Like most other states, Missouri uses assessments intended to measure whether students are on a pathway to "college and career readiness." The state longitudinal data system now has the capacity to directly test that claim. We make use of 8th-grade assessment (MAP) scores in Math, Science, and Communication Arts for roughly 260,000…

We investigated two research questions: which students are more likely to respond inconsistently to mixed-worded questionnaire scales, and which country samples have larger shares of inconsistent respondents? We defined an inconsistent response as strongly agreeing or disagreeing with both positively and negatively worded items of the same scale.…

In this quasi-experimental design (QED) study, we examined the impacts of Catapult Learning's Wraparound Supplemental Educational Services program on Grades 6-8 student math and reading achievement in selected schools in a large parochial school district. The primary focus of this report was Wraparound Supplemental Educational Services' impact on…

This study capitalizes on response and process data from the computer-based TIMSS 2019 Problem Solving and Inquiry tasks to investigate gender differences in test-taking behaviors and their association with mathematics achievement at the eighth grade. Specifically, a recently proposed hierarchical speed-accuracy-revisits (SAR) model was adapted to…

Previous literature has indicated a lack of information available regarding virtual schooling and how it compares to traditional schooling in terms of the academic achievement of students (Angiello, 2010; Brady, 2012; Dichev, Dicheva, Agre, & Angelova, 2013; Molnar et al., 2019; Molnar, 2021). This study aimed to examine differences among…

Principals (policy makers) have debated the progress in U.S. student performance for a half century or more. Informing these conversations, survey agents have administered seven million psychometrically linked tests in math and reading in 160 waves to national probability samples of selected cohorts born between 1954 and 2007. This study is the…

This paper targets patterns of expressed emotional directions towards mathematics. By using TIMSS data and recoding two of the instruments, we compared responses from the same student cohort in Grade 4 (11 years old) and Grade 8 (15 years old) in Sweden. Two hypotheses were tested: negative emotions including negative motivations increase with…

This study identifies students' academic trajectories in the middle grades relative to a set of college readiness benchmarks. We apply math and reading college readiness benchmarks to rich longitudinal data for more than 360,000 students across the nation. Student-level and school-level demographic characteristics significantly predict academic…

The aim of this study is to investigate the presence of DIF over the gender variable with the latent class modeling approach. The data were collected from 953 students who participated in the PISA 2018 8th-grade financial literacy assessment in the USA. Latent Class Analysis (LCA) approach was used to identify the latent classes, and the data fit…

The study aimed to identify significant disparities in the reading growth of English learners (ELs) enrolled in either push-in or pull-out EL services, as measured by the ACCESS and MAP assessments. Conducted at a middle school in southwestern Illinois, the research focused on the impact of different EL programming types on the reading performance…

The purpose of this non-experimental quantitative research study was to compare the mathematics and science achievement of eighth-grade students in STEM vs. nonSTEM middle schools in Middle Georgia. There was minimal research in regard to the benefits STEM education has on middle schools in Middle Georgia as the initial push and adoption of STEM…

Nearly 14 million species are estimated to exist on Earth, of which 1.8 million have been identified, and new species are being added to the world of science every day. Therefore, scientists are aware that there are still unidentified species living globally. Biodiversity is a wide concept encompassing all living things in our living space. This…

This study developed and validated the Science Practice Scale (SPS) and investigated the implementation of scientific teaching practices by Grade 8 science teachers in Jordan. The responses of 235 8th grade science teachers who participated in the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study [TIMSS] of 2019 were analysed using the Rasch…

This quantitative, ex post facto study is to examine what differences exist, if any, in ACT Aspire math scores based on gender, instructional method, and the interaction between gender and instructional method among ninth grade students taking Algebra 1 in a school district located in Northeast Arkansas. Using a two-way ANOVA, the first main…

Researchers, school personnel and parents are concerned with students' academic motivation. However, research on the topic yields ambiguous results. While adolescents in Western societies report a decline in achievement drive over the school years, adolescents in some Eastern societies may avoid this negative trend. In addition to personal…