Democrats from the House Education and Labor Committee sent a letter to U.S. Education Secretary Betsy DeVos to express concerns about new limits on Civil Rights Data Collection.
U.S. Rep. Bobby ScottThe Department of Education proposed to no longer collect certain data elements, including numbers on students who retake courses, preschool enrollment, students in English language programs categorized by disability status, teachers with repeated absences and preschool suspensions disaggregated by race, gender, disability and English language status.
In the letter, the representatives argued that the missing data would make it harder to assess and address inequities in education.
“By amending the collection of this data to remove key elements as proposed, the Department will significantly weaken a key source of information used to identify civil rights violations and address inequities in our educational system,” they wrote. “This proposal will undermine the bipartisan will of Congress to report vital information to parents and to the public.”
