A few developments on the NAEP front over the past few weeks:
- The Department of Education cancelled the national test of 17-year-olds.
- NCES commissioner Peggy Carr was placed on administrative leave.
- Mark Schneider, who ran the Institute for Educational Sciences in the previous Trump administration was asked about this situation by “the 74.” They reported that “he’d prefer the next commissioner to have state-level experience and to be more ‘critical of these big research houses’ like ETS, which has held NAEP contracts for roughly 40 years and just won another competition in January. “
- Liam Knox just reported that the NCES has “closer to five than 10” employees following this week’s mass layoffs at the Department of Education.
- Update: Politico reports that the Institute of Educational Sciences is down to a single employee.
It almost seems like irrelevant small potatoes at this point, but one imagines that ETS may lose some amount of its NAEP-related revenues despite decisions to scrub references to DEI from their public-facing materials.