Federal Register / Vol. 74, No. 204 / Friday, October 23, 2009 / Notices 54795 

DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE 

Department of the Army 

Availability for Non-Exclusive, 

Exclusive, or Partially Exclusive 

Licensing of U.S. Patent Application 

Concerning System and Method for the 

Deconvolution of Mixed DNA Profiles 

Using a Proportionately Shared Allele 

Approach 

AGENCY: Department of the Army, DoD. 

ACTION: Notice. 

SUMMARY: Announcement is made of the 

availability for licensing of the 

invention set forth in U.S. Patent 

Application Serial No. 12/421,124, 

entitled ‘‘System and Method for the 

Deconvolution of Mixed DNA Profiles 

Using a Proportionately Shared Allele 

Approach.’’ The United States 

Government, as represented by the 

Secretary of the Army, has rights to this 

invention. 

ADDRESSES: Commander, U.S. Army 

Medical Research and Materiel 

Command, ATTN: Command Judge 

Advocate, MCMR–JA, 504 Scott Street, 

Fort Detrick, Frederick, MD 21702– 

5012. 

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: For 

patent issues, Ms. Elizabeth Arwine, 

Patent Attorney, (301) 619–7808. For 

licensing issues, Dr. Paul Mele, Office of 

Research and Technology Applications 

(ORTA), (301) 619–6664, both at telefax 

(301) 619–5034. 

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The U.S. 

Army intends to move expeditiously to 

license this invention. Licensing 

application packages and other 

materials are available from the ORTA. 

All applications and commercialization 

plans must be returned to the ORTA, at 

(see ADDRESSES section), by November 

30, 2009. Interest in an exclusive and/ 

or non-exclusive license can be 

proposed in the same license 

application. Financial terms should also 

be included. Additional information 

and revisions to applications may be 

requested by the ORTA through 

December 11, 2009. The ORTA will 

evaluate applications, provide feedback 

as deemed appropriate, and negotiate 

licensing terms during the period of 

January through March 2010. 

Subsequently, draft license agreement(s) 

will be issued for review and signature. 

The Army, in its decisions concerning 

the granting of licenses, will give special 

consideration to small business firms. 

The Army intends to insure that its 

licensed inventions are broadly 

commercialized throughout the United 

States and the world. The Army intends 

that licensees will assume past and 

future patent prosecution costs. 

(Authority: 35 U.S.C. 207, 37 CFR part 404). 

Brenda S. Bowen, 

Army Federal Register Liaison Officer. 

[FR Doc. E9–25542 Filed 10–22–09; 8:45 am] 

BILLING CODE 3710–08–P 

DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION 

Submission for OMB Review; 

Comment Request 

AGENCY: Department of Education. 

SUMMARY: The Director, Information 

Collection Clearance Division, 

Regulatory Information Management 

Services, Office of Management invites 

comments on the submission for OMB 

review as required by the Paperwork 

Reduction Act of 1995. 

DATES: Interested persons are invited to 

submit comments on or before 

November 23, 2009. 

ADDRESSES: Written comments should 

be addressed to the Office of 

Information and Regulatory Affairs, 

Attention: Education Desk Officer, 

Office of Management and Budget, 725 

17th Street, NW., Room 10222, New 

Executive Office Building, Washington, 

DC 20503, be faxed to (202) 395–5806 or 

send e-mail to 

oira_submission@omb.eop.gov. 

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Section 

3506 of the Paperwork Reduction Act of 

1995 (44 U.S.C. Chapter 35) requires 

that the Office of Management and 

Budget (OMB) provide interested 

Federal agencies and the public an early 

opportunity to comment on information 

collection requests. OMB may amend or 

waive the requirement for public 

consultation to the extent that public 

participation in the approval process 

would defeat the purpose of the 

information collection, violate State or 

Federal law, or substantially interfere 

with any agency’s ability to perform its 

statutory obligations. The IC Clearance 

Official, Regulatory Information 

Management Services, Office of 

Management, publishes that notice 

containing proposed information 

collection requests prior to submission 

of these requests to OMB. Each 

proposed information collection, 

grouped by office, contains the 

following: (1) Type of review requested, 

e.g. new, revision, extension, existing or 

reinstatement; (2) Title; (3) Summary of 

the collection; (4) Description of the 

need for, and proposed use of, the 

information; (5) Respondents and 

frequency of collection; and (6) 

Reporting and/or Recordkeeping 

burden. OMB invites public comment. 

Dated: October 20, 2009. 

Angela C. Arrington, 

Director, Information Collection Clearance 

Division, Regulatory Information 

Management Services, Office of Management. 

Office of Elementary and Secondary 

Education 

Type of Review: Extension. 

Title: State Fiscal Stabilization Fund 

MOE Guidance. 

Frequency: Once. 

Affected Public: State, Local, or Tribal 

Gov’t, SEAs or LEAs. 

Reporting and Recordkeeping Hour 

Burden: 

Responses: 10. 

Burden Hours: 10. 

Abstract: This guidance supplements 

the April 2009 Guidance on the State 

Fiscal Stabilization Fund program and 

provides additional information on the 

statutory maintenance-of-effort (MOE) 

requirements and the process through 

which a State applies for an MOE 

waiver. 

Requests for copies of the information 

collection submission for OMB review 

may be accessed from http:// 

edicsweb.ed.gov, by selecting the 

‘‘Browse Pending Collections’’ link and 

by clicking on link number 4111. When 

you access the information collection, 

click on ‘‘Download Attachments’’ to 

view. Written requests for information 

should be addressed to U.S. Department 

of Education, 400 Maryland Avenue, 

SW., LBJ, Washington, DC 20202–4537. 

Requests may also be electronically 

mailed to the Internet address 

ICDocketMgr@ed.gov or faxed to 202– 

401–0920. Please specify the complete 

title of the information collection when 

making your request. 

Comments regarding burden and/or 

the collection activity requirements 

should be electronically mailed to 

ICDocketMgr@ed.gov. Individuals who 

use a telecommunications device for the 

deaf (TDD) may call the Federal 

Information Relay Service (FIRS) at 1– 

800–877–8339. 

[FR Doc. E9–25608 Filed 10–22–09; 8:45 am] 

BILLING CODE 4000–01–P 

DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION 

RIN 1810–AB09 

Race to the Top Fund 

Catalog of Federal Domestic 

Assistance (CFDA) Number: 84.395C. 

AGENCY: Department of Education. 

ACTION: Notice of public meetings and 

request for input to gather technical 


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54796 Federal Register / Vol. 74, No. 204 / Friday, October 23, 2009 / Notices 

expertise pertaining to a possible Race 

to the Top program, and provide 

technical assistance for the development 

and implementation of high-quality 

assessments based on common 

standards. 

SUMMARY: By March 2010, the Secretary 

of Education (Secretary) intends to 

announce a competition for a program 

that would support one or more 

consortia of States that are working 

toward jointly developing and 

implementing common, high-quality 

assessments aligned with a consortium’s 

common set of K–12 standards that are 

internationally benchmarked and that 

build toward college and career 

readiness by the time of high school 

completion. To inform the design of this 

program and the development of a 

notice inviting applications that 

establishes the requirements for this 

competition, and to provide technical 

assistance to States, the Secretary is 

seeking input from States, technical 

experts, and members of the public 

through public meetings and written 

submissions. Following the public 

meetings and review of the written 

submissions, the Department intends to 

publish a notice inviting applications 

for such a competition. 

DATES: Public meetings will be held on 

the dates and at the locations specified 

later in this notice. Written submissions 

must be received by the Department on 

or before 5:00 p.m., Eastern time, on 

Wednesday, December 2, 2009. 

ADDRESSES: For those submitting 

written input, we encourage 

submissions by e-mail using the 

following address: 

racetothetop.assessmentinput@ed.gov. 

You must include the term ‘‘Race to the 

Top Assessment Program’’ in the subject 

line of your e-mail. If you prefer to send 

your input by mail, address it to Office 

of Elementary and Secondary 

Education, Attention: Race to the Top 

Assessment Program—Public Input 

Meetings, U.S. Department of 

Education, 400 Maryland Avenue, SW., 

room 3E108, Washington, DC 20202. 

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: U.S. 

Department of Education, 400 Maryland 

Avenue, SW., room 3E108, Washington, 

DC 20202. Telephone: 202–453–7246 or 

by e-mail: 

racetothetop.assessment@ed.gov. 

If you use a telecommunications 

device for the deaf (TDD), call the 

Federal Relay Service (FRS), toll free, at 

1–800–877–8339. 

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: 

Background: The Race to the Top 

Fund, authorized under the American 

Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 

(ARRA), Public Law 111–5, provides 

$4.35 billion for competitive grants to 

States to encourage and reward States 

that are creating the conditions for 

education innovation and reform; 

implementing ambitious plans in the 

four education reform areas described in 

the ARRA; and achieving significant 

improvement in student outcomes, 

including making substantial gains in 

student achievement, closing 

achievement gaps, improving high 

school graduation rates, and ensuring 

student preparation for success in 

college and careers. 

The Department is considering 

implementing two separate programs 

under the Race to the Top Fund. The 

first, a general program, will be 

announced later this Fall through a 

notice inviting applications and notice 

of final priorities, requirements, 

definitions, and selection criteria. Under 

this general program, the Department 

will award approximately $4 billion to 

State applicants that have demonstrated 

that they have created certain 

conditions for reform and for increased 

student achievement and propose to 

develop and implement comprehensive 

reform strategies that are integrated 

across the four ARRA education reform 

areas. 

Through this notice, we are seeking 

input on a second proposed program 

(Assessment Program), which would 

provide for approximately $350 million 

in grants to consortia of States for the 

development of common, high-quality 

assessments aligned with an applicant 

consortium’s common set of K–12 

standards that are internationally 

benchmarked and that build toward 

college and career readiness by the time 

of high school completion. In addition, 

at least 50 percent of the award to States 

under this proposed competition must 

be used to provide subgrants to local 

educational agencies (LEAs), including 

public charter schools identified as 

LEAs under State law, based upon 

LEAs’ relative shares of funding under 

Part A of Title I of the Elementary and 

Secondary Education Act of 1965, as 

amended (ESEA). 

At a later date and depending upon 

the input from the public meetings and 

written submissions described in this 

notice, the Secretary intends to issue a 

notice inviting applications for a 

competition for this second program 

that will set forth the requirements and 

criteria for the submission of 

applications. If the Secretary determines 

that it is not feasible to conduct this 

second program, the $350 million 

designated for this program will revert 

to fund additional grants under the 

general Race to the Top program. 

Because requirements for an 

assessment program are highly 

technical, the Department wishes to 

solicit input from assessment experts, 

directors of large-scale assessment 

programs, States, other key 

stakeholders, and members of the public 

to inform the design and development 

of this program, including the notice 

inviting applications and to provide 

technical assistance to States. Therefore, 

the Department will hold a series of 

public meetings at which invited 

experts and members of the public will 

have the opportunity to provide input, 

as well as the opportunity to submit 

written input. Should we decide to 

implement this Assessment Program by 

holding a competition, we do not intend 

to conduct notice and comment 

rulemaking. Section 437(d)(1) of the 

General Education Provisions Act, 20 

U.S.C. 1232(d)(1), allows the 

Department to waive rulemaking for the 

first grant competition under a new or 

substantially revised program authority. 

This would be the first competition for 

an Assessment Program under the Race 

to the Top Fund. 

In addition to informing the design 

and development of the potential 

competition and the notice inviting 

applications, the Department anticipates 

that these meetings will also enable both 

the Department and States to learn more 

about the design, development, and 

implementation of high-quality 

assessments and will support State 

consortia in developing the highestquality proposals with the greatest 

likelihood of impact. We anticipate that 

States, in particular, will acquire critical 

knowledge about best practices in 

assessments, and then be able to employ 

that knowledge in developing their 

applications and in designing highquality assessments. 

Details of Public Meetings 

Structure of Public Meetings 

The Department anticipates that each 

meeting will have two components as 

follows: 

(1) Input from invited panels of 

experts and stakeholders: 

Æ Each meeting will have an invited 

set of panelists who will have a set 

amount of time to respond individually 

to the questions in this notice. 

Æ The Department representatives 

will then ask questions of individual 

panelists and facilitate cross-panelist 

discussion. 

(2) Open opportunity to share input: 

Æ Each meeting will have 60 to 90 

minutes dedicated to opportunities for 

interested members of the public, who 


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Federal Register / Vol. 74, No. 204 / Friday, October 23, 2009 / Notices 54797 

have registered to speak, to respond to 

the questions in this notice. 

Æ Each individual scheduled to speak 

will have 5 minutes to provide oral 

input. 

Æ Written submissions will also be 

accepted as described in the 

‘‘Submission of Written Input’’ section. 

Each meeting will likely focus on a 

particular topic as indicated in the next 

section. The Department will share any 

updates, including posting additional 

questions, online at http:// 

www.ed.gov/programs/racetothetopassessment.index.html. 

Topic Areas, Dates, Times, Locations, 

and Registration Information 

The public meetings will occur on the 

following dates at the times and 

locations indicated below. 

• Topic Area: General Assessment: 

Æ Thursday, November 12; in Boston, 

MA; at the Embassy Suites Boston 

at Logan Airport, 207 Porter Street, 

Boston, MA; from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. 

Æ Tuesday, November 17; in Atlanta, 

GA; at the Atlanta Airport Marriott, 

4711 Best Road, Atlanta, GA; from 

10 a.m. to 5 p.m. 

Æ Tuesday, December 1; in Denver, 

CO; at the Grand Hyatt Denver, 

1750 Welton Street, Denver, CO; 

from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. 

• Topic Area: High School 

Assessments: 

Æ Friday, November 13; in Boston, 

MA; at the Embassy Suites Boston 

at Logan Airport, 207 Porter Street, 

Boston, MA; from 1:30 p.m. to 5 

p.m. 

• Topic Area: Assessment of Students 

with Disabilities: 

Æ Wednesday, November 18; in 

Atlanta, GA; at the Atlanta Airport 

Marriott, 4711 Best Road, Atlanta, 

GA; from 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. 

• Topic Area: Assessment of English 

Language Learners: 

Æ Wednesday, December 2; in 

Denver, CO; at the Grand Hyatt 

Denver, 1750 Welton Street, 

Denver, CO; from 9 a.m. to 12:30 

p.m. 

• Topic Area: Technology and 

Innovation in Assessment: 

Æ Friday, November 13; in Boston, 

MA; at the Embassy Suites Boston 

at Logan Airport, 207 Porter Street, 

Boston, MA; from 9 p.m. to 12:30 

p.m. 

Attendance: If you are interested in 

attending an event, you must register by 

sending an e-mail to racetothetop.

assessment@ed.gov. You must include 

in the subject line of your email the city 

in which you wish to attend, and the 

date(s) on which you wish to attend. 

Registrations will be processed on a 

first-come, first-served basis with space 

reserved for State participants. 

Providing input: If you are interested 

in speaking during the open input 

portion of the meeting, you must 

register by sending an e-mail to 

racetothetop.assessmentspeaker@

ed.gov. You must include in the subject 

line of your email the word ‘‘Speaker’’, 

the city in which you wish to speak, and 

the topic area to which you wish to 

respond. Registrations will be processed 

on a first-come, first-served basis. 

People who are unable to attend a 

meeting in person or who do not register 

early enough to speak during the 

meeting are encouraged to submit 

written input. 

Assistance to Individuals With 

Disabilities at the Public Meetings 

The meeting sites will be accessible to 

individuals with disabilities and sign 

language interpreters will be available. 

If you need an auxiliary aid or service 

other than a sign language interpreter to 

participate in the meeting (e.g., 

interpreting service such as oral, cued 

speech, or tactile interpreter; assisted 

listening device; or materials in 

alternate format), notify the contact 

person listed under FOR FURTHER

INFORMATION CONTACT at least two weeks 

before the scheduled meeting date. 

Although we will attempt to meet a 

request we receive after this date, we 

may not be able to make available the 

requested auxiliary aid or service 

because of insufficient time to arrange 

it. 

Submission of Written Input 

All interested parties, including those 

who cannot attend a meeting or from 

whom we do not have time to hear at 

a meeting, may submit written input in 

response to this notice. 

Written input will be accepted at the 

meeting site or via e-mail and mail at 

the addresses listed in the ADDRESSES

section of this notice. Written input 

must be submitted by the date listed in 

the DATES section. 

When submitting input at the 

meetings, we request that you submit 

three written copies and an electronic 

file (CD or diskette) of your statement at 

the meeting. Please include your name 

and contact information on the written 

and electronic files. 

Both at the meetings and in your 

written submission, we encourage you 

to be as specific as possible. To ensure 

that your input is fully considered, we 

urge you to identify clearly the specific 

question, purpose, and characteristic 

that each of your suggestions addresses 

and to arrange your submission in the 

order of the questions listed later in this 

notice. Please also include a description 

of your involvement, if any, in statewide 

assessment practices. 

Sharing Input Publicly 

The Department is committed to 

gathering and sharing publicly the input 

from the meetings and written 

submissions. Each meeting will be 

video-taped and/or transcribed, and the 

video and/or transcript will be available 

for viewing at http://www.ed.gov/ 

programs/racetothetop-assessment.

index.html. All written input received 

will be available for viewing via this 

Web site, as well. 

Assessment Program Design and 

Questions 

The Assessment Program is intended 

to support consortia of States working 

toward jointly developing and 

implementing a next generation of 

common summative assessments that 

are aligned with a common set of 

kindergarten-through-grade-12 

internationally benchmarked, college 

and career ready standards that model 

and support effective teaching and 

student learning. Such summative 

assessments would allow students, 

including students with disabilities and 

English language learners, to 

demonstrate at each grade level tested 

their mastery of knowledge and skills 

and the extent to which each student is 

on track to college and career readiness 

by the time of high school graduation. 

In designing the requirements for this 

program, the Secretary is particularly 

interested in innovative and effective 

approaches to assessment that will 

assist States in creating powerful and 

useful systems of assessment that meet 

these requirements. 

In the following paragraphs, we have 

provided a framework that outlines the 

characteristics we believe should be 

required or encouraged in assessment 

systems supported by a grant under this 

proposed program. We then list the 

specific questions on which we seek 

input, taking into account this 

framework. In addition, at least 50 

percent of the award to States under any 

Race to the Top competition must be 

used to provide subgrants to local 

educational agencies (LEAs), including 

public charter schools identified as 

LEAs under State law, based upon 

LEAs’ relative shares of funding under 

Part A of Title I of the Elementary and 

Secondary Education Act of 1965, as 

amended (ESEA). This notice also 

highlights potential uses and questions 

for the LEA portion of the funding. 

It is important to note that this 

proposed program, the public meetings, 


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54798 Federal Register / Vol. 74, No. 204 / Friday, October 23, 2009 / Notices 

and the framework below would focus 

on the design and quality of assessment 

systems and not accountability policies, 

such as those described in section 1116 

of the ESEA. Given the pending 

reauthorization of the ESEA, we intend 

that the Assessment Program would 

support the development of the best 

possible assessments that could be not 

only appropriately used by States under 

the current ESEA assessment and 

accountability requirements, but could 

also serve additional purposes as 

outlined later in this notice. 

Framework 

Design of Assessment Systems—General 

Requirements 

The Department is particularly 

interested in supporting the 

development of summative assessments 

that measure— 

• Individual student achievement as 

measured against standards that build 

toward college and career readiness by 

the time of high school completion; 

• Individual student growth (that is, 

the change in student achievement data 

for an individual student between two 

or more points in time); and 

• The extent to which each 

individual student is on track, at each 

grade level tested, toward college or 

career readiness by the time of high 

school completion. 

At a minimum, we would expect that 

the common assessments would 

measure each of these elements in the 

subject areas of reading/language arts 

and mathematics, and would provide 

information for each student annually in 

grades 3 through 8, and provide 

information at the high school level 

about each student’s college and/or 

career readiness. The assessments need 

not be limited to a single end-of-year 

assessment but could include multiple 

summative components administered at 

different points during the school year. 

Moreover, the assessments might be 

viewed as replacing rather than adding 

to the assessments currently in use in 

States participating in the consortia. 

Information gathered from the 

assessments should be useable in 

informing— 

• Teaching, learning, and program 

improvement; 

• Determinations of school 

effectiveness; 

• Determinations of principal and 

teacher effectiveness to inform 

evaluation and the provision of support 

to teachers and principals; and 

• Determinations of individual 

student college and career readiness, 

such as determinations made for high 

school exit decisions, college course 

placement in credit-bearing classes, or 

college entrance. 

Design of Assessment Systems— 

Required Characteristics 

With respect to the design of the 

assessment system, the Department 

would likely require that the 

assessments, at a minimum, meet the 

following characteristics: 

(1) Reflect and support good 

instructional practice by eliciting 

complex responses and demonstrations 

of knowledge and skills consistent with 

the goal of being college and career 

ready by the time of high school 

completion; 

(2) Be accessible to the broadest 

possible range of students, with 

appropriate accommodations for 

students with disabilities and English 

language learners; 

(3) Contain varied and unpredictable 

item types and content sampling, so as 

not to create incentives for 

inappropriate test preparation and 

curriculum narrowing; 

(4) Produce results that can be 

aggregated at the classroom, school, 

LEA, and State levels; 

(5) Produce reports that are relevant, 

actionable, timely, accurate, and 

displayed in ways that are clear and 

understandable for target audiences, 

including teachers, students and their 

families, schools, LEAs, communities, 

States, institutions of higher education, 

policymakers, researchers, and others; 

(6) Make effective and appropriate use 

of technology; 

(7) Be valid, reliable, and fair; 

(8) Be appropriately secure for the 

intended purposes; 

(9) Have the fastest possible 

turnaround time on scoring, without 

forcing the use of lower-quality 

assessment items; and 

(10) Be able to be maintained, 

administered, and scored at a cost that 

is sustainable over time. 

Design of Assessment Systems—Desired 

Characteristics 

In addition, the Department is 

particularly interested in assessment 

systems in which— 

(1) Teachers are involved in scoring of 

constructed responses and performance 

tasks in order to measure effectively 

students’ mastery of higher-order 

content and skills and to build teacher 

expertise and understanding of 

performance expectations; 

(2) The assessment approach can be 

easily adapted to include summative 

assessments in other content areas (e.g., 

science, social studies) in the future; 

(3) The technology ‘‘platform’’ created 

for summative assessments supports 

assessment and item development, 

administration, scoring, and reporting 

that increases the quality and costeffectiveness of assessments; and 

(4) The technology infrastructure 

created for summative assessments can 

be easily adapted to support 

practitioners and professionals in the 

development, administration, and/or 

scoring of high-quality interim 

assessments. 

Design of Assessment Systems—LEALevel Activities 

With funds that are directed to LEAs 

under this program, the Department is 

interested in supporting LEA-level 

activities that are designed by the State 

consortium to support development and 

implementation of its assessment 

system. With respect to LEA-level 

funds, the Department would likely 

require that the funds be used to 

support the following types of activities 

conducted by LEAs that choose to 

participate: 

• Pilot testing of the new assessments 

with different populations, including 

English-language learners and students 

with disabilities; 

• Designing systems to support and 

enable effective and consistent teacher 

scoring, providing professional 

development support for these 

activities, and implementing them 

statewide; 

• Statewide transition to the 

consortium’s K–12 common, college and 

career ready, internationally 

benchmarked standards, with new highquality assessments (consistent with the 

State plans described in the notice of 

proposed priorities, requirements, 

definitions, and selection criteria for the 

Race to the Top Fund general program 

(74 FR 37804, July 29, 2009). Such LEA 

activities might include: developing a 

rollout plan for implementation of the 

standards and assessments together with 

all of their supporting components; 

developing or acquiring, disseminating, 

and implementing high-quality 

instructional materials and assessments; 

developing or acquiring and delivering 

high-quality professional development 

to support the transition to new 

standards and assessments; and 

engaging in other strategies that 

translate the standards and information 

from assessments into classroom 

practice for all students; and 

• Development of formative or 

interim assessments that align with 

State summative assessments as part of 

a comprehensive assessment system. 

Questions for Input 

The specific questions on which the 

Department seeks input are listed 


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Federal Register / Vol. 74, No. 204 / Friday, October 23, 2009 / Notices 54799 

1Michael J. Kolen and Robert L. Brennan, Test 

Equating, Scaling, and Linking: Methods and 

Practices (2nd ed), 2004, New York: SpringerVerlag. See especially: Chapter 6, ‘‘Item Response 

Theory Methods,’’ Section 9, ‘‘Using IRT Calibrated 

Item Pools’’; and Chapter 8, ‘‘Practical Issues in 

Equating,’’ Section 1, ‘‘Equating and the Test 

Development Process’’ and Section 6, ‘‘Conditions 

Conducive to Satisfactory Equating.’’ 

See also Hedges, L. V., and Vevea, J. L. (1997). 

A study of equating in NAEP. http://www.air.org/ 

publications/documents/hedges_rpt.pdf. 

below. All input, including expert 

presentations and discussions, public 

input, and written submissions, should 

be primarily focused on responding to 

these questions in the context of the 

framework outlined above, and may also 

provide input on the framework itself. 

We encourage you to make your input 

as specific as possible, to provide 

evidence to support your proposals, and 

to present the information in a context 

and format that will be helpful to States 

implementing high-quality assessments. 

Questions focus on the topics of general 

assessment, high school assessment, 

assessment of English language learners, 

assessment of students with disabilities, 

technology and innovation in 

assessment, specific technical 

assessment questions, and project 

management. 

To ensure that your input is fully 

considered in the development of the 

notice inviting applications, we urge 

you to identify clearly the specific 

question, purpose, or characteristic that 

you are addressing, and to arrange your 

input in the order of the questions as 

they are listed in the next section. 

General Assessment Questions 

(1) Propose an assessment system 

(that is, a series of one or more 

assessments) that you would 

recommend and that meets the general 

requirements and required 

characteristics described in this notice. 

Describe how this assessment system 

would address the tensions or tradeoffs 

in meeting all of the general 

requirements and required 

characteristics. Describe the strengths 

and limitations of your recommended 

system, including the extent to which it 

is able to validly meet each of the 

requirements described in this notice. 

Where possible, provide specific 

illustrative examples. 

(2) For each assessment proposed in 

response to question (1), describe the— 

• Optimal design, including— 

Æ Type (e.g., norm-referenced, 

criterion-referenced, adaptive, 

other); 

Æ Frequency, length, and timing of 

assessment administrations 

(including a consideration of the 

value of student, teacher, and 

administrative time); 

Æ Format, item-type specifications 

(including the pros and cons of 

using different types of items for 

different purposes), and mode of 

administration; 

Æ Whether and how the above 

answers might differ for different 

grade levels and content areas; 

• Administration, scoring, and 

interpretation of any open-ended item 

types, including methods for ensuring 

consistency in teacher scoring; 

• Approach to releasing assessment 

items during each assessment cycle in 

order to ensure public access to the 

assessment questions; and 

• Technology and other resources 

needed to develop, administer, and 

score the assessments, and/or report 

results. 

(3) ARRA requires that States award at 

least 50 percent of their Race to the Top 

funds to LEAs. The section of this notice 

entitled Design of Assessment 

Systems—LEA-Level Activities, 

describes how LEAs might be required 

to use these funds. What activities at the 

LEA level would best advance the 

transition to and implementation of the 

consortium’s common, college and 

career ready standards and assessments? 

(4) If a goal is that teachers are 

involved in the scoring of constructed 

responses and performance tasks in 

order to measure effectively students’ 

mastery of higher-order content and 

skills and to build teacher expertise and 

understanding of performance 

expectations, how can such assessments 

be administered and scored in the most 

time-efficient and cost-effective ways? 

(5) Given the assessment design you 

proposed in response to question (1), 

what is your recommended approach to 

competency-based student testing 

versus grade-level-based student 

testing? Why? How would your design 

ensure high expectations for all 

students? 

(6) Given the assessment design you 

proposed in response to question (1), 

how would you recommend that the 

assessments be designed, timed, and 

scored to provide the most useful 

information on teacher and principal 

effectiveness? 

Specific Technical Assessment 

Questions 

(1) What is the best technical 

approach for ensuring the vertical 

alignment of the entire assessment 

system across grades (e.g., grades 3 

through 8 and high school)? 

(2) What would be the best technical 

approach for ensuring external validity 

of such an assessment system, 

particularly as it relates to 

postsecondary readiness and highquality internationally benchmarked 

content standards? 

(3) What is the proportion of 

assessment questions that you 

recommend releasing each testing cycle 

in order to ensure public access to the 

assessment while minimizing linking 

risk? 1 What are the implications of this 

proportion for the costs of developing 

new assessment questions and for the 

costs and design of linking studies 

across time? 

High School Assessment 

Provide recommendations on the 

optimal approach to measuring each 

student’s college and career readiness 

by the time of high school completion. 

In particular, consider— 

(1) How would you demonstrate that 

high school students are on track to 

college and career readiness, and at 

what points throughout high school 

would you recommend measuring this? 

Discuss your recommendations on the 

use of end-of-course assessments versus 

comprehensive assessments of college 

and career readiness. 

Note: If you recommend end-of-course 

assessments, please share your input on how 

to reconcile the fact that college and career 

ready standards might not include all of the 

topics typically covered in today’s high 

school courses. 

Assessment of English Language 

Learners 

(1) Provide recommendations for the 

development and administration of 

assessments for each content area that 

are valid and reliable for English 

language learners. How would you 

recommend that the assessments take 

into account the variations in English 

language proficiency of students in a 

manner that enables them to 

demonstrate their knowledge and skills 

in core academic areas? Innovative 

assessment designs and uses of 

technology have the potential to be 

inclusive of more students. How would 

you propose we take this into account? 

(2) In the context of reflecting student 

achievement, what are the relative 

merits of developing and administering 

content assessments in native 

languages? What are the technical, 

logistical, and financial requirements? 

Assessment of Students With 

Disabilities 

(1) Taking into account the diversity 

of students with disabilities who take 

the assessments, provide 

recommendations for the development 


CPrice-Sewell on DSKGBLS3C1PROD with NOTICES
54800 Federal Register / Vol. 74, No. 204 / Friday, October 23, 2009 / Notices 

and administration of assessments for 

each content area that are valid and 

reliable, and that enable students to 

demonstrate their knowledge and skills 

in core academic areas. Innovative 

assessment designs and uses of 

technology have the potential to be 

inclusive of more students. How would 

you propose we take this into account? 

Technology & Innovation in Assessment 

(1) Propose how you would 

recommend that different innovative 

technologies be deployed to create 

better assessments, and why. Please 

include illustrative examples in areas 

such as novel item types, constructed 

response scoring solutions, uses of 

mobile computing devices, and so on. 

(2) We envision the need for a 

technology platform for assessment 

development, administration, scoring, 

and reporting that increases the quality 

and cost-effectiveness of the 

assessments. Describe your 

recommendations for the functionality 

such a platform could and should offer. 

(3) How would you create this 

technology platform for summative 

assessments such that it could be easily 

adapted to support practitioners and 

professionals in the development, 

administration, and/or scoring of highquality interim assessments? 

(4) For the technology ‘‘platform’’ 

vision you have proposed, provide 

estimates of the associated development 

and ongoing maintenance costs, 

including your calculations and 

assumptions behind them. 

Project Management 

(1) Provide estimates of the 

development, maintenance, and 

administration costs of the assessment 

system you propose, and your 

calculations and assumptions behind 

them. 

(2) Describe the range of development 

and implementation timelines for your 

proposed assessment system, from the 

most aggressive to more conservative, 

and describe the actions that would be 

required to achieve each option. 

(3) How would you recommend 

organizing a consortium to achieve 

success in developing and 

implementing the proposed assessment 

system? What role(s) do you recommend 

for third parties (e.g., conveners, project 

managers, assessment developers/ 

partners, intermediaries)? What would 

you recommend that a consortium 

demonstrate to show that it has the 

capacity to implement the proposed 

plan? 

Accessible Format: Individuals with 

disabilities can obtain this document in 

an accessible format (e.g., braille, large 

print, audiotape, or computer diskette) 

on request to the program contact 

person listed under FOR FURTHER

INFORMATION CONTACT. 

Electronic Access to This Document: 

You can view this document, as well as 

all other documents of this Department 

published in the Federal Register, in 

text or Adobe Portable Document 

Format (PDF) on the Internet at the 

following site: http://www.ed.gov/news/ 

fedregister. 

To use PDF you must have Adobe 

Acrobat Reader, which is available free 

at this site. If you have questions about 

using PDF, call the U.S. Government 

Printing Office (GPO), toll free, at 1– 

888–293–6498; or in the Washington, 

DC, area at (202) 512–1530. 

Note: The official version of this document 

is the document published in the Federal 

Register. Free Internet access to the official 

edition of the Federal Register and the Code 

of Federal Regulations is available on GPO 

Access at: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/nara/ 

index.html. 

Dated: October 20, 2009. 

Arne Duncan, 

Secretary of Education. 

[FR Doc. E9–25600 Filed 10–22–09; 8:45 am] 

BILLING CODE 4000–01–P 

DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY 

Federal Energy Regulatory 

Commission 

Notice of Filings #1 

October 16, 2009. 

Take notice that the Commission 

received the following electric rate 

filings: 

Docket Numbers: ER10–44–000. 

Applicants: Ameren Services 

Company. 

Description: Illinois Power Co submits 

the Transmission Construction 

Agreement between Ameren Services 

and Prairie State Generating Company, 

LLC, to be effective 10/6/09. 

Filed Date: 10/13/2009. 

Accession Number: 20091014–0081. 

Comment Date: 5 p.m. Eastern Time 

on Tuesday, November 3, 2009. 

Take notice that the Commission 

received the following electric securities 

filings: 

Docket Numbers: ES10–4–000. 

Applicants: Trans Bay Cable LLC. 

Description: Application of Trans Bay 

Cable LLC for Authority to Issue 

Securities. 

Filed Date: 10/15/2009. 

Accession Number: 20091015–5102. 

Comment Date: 5 p.m. Eastern Time 

on Monday, November 2, 2009. 

Docket Numbers: ES10–5–000. 

Applicants: System Energy Resources, 

Inc. 

Description: Application of System 

Energy Resources, Inc., for 

Authorization Under FPA Section 204. 

Filed Date: 10/15/2009. 

Accession Number: 20091015–5103. 

Comment Date: 5 p.m. Eastern Time 

on Monday, November 2, 2009. 

Any person desiring to intervene or to 

protest in any of the above proceedings 

must file in accordance with Rules 211 

and 214 of the Commission’s Rules of 

Practice and Procedure (18 CFR 385.211 

and 385.214) on or before 5 p.m. Eastern 

time on the specified comment date. It 

is not necessary to separately intervene 

again in a subdocket related to a 

compliance filing if you have previously 

intervened in the same docket. Protests 

will be considered by the Commission 

in determining the appropriate action to 

be taken, but will not serve to make 

protestants parties to the proceeding. 

Anyone filing a motion to intervene or 

protest must serve a copy of that 

document on the Applicant. In reference 

to filings initiating a new proceeding, 

interventions or protests submitted on 

or before the comment deadline need 

not be served on persons other than the 

Applicant. 

The Commission encourages 

electronic submission of protests and 

interventions in lieu of paper, using the 

FERC Online links at http:// 

www.ferc.gov. To facilitate electronic 

service, persons with Internet access 

who will eFile a document and/or be 

listed as a contact for an intervenor 

must create and validate an 

eRegistration account using the 

eRegistration link. Select the eFiling 

link to log on and submit the 

intervention or protests. 

Persons unable to file electronically 

should submit an original and 14 copies 

of the intervention or protest to the 

Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, 

888 First St., NE., Washington, DC 

20426. 

The filings in the above proceedings 

are accessible in the Commission’s 

eLibrary system by clicking on the 

appropriate link in the above list. They 

are also available for review in the 

Commission’s Public Reference Room in 

Washington, DC. There is an 

eSubscription link on the Web site that 

enables subscribers to receive email 

notification when a document is added 

to a subscribed dockets(s). For 

assistance with any FERC Online 

service, please email 

FERCOnlineSupport@ferc.gov. or call 


CPrice-Sewell on DSKGBLS3C1PROD with NOTICES