In this article, the change in examinee effort during an assessment, which we will refer to as persistence, is modeled as an effect of item position. A multilevel extension is proposed to analyze hierarchically structured data and decompose the individual differences in persistence. Data from the 2009 Program of International Student Achievement…

Methods for detecting differential item functioning (DIF) and item bias are typically used in the process of item analysis when developing new measures; adapting existing measures for different populations, languages, or cultures; or more generally validating test score inferences. In 2007 in "Language Assessment Quarterly," Zumbo…

In 2009, some Spanish regions implemented the Program School 2.0 with the purpose of introducing digital methodologies at schools. The aim of this paper is to analyse which part of the variation in reading scores is due to this program. For this purpose, we use data from the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA 2009 and 2012) for…

This article focuses on analysing the effect of educational differentiation policies of OECD educational systems on socioeconomically disadvantaged students, based on data from PISA 2009. The analysis is conducted on the basis of a definition of two subgroups of disadvantaged students: those that achieve high scores, and those obtaining scores…

Even as the Internet and i-devices have changed so many parts of people's lives, educational testing has not changed substantially in decades. Though researchers and educators have for years raised ample concerns about existing tests, assessments have barely evolved. Further, despite years of expanded testing and greater school accountability,…

In this article, the author tells the story of her search for appropriate tools to conceptualise policy work. She had set out to explore the relationship between the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and Australia's education policy, but early interview data…

While many nations express a commitment to improved educational quality, education often slips down on the policy agenda. Because the benefits of educational investments are seen only in the future, it is possible to underestimate the value and the importance of improvements. This report uses recent economic modelling to relate cognitive…

Differential item functioning (DIF) analysis is a statistical technique used for ensuring the equity and fairness of educational assessments. This study formulates a new DIF analysis method using the information similarity index (ISI). ISI compares item information functions when data fits the Rasch model. Through simulations and an international…

This book contains a compilation of papers presented at the International Conference on Education and New Developments (END 2017), organized by the World Institute for Advanced Research and Science (W.I.A.R.S.). Education, in our contemporary world, is a right since we are born. Every experience has a formative effect on the constitution of the…

The 7th International Conference on Education Data Mining held on July 4th-7th, 2014, at the Institute of Education, London, UK is the leading international forum for high-quality research that mines large data sets in order to answer educational research questions that shed light on the learning process. These data sets may come from the traces…