25th Apr 2006 07:01
Pearson PLC25 April 2006 25 April 2006 PEARSON ENTERS TEACHER CERTIFICATION MARKET: ACQUIRES NATIONAL EVALUATION SYTEMS,AMERICA'S LEADING TEACHER CERTIFICATION TESTING COMPANY Pearson, the international education and information company, today announcedthat it has agreed to acquire National Evaluation Systems, Inc (NES). NES is the leading provider of customised state assessments for teachercertification in the US. It works under contract with state education agencies,developing and administering licensure tests for prospective teachers who wantto enter the profession, teach a new subject or work in a new state. NES has long-term contracts with fifteen states, customising teachercertification tests to each states' curriculum standards in more than 100subject areas and providing approximately one million tests each year. Itmanages the entire testing process from research, test development andpsychometrics through to test administration, processing and scoring. Itsaverage contract length is five years and many of its contracts have lasted wellover a decade. Founded in 1972, NES is based in Amherst, Massachusetts, withregional offices and scoring centres in Sacramento, California; Albany, NewYork; and Austin, Texas. Teacher certification testing is a growing market, driven by the US government'srequirement for 'highly qualified' teachers and by the need for new teachers toenter the profession. There are approximately three million public schoolteachers in the US. Approximately 2.5 million new teachers will need to be hiredin the current decade, as 700,000 current teachers retire and 1.8 million areexpected to leave the profession prior to retirement. On average, nearly 6% ofthe teacher workforce does not return for each new academic year and half of allnew teachers leave the profession within five years. Emphasizing the recruitmentand retention of 'highly qualified' teachers and mandating that all 'coresubject' public school teachers must be certified, the US Congress allocated $3billion per year for teacher training and development when it reauthorized theElementary and Secondary Education Act which includes the provisions of No ChildLeft Behind. NES had sales of $73m in 2005 and gross assets of $16m at the year end. Pearsonexpects the acquisition to enhance adjusted earnings per share and return oninvested capital from 2007, its first full year. It expects the acquisition tobe earnings neutral in 2006, including integration costs. As part of Pearson, NES will operate alongside Pearson Educational Measurement,the US market leader in student assessment and testing. Pearson has long-termcontracts with more than 20 states to develop, administer, score and report theresults of student assessments against state curriculum standards, and workswith the US Department of Education to deliver the National Assessment ofEducational Progress ('The Nation's Report Card'). Pearson is also a leader inassessing and certifying professional people through its internationalprofessional testing business, Pearson VUE. Steve Dowling, President of Pearson's School companies, said: "The teacher is the key to student learning. This move into teachercertification testing is a natural fit with our existing School testingcapabilities and takes us into another growth market. Pearson's focus is allabout improving student achievement, and helping states to identify and certifyqualified teachers and providing teachers with services to get certified is atthe core of that goal. NES is a pioneer in this field and has talentedleadership and employees who will be great assets to Pearson." Dr. William Gorth, President and CEO of NES, said: "We are excited to join Pearson, which has outstanding assets in education andthe resources to grow the business." ENDS Further information Luke Swanson/ Simon Mays-Smith/ Deborah Lincoln: +44 (0)20 7010 2310Wendy Spiegel: +1 800 745-8489/ David Hakensen: +1 952 681 3040 About Pearson Education Educating 100 million people worldwide, Pearson Education (www.pearsoned.com) isthe global leader in educational publishing, providing scientificallyresearch-based print and digital programmes to help students of all ages learnat their own pace, in their own way. Almost all students in America learn from aPearson programme at some point in their educational career. Some 25,000 USschools and one million teachers and students use Pearson technology to helpinstruct preK-12 students and manage how they are doing. Pearson providesschools with custom services to create, deliver, score and report educationalassessments, both in print and online, that help promote learning. Pearson isthe market leader in Higher Education in print and digital products and servesmore than three million college students who are pursuing their courses onlineusing our programmes and applications. The company is home to such renownedpublishing brands as Pearson Prentice Hall, Pearson Longman, Pearson ScottForesman, Pearson Early Learning, Pearson Learning Group, Pearson DigitalLearning, and Pearson Addison Wesley. Pearson Education is part of Pearson (LSE:PSON; NYSE: PSO). In addition to Pearson Education, Pearson's primary operationsinclude the Financial Times Group and the Penguin Group. This information is provided by RNS The company news service from the London Stock ExchangeRelated Shares:
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