The Comprehensive Tests of Basic Skills, Form U, is scored in two ways: number-correct and pattern. The latter makes use of the information about which particular items are answered correctly, giving more weight to the more discriminating items and making allowances for guessing. Critics have suggested that black students are penalized by pattern…

This is a descriptive study of the activities, statistics, and decisions made regarding the re-testing of six inner-city elementary schools, based on results of a norm-referenced achievement test given in the Cincinnati Public School district in April, 1985. Three statistical operations were performed on test data from the Design for School…

In the Louisiana Basic Skills Testing (BST) program, initiated in 1982, criterion-referenced tests of language arts and mathematics were administered to all second grade students. Longitudinal data over three years tracked four cohorts of students to address when retention appears to be most effective and whether a combination of repeated…

One of a series of studies examining Louisiana's compensatory education program, this study investigated four assumptions upon which a skill-specific intervention program was based. Framed as questions, these assumptions are: (1) Is retention effective for students who do not know basic content for a given grade level? (2) When is retention most…

Due to a concern regarding the validity of Chicago public elementary schools standardized test scores on the Iowa Tests of Basic Skills, a test audit was conducted. The audit was limited to 40 schools. Two schools were selected from each of the 20 administrative districts, with each school testing one seventh- and one eighth-grade class. These…

The results of an evaluation of Vermont's statewide assessment initiative are presented, with information about the implementation of the program, its effects on educational practice, the analytic challenge presented by the portfolio scoring process, the reliability and validity of portfolio scores, and the tensions between assessment and…

The operational preparations for the Dutch national assessment program in education started in 1986. The program's aim is to periodically describe the contents of the curriculum in use and the attainment of 8-year-old and 11-year-old students on a national basis by means of surveys. In this paper some of the guiding principles in instrument…

School effectiveness indices (SEIs), based on regressing test performance onto earlier test performance and a socioeconomic status measure, were obtained for eight subject-grade combinations from 485 South Carolina elementary schools. The analysis involved school means based on longitudinally matched student data. Reading and mathematics…

The purposes of this study were to examine the relationship between academic achievement and demographic and school background variables for school districts and school buildings and to develop from these relationships a basis for comparing achievement at similar schools. The sample consisted of Iowa public school districts that participated in…