Sepulveda, Pichardo, Rodriguez, Rivera, Arroyo, Davila, Dilan, De La Rosa, Ortiz, Ramos, Blake,
Aubry, Perry, Barron, Kim, Walker, Dickens, Hyndman, Mosley, Simon, Wright
MLTSPNSR
Add §208-b, Ed L; amd §296, Exec L
Prohibits collegiate learning assessment exams in colleges in the state; individual collegiate learning assessment exam results shall be considered private student information and may not be released by any college without the express written permission of the student test taker.
NEW YORK STATE ASSEMBLY MEMORANDUM IN SUPPORT OF LEGISLATION submitted in accordance with Assembly Rule III, Sec 1(f)
BILL NUMBER: A7091A
SPONSOR: Crespo TITLE OF BILL:
An act to amend the education law and the executive law, in relation to
prohibiting college learning assessment exams in colleges in the state
PURPOSE:
The purpose of this bill is to stop the administration of the collegiate
learning assessment exams before they are standardized college exit
exams. Such exams can be used as a discriminatory mechanism and can be
misleading in assessing student academic attainment will lead to job
discrimination based on test score.
SUMMARY OF PROVISION:
Section 1: Adds a new section 208(b) to prohibit collegiate learning
exams for any purposes other than internal assessment but the college/
university. Under this law, the board of regents is prohibited from
instituting or allowing the College Learning Assessment (CLA) exam from
being given at SUNY and CUNY campuses or at independent colleges and
universities for any purposes other than internal assessment but the
college! university.
Prohibits colleges or university from using CLA for any purpose other
than assessment of institutional effectiveness, course readiness of an
individual student, or internal assessment.
Individual exam results are to be considered private student information
and may not be released without express written permission by the test
taker.
Defines the term "collegiate learning assessment" as a standardized test
including, but not limited to proprietary tests such as the collegiate
learning assessment and the CLA+.
Section 2: Section 296 of the executive law is amended by adding a new
subdivision I-h declares it to be unlawful discriminatory practice for
an employer, labor organization, employment agency, or any joint labor-
management committee controlling apprentice training program to use the
results of CLA in the hiring or retaining of any person for the employ-
ment purposes or to compel a person to share with them the results of
their CLA.
Section 3: This act shall take effect immediately.
JUSTIFICATION:
At a time when college graduates are having extreme difficulties in
finding employment and are faced with paying large student loans and at
a time when the cost of obtaining a college education is negatively
impacting families across our State, a proposed new exit exam for
college students is being deployed on private college campuses and will
soon find its way to public colleges and universities.
The exit exam, developed by an offshoot of the controversial Rand Corpo-
ration, is called the Collegiate Learning Assessment (CLA).
It is a measurement of what a student has learned while in college and
the score can he required by a prospective employer. In a society were
high-stakes testing determines losers and winners, the CLA will create a
new mechanism to discriminate against students who are not good test
takers, students who can not afford the expensive prep classes for the
CLA, and low income students who enter college already at a disadvantage
based on the k-12 education they received.
No longer will a college degree he enough to enter the labor market.
Now employers will he able to ask for the former student's CLA score and
determine hiring prospects for that student based on that score. One
major and undisputable fact on the CLA is that SAT performance is tied
to CLA score.
So we now know that those with higher SAT scores will score higher in
the CLA exam. Resource-rich families and students who paid for SAT prep-
aration classes to increase their score will do the same for the CLA
exam, Those same students have had the benefits of private k-12 educa-
tion or are from well funded k-12 school districts.
As it now stands, New York State students have the worst average SAT
scores in the Northeastern United States. In addition, low income and
minority students score poorly on these exams. If the CLA is allowed to
become a standardized exit exam, it will make these students into
second-class recruits for employers. The CLA score will become a huge
obstacle to obtaining employment after college graduation.
The CLA can not be allowed to create a new barrier for college graduates
who have worked hard for their college degrees but will be faced with
employer discrimination based on this high stakes exam.
This legislation seeks to ban the use of the CLA at all State University
of New York and City University of New York colleges and universities
for any purposes other than internal assessment but the college/ univer-
sity. It also bans the use of the CLA by private colleges that receive
public funding from the State of New York; such as Bundy Aid, for any
purposes other than internal assessment but the college/ university.
To highlight the detrimental impact of the CLA on a college graduate,
you only need to know that the CLA score for a college administering the
exam will not be made public.
Yet the score for the individual student will now be a new standard that
employers can request at a job interview.
Jim Crow laws have evolved into such practices as a CLA exam and a score
that will decide who are the financial winners in our society. With
millions of Americans unemployed and underemployed and with the current
status of our labor market, the CLA will be systematizing a number of
economic, educational and social disadvantages that can not be allowed
to take hold in New York State.
With both the largest state supported public higher education system in
the nation and the largest municipal higher education system in the
nation via CUNY, New York can lead the way in preventing the negative
impact of the CLA on our college graduates and youth.
Employers who complain that college graduates are not prepared for the
labor market after college graduation do not need to base their hiring
choice on a standardized exam like the CLA. It is already well known
that the SAT is not a good predictor of college performance. Employers
need to better train their human resources staff to achieve the best
possible goals for their recruitment of new employees, not disguise
their biased hiring practice through requiring college graduates to
disclose a score that will fail to show their full potential.
At a time when minority students are becoming the largest group graduat-
ing from high schools and entering college, it appears that in combina-
tion with the projected reduction in the Caucasian labor force, a new
mechanism to systematically exclude prospective minority students from
the job market is being devised and implemented and slowly rolled out,
starting with private colleges.
While CLA style exit exams are used in some Western democracies, their
populations are homogeneous and those nations have not had the American
experience with institutionalized racial bigotry, biased public poli-
cies, and outright codifying of laws that discriminate based on race and
ethnicity.
The CLA represents that greatest threat to the civil rights of low-in-
come and minority youth and their communities in the past 50 years! It
must be banned in New York State.
FISCAL IMPLICATIONS:
None
EFFECTIVE DATE:
This act shall take effect immediately.
