Public Comment Response

Response to Public Comments Received During the 30-day Comment Period

April 2022

Private School Universe Survey (PSS) 2023-2024 Data Collection,
and 2023-24 and 2025-26 PSS Frame Development Activities

ED-2022-SCC-0012 Comments on FR Doc # 2022-01900

Name: Carl Bryan, Administrative Rules Coordinator, Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction

The Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction (WDPI) appreciates the opportunity to provide feedback on the Institute of Educational Sciences, United States Department of Education’s (USDE) request for comment regarding the Private School Universe Survey (PSS) 2023-24 Data Collection, and 2023-24 and 2025-26 PSS Frame Development Activities. The WDPI respectfully submits the below comments for consideration.

The WDPI currently provides a list of private schools as a precursor to the PSS every other year. The WDPI increasingly requires the ability to be able to ingest the private school NCES identifiers back into our own systems, but there currently is no streamlined way to match the list of private schools back to the directory that the WDPI maintains. The WDPI requests that the USDE also store states’ local identifiers, similar to the process that happens through file specification FS029 Directory under EDFacts. This would be especially helpful with statewide ACT testing, where the WDPI is integrating with the test vendor to both send student rosters and receive back outcomes. This process also includes private schools in Wisconsin that participate in the state’s parental choice programs.

Thank you for the opportunity to comment. If you have any questions, please contact Yvette Johanson, Data Warehouse & Decision Support Team, at yvette.johanson@dpi.wi.gov.

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NCES Response:

Dear Mr. Bryan,

Thank you for your feedback submitted March 28, 2022, responding to a 30-day request for comments on the proposed Private School Universe Survey (PSS) 2023-2024 Data Collection, and 2023-24 and 2025-26 PSS Frame Development Activities. The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) appreciates your interest in the PSS survey.

At this time, NCES does not have any plans to collect state identifiers for private schools. NCES has sources of potential private schools other than state departments of education and we would not have state identifiers for these schools. As the definition of a private school NCES uses varies from those used by some state departments of education, some private schools on state lists would not match to a school on the PSS.

Currently, it is possible match schools on the PSS (responding schools only – NCES does not release information on nonresponding schools) by using the school’s name and geographic information on the public-use PSS files located at https://nces.ed.gov/surveys/pss/pssdata.asp

Sincerely,

Steve Broughman

Private School Universe Survey

Cross-Sectional Surveys Branch

National Center for Education Statistics (NCES)

U.S. Department of Education

Office: 202-245-8338

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