Educational Records Bureau
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Educational Records Bureau (ERB) is the only not-for-profit educational services organization offering assessments for both admission and achievement for independent and selective public schools for Pre K-grade 12.
Founded in 1927, ERB's mission is to create testing and learning solutions that help schools develop improved curriculum, teaching, and learning through diagnosis of assessment results that address essential learning standards.
ERB is headquartered in New York City and has over 2000 independent school and public school members globally.
Membership
Membership is available to public and private schools (see www.erblearn.org for information about becoming a member).
Leadership
The organization is governed by a board of trustees who are ultimately responsible for the organization. Members in 2011 were:[1]
Dr. David Magill, Director, University of Chicago Laboratory Schools
Marlene Shaw, Head of School, St. Mary’s Episcopal School
Dr. Daniel E. Waters, Superintendent, Tredyffrin-Easttown School District
Reveta Bowers, Head of School, Center for Early Education
Miguel J. Brito, Headmaster, St. Philip’s Academy
Dr. Lourdes Cowgill, President, Pine Crest School
Dr. Thomas Kelly, Head of School, Horace Mann School
Dr. T.J. Locke, Head of School, Isidore Newman School
Dr. Cheryl Maloney, Superintendent Weston Public Schools
Debbie Reed, Head of School Polytechnic School
Dr. Gary Richards, Superintendent Wilton Public Schools
Dr. Keith Shahan, Executive Director Independent Schools Association of the Central States
Rebecca Upham, Head of School Buckingham Browne & Nichols School
Andy Watson, Head of School Albuquerque Academy
Revenues and expenses
Testing fees is the largest single source of revenue for ERB. In 2009 revenue from fees paid for its testing programs was $14,299,243 according to its filings on its publicly available IRS tax forms 990.
In 2009 ERB granted $49,205 in financial aid to assist in admission test fees for 520 New York area students via the Independent Schools Admissions Association of Greater New York.
The second largest source of revenue was investment income of $1,163,458, followed by membership dues of $500,670.
Test preparation and administration constitute ERB's greatest expenses, with these costs being both internal and in fees paid to outside contractors (e.g. Educational Testing Service).
Executive officers also are a significant portion of ERBs expenses, with the single largest employee expense being for the president of ERB (David F. Clune), who received total compensation of $351,041 in 2009, which was down from $385,579 in 2008.
Goals
ERB is committed to:
- Developing improved methods of testing student achievement
- Reporting and interpreting individual and group test results to member schools
- Supporting strong linkages among students, the curriculum, and assessment practices, through staff workshops and consultations with educators and measurement specialists
Testing/assessment programs
ERB provides both admission and achievement assessment programs along with next steps support services for member schools.
ERB usually is unknown to the general public, but was mentioned in a New York Times Article in 2011 after a scoring error was made by one of its contractors on the ISEE admission test for the 2010/2011 testing year. About 7000 (or 17%) of the tested students had incorrect scores due to an error in use of a scoring key. ERB was not informed by its vendor, Measurement Inc., until after schools had mailed admission decisions to their applicants. Commenting on the effect of the error on students' school applications as reported by the New York Times, David F. Clune, of Wilton, Connecticut, and president of ERB, stated “It is a lesson we all learn at some point — that life isn’t fair.”.[2] Errors in scoring had affected a smaller number of students at other testing organizations, most notably with an error in the scoring of 4000 students in the October 2005 administration of the SAT.[3]
Admission
- Early Childhood Admission Assessment (ECAA)
- Independent School Entrance Examination (ISEE)
Achievement
- Children's Progress Academic Assessment (CPAA)
- Comprehensive Testing Program (CTP)
- Formative Content Bank (FCB)
- Writing Assessment Program (WrAP)
- Writing Practice Program (WPP)
References
- ↑ "ERB Our Trustees". Retrieved 2011-04-16.
- ↑ "New York Times April 8, 2011: "7,000 Private School Applicants Got Incorrect Scores, Company Says"". The New York Times. 2011-04-08.
- ↑ Hoover, Eric (2007-08-24). "$2.85-Million Settlement Proposed in Lawsuit Over SAT-Scoring Errors". The Chronicle of Higher Education. Archived from the original on 2007-09-30. Retrieved 2007-08-27.