New York, Arizona At Odds With Ed. Dept. Over English Testing

Federal education officials have told New York Commissioner of Education Richard P. Mills that his state must change the way it tests English-learners or lose federal aid.

Tom Dunn, a spokesman for the New York State Department of Education, responded in an e-mail message to Education Week last week that state officials are willing to “arrive at a solution,” but that it is “premature to outline a solution now.”

Under the federal No Child Left Behind Act, states must include English-language learners in regular standardized assessments in reading and mathematics and use those scores in calculating schools’ and districts’ yearly progress...