OMB83C Change Memo

DATE: April 12, 2017

TO: Robert Sivinski & E. Ann Carson, OMB

THROUGH: Kashka Kubzdela, NCES

FROM: Mary Coleman, NCES

Re: International Early Learning Study (IELS) 2018 Field Test Recruitment Confidentiality Pledge Change Request (OMB# 1850-0936 v.2)

The International Early Learning Study (IELS), scheduled to be conducted in 2018, is a new study sponsored by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), an intergovernmental organization of industrialized countries. In the United States, the IELS is conducted by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES). The IELS focuses on young children and their cognitive and non-cognitive skills and competencies as they transition to primary school. The IELS is designed to examine: children’s early learning and development in a broad range of domains, including social emotional skills as well as cognitive skills; the relationship between children’s early learning and children’s participation in early childhood education and care (ECEC); the role of contextual factors, including children’s individual characteristics and their home backgrounds and experiences, in promoting young children’s growth and development; and how early learning varies across and within countries prior to beginning primary school. In 2018, in the participating countries, including the United States, the IELS will assess nationally-representative samples of children ages 5.0-5.5 years (in kindergarten in the United States) through direct and indirect measures, and will collect contextual data about their home learning environments, ECEC histories, and demographic characteristics. The IELS will measure young children’s knowledge, skills, and competencies in both cognitive and non-cognitive domains, including language and literacy, mathematics and numeracy, executive function/self-regulation, and social emotional skills. This assessment will take place as children are transitioning to primary school and will provide data on how U.S. children entering kindergarten compare with their international peers on skills deemed important for later success. To prepare for the main study that will take place in September-November 2018, the IELS countries will conduct a field test in the fall of 2017 to evaluate newly developed assessment instruments and questionnaires and to test the study operations. The U.S. IELS field test data collection will occur from September to October, 2017. In order to meet the international data collection schedule for the fall 2017 field test, field test respondent recruiting activities must begin by May 2017. The request is to conduct recruitment activities for the 2017 IELS field test was approved in April 2017 (1850-0936 v.2).

This request is to update the confidentiality pledge cited as part of IELS to account for the Cybersecurity Enhancement Act of 2015 and to cite additional data security & confidentiality requirements.

Citation of the data security and confidentiality protection procedures has been expanded in Part A to reflect all of the laws and regulations with which IELS data collection contractors and agents comply. Also, the confidentiality pledge has been updated throughout the submission documents (Part A, Appendices A - B) to reflect the addition of the Cybersecurity Enhancement Act of 2015 provision. The revised pledge reads: “All of the information you provide may be used only for statistical purposes and may not be disclosed, or used, in identifiable form for any other purpose except as required by law (20 U.S.C. §9573 and 6 U.S.C. §151).”

These revisions do not affect the estimated burden to respondents or the total cost to the federal government for IELS 2018.