The 2014 Michigan Public High School Context and Performance Report Card is the Mackinac Center's second effort to measure high school performance. The first high school assessment was published in 2012, followed by the Center's 2013 elementary and middle school report card, which used a similar methodology to evaluate school performance. The…

Few arguments about education are as effective at galvanizing public attention and motivating political action as those that compare the performance of students with their counterparts in other countries and that connect academic achievement to economic performance. Because data from international large-scale assessments (ILSA) have a powerful…

The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) makes possible comparison of groups of students and provides information about what these groups know and can do. The scale anchoring techniques described in this chapter address the latter purpose. The direct method and the smoothing method of scale anchoring are discussed. (SLD)

Recent test results reveal that the test score decline has ended, but the legacy of this highly publicized educational episode continues. One widespread interpretation of the decline and recovery is that permissiveness and a collapse of standards in the late 1960s led to the decline and that a return to the basics and to tougher standards caused…

The purpose of this paper is (1) to discuss a set of standards that can be used to evaluate potential assessment instruments; and (2) to use these standards to evaluate the American College Testing Program's College Outcomes Measures Program (ACT-COMP) and the Educational Testing Service (ETS) Academic Profile. Using the work of S. Messick (1975,…

As the nation celebrates the 50th Anniversary of the 1954 Brown Decision, it is important to examine the achievement gap between children attending resegregated public schools and their counterparts attending integrated schools. The achievement gap is directly impacted by four specific interdependent types of deficits: moral, human capital,…

The phenomenon of simultaneous differential item functioning (DIF) amplification and cancellation and the role of the SIBTEST computer program in detecting it were studied. A variety of simulated test data was generated for this purpose. In addition, the following real test data were used: (1) American College Testing program data for 2,115 males…

Data from the Canadian Test of English for Scholars and Trainees (CanTEST) are compared to data from the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) to establish CanTEST as a valid admissions tool for English-as-a-Second Language college applicants. Data are taken from four groups of examinees who took both tests. (eight references) (LR)