Simulation studies are extremely common in the item response theory (IRT) research literature. This article presents a didactic discussion of "truth" and "error" in IRT-based simulation studies. We ultimately recommend that future research focus less on the simple recovery of parameters from a convenient generating IRT model,…

The choice of anchor tests is crucial in applications of the nonequivalent groups with anchor test design of equating. Sinharay and Holland (2006, 2007) suggested "miditests," which are anchor tests that are content-representative and have the same mean item difficulty as the total test but have a smaller spread of item difficulties.…

This paper illustrates that the psychometric properties of scores and scales that are used with mixed-format educational tests can impact the use and interpretation of the scores that are reported to examinees. Psychometric properties that include reliability and conditional standard errors of measurement are considered in this paper. The focus is…

This article discusses a particular type of concordance table and the potential for test score misuse that may result from employing such a table. The concordance that is discussed is typically created between scores on different, nonequatable versions of a test that share the same or close to the same test title. These concordance tables often…

State test score trends are widely interpreted as indicators of educational improvement. To validate these interpretations, state test score trends are often compared to trends on other tests such as the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). These comparisons raise serious technical and substantive concerns. Technically, the most…

Discusses the comparison of groups of individuals who were administered different forms of a test. Focuses on the situation in which there is little overlap in content between the test forms. Reviews equating problems in national tests in Canada and Israel. (SLD)

Discusses three common misconceptions about achievement testing: (1) the idea that men generally outscore women; (2) the notion that the primary role of norms is to compare one student to another; and (3) the misconception that it is not possible to measure the achievement of kindergarten and primary grade students with group tests. (SLD)

A conceptual analysis of gain scores and a technically sound procedure for using such scores to compare different instructional programs are presented. The procedure proposed makes use of an index called Rescaled and Adjusted Gains within Strata (RAGS), together with a flexible but explicit procedure for score analysis and reporting. (LC)