rating Tool (PART) 
2006 Budget

Department of Education Adult Education State Grants  
             
Section
Score
	
                                                                            
                                             
1: Program Purpose and Design (20% weight)		100%
2: Planning (10% weight)	 					29%
3: Management (20% weight)	  				67%
4: Results (50% weight)	 					0%

Total Score %:		 						36%
Total Score:
36	Results Not Demonstrated

Source: http://www.transparentgovernment.org/tg/news/totalPART.htm

David J. Rosen
djrosen at comcast.net

> Aaace-NLA colleagues: According to the U. S. Department of Education, the
> budget for the State Grants program that funds the Adult Education and
> Literacy System (AELS) for FY 2006 is $200million, a drop of some
> two-thirds from $570 in FY 2005. According to the message posted on the ED
> web site, this was done because the State Grants programs failed the PART
> analysis, which stands for Program Assessment Rating Tool. Following is a
> brief note about the PART analysis. More can be found online at
> www.transparentgovernment.org/tg/fyo5budget.htm.
> Tom Sticht
>
>
>
>
>
>
> What is PART?
> At the center of the Administration's approach to "performance budgeting"
> is the Program Assessment Rating Tool (PART). The PART is a
> methodological, standardized and evidence-based evaluation - offering hard
> data on whether federal programs are doing what taxpayers are paying for
> them to do and assessing whether they are being managed properly.
>
> It investigates the most important aspects of performance... from
relevance
> to results. By focusing on these various characteristics, managers can
> paint an in-depth picture of just what exactly they are achieving, or if
> they are achieving anything at all! The results are presented by OMB as
> four different percentages (one for each section of the PART) and as a
> categorical assessment ("Effective," "Moderately Effective," "Adequate,"
> "Ineffective" or "Results Not Demonstrated").
>
> Each section of the PART is assigned a value at which it is weighted.
>
>
> Purpose: 20 percent
> Planning: 10 percent
> Management: 20 percent
> Results: 50 percent
>
>
> By focusing on these various characteristics, managers can paint an
> in-depth picture of just what exactly they are achieving, or if they are
> achieving anything at all. Across the board, the PART asks the same 25
> questions of each program. This standardization reduces the
> apples-to-oranges challenge of other evaluation systems and creates a
> wider source of management guidance for managers to take back and
> implement in their own programs. And the fact that PART is evidence-based
> - requiring proof of the results claimed by program officials -
> demonstrates to Congress the successes of the programs and justifies every
> penny of the budget allocation.
>
>
>
>
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