President George W. Bush has appointed Lou Ramos, community relations manager for PPL Susquehanna, to a key national education advisory post.
Ramos' appointment to the National Assessment Governing Board gives him a voice in formulating educational testing policy on a national level. The board sets policy for the National Assessment of Educational Progress, commonly called the nation's report card.
The assessment is given every two years to about 120,000 students in grades 4, 8 and 12 in randomly selected public and private schools. They are tested most often in reading, writing, math and science.
"I'm proud to have been selected to help in building a better future for America in our children," Ramos said. "Serving on this board allows me to represent the local communities around the Susquehanna plant, and Pennsylvania as a whole, in the work being done on educational accountability, which is increasingly being required by federal legislation."
The only other member from Pennsylvania is state Rep. Dwight Evans, D-Philadelphia. Ramos' position on the national regulatory board is a part-time advisory post with a four-year term and a two-term limit.
The 26-member National Assessment Governing Board, created by Congress in 1988, selects subject areas to be assessed, identifies achievement goals, develops assessment objectives and test specifications, and develops guidelines for analysis.
"Many of our educators are not familiar with the national test since historically it has been voluntary," Ramos said. "Explaining the importance and relevance of this test is part of the role I can play."
A PPL employee for 31 years, Ramos became community relations manager for the Susquehanna nuclear power plant in July. He is a member of the Pennsylvania Board of Education and an architect of Allentown's school reform initiative before he moved to the Berwick area.
Ramos also served on a federal commission that published a report last year focusing on the need to assess the preparedness of 12th-grade students across the country to become productive citizens and compete in a global economy.
The Susquehanna plant, located in Luzerne County about seven miles north of Berwick, is owned jointly by PPL Susquehanna LLC and Allegheny Electric Cooperative Inc. and is operated by PPL Susquehanna.
PPL Susquehanna is one of PPL Corporation's generating facilities. Headquartered in Allentown, Pa., PPL Corporation (NYSE: PPL) controls more than 12,000 megawatts of generating capacity in the United States, sells energy in key U.S. markets and delivers electricity to nearly 5 million customers in Pennsylvania, the United Kingdom and Latin America. More information is available at www.pplweb.com.