Monday May 4, 7:45 am Eastern Time
Company Press Release
TASA's BETA Subsidiary Awarded Texas LEP Subcontract
BREWSTER, N.Y.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 4, 1998--Touchstone Applied Science Associates (NASDAQ:TASA - news), Brewster, NY, announced today
that its subsidiary Beck Evaluation and Testing Associates (BETA) has received a five-year subcontract from the Texas Education Agency as part of a bid with
National Computer Systems, Inc. (NCS). The contract is for the development of a statewide testing program for Limited English Proficiency (LEP) students in
Texas. As part of this new statewide program, BETA will develop English reading proficiency tests annually for LEP students in Grades 3 through 8. The terms of
the subcontract were not disclosed.
''This award brings to six the number of state-level contracts that BETA has received during the past 12 months,'' noted Andrew L. Simon, President and CEO of
TASA. ''BETA now provides test assessment and design (psychometric) services to Minnesota, Delaware, Michigan, Rhode Island, and Virginia, as well as to
Texas. These six BETA assessment contracts represent our growing participation in the reading assessment market and complement TASA's own Degrees of
Reading Power (DRP) assessment commitments.''
''We substantially broadened our assessment capabilities last year,'' Mr. Simon continued, ''with the acquisition of BETA and the purchase of the Maculaitis
Assessment of Competencies (the MAC). The MAC is a series of English mastery tests that includes reading, writing, and speaking assessments for students with a
limited English proficiency in pre-K through high school. With the growing emphasis nationwide for all students educated in the United States to achieve proficiency
in English, we expect the LEP sector of our assessment business to grow rapidly. TASA now offers administrators and teachers of LEP students either custom tests
from BETA, or Maculaitis tests from our catalog. New Jersey, for example, tests its LEP students with our Maculaitis test. We view the new Texas LEP assessment
subcontract as a natural outgrowth of our interest in providing quality LEP assessments, of BETA's strengths in customized testing, and of BETA's 15-year history of
working with the Texas Education Agency.''
BETA President Michael D. Beck added, ''We provide custom assessment services directly to state education authorities as well as indirectly through the two
largest commercial contractors in the contract/customized assessment market: National Computer Systems and Harcourt Brace. Our business strategy is to provide
these specialized services for the major state contracts as a subcontractor, primarily for assessment or psychometric services and actual test design and development.
The prime contractor provides for all the printing, logistics, warehousing, scoring and reporting services necessary to complete the state contracts. It's a system that
works well for us, and works well for our clients.''
TASA provides assessment and instructional products and services to the educational markets. Its customers include individual states, schools, colleges, and
universities, as well as parents and individual teachers primarily in grades K - 4. For the assessment markets, the Company develops, publishes, and distributes a
highly regarded, proprietary line of reading tests, and custom designs tests specifically to meet clients' measurement specifications. For the instructional markets,
TASA subsidiary Modern Learning Press designs, publishes, and distributes affordable ''consumable'' student workbooks for grades K-4, and creates and
publishes books and pamphlets for elementary school teachers and parents. In conjunction with Yale University's Gesell Institute, it publishes a line of books on the
Gesell child development scales, a predictor of a young child's readiness to start kindergarten. In March 1998, TASA announced execution of a letter of intent to
acquire its initial educational delivery capability -- The Drake Business Schools. The acquisition is anticipated to close July 1, 1998.
For further information, please contact either Mr. Andrew Simon, CEO at 914-277-8100 or Mr. John Dutton, CFO at 213-630-4401, or visit the TASA website
at www.tasa.com.
Statements contained in this release, which are not historical facts, are ''forward-looking'' statements as contemplated by the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act
of 1995. Such forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties, which could cause actual results to differ materially from those projected or implied
in the forward-looking statements.
Contact:
For further information:
Mr. Andrew Simon, CEO
914-277-8100
or
Mr. John Dutton, CFO
213-630-4401
tasa.com
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