Testing Burden on ELLs Needs Easing, Federal Officials Say

Education Week: Libia Gil, the head of the U.S. Department of Education's office of English-language acquisition, says she's working with Secretary of Education Arne Duncan to ease the burden of testing for English-learners and their teachers.

"We do believe in annual testing, but we also believe there's overtesting. It's coming from all over. You have state assessments, you have local assessments, you have classroom assessments—some for different purposes, not all for accountability," said Ms. Gil, a veteran bilingual and dual-language educator who came to OELA in September 2013.

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