Nationally, there are dozens of established indicators of school performance and thousands of possible combinations of those indicators to create an accountability framework. How do policy makers decide which variables are most important? This relates to measurement modeling -- that is, how to incorporate all pieces of the puzzle into a…

The quality and types of relationships formed between students and teachers has been shown to play an essential part in the personal and academic success of students (Davis, 2003; Pianta, 1999). Little, however, has been done to determine the role that assessment plays in teacher-student relationships. Drawing upon the work of cultural…

This report documents efforts to develop instruments for data-gathering and to train field staff in the use of the instruments, as part of a feasibility study designed to validate a conceptual framework that describes the elements of California's special education prereferral and alternative assessment procedures for ethno-linguistically diverse…