This study aimed to examine the relationship between student engagement and student retention of adult learners at community colleges. The relationship between student retention and the five Community College Survey of Student Engagement (CCSSE) student engagement benchmarks (active and collaborative learning, student effort, academic challenge,…

The paper explores curriculum design and drivers of ethics in universities and the professional accounting bodies in Ghana. Data were collected through individual face-to-face interviews. The study revealed that ethics in the curricula of universities and professional bodies are integrated within and across subjects and within all levels of…

The purposes of the research were to: (1) create a scientific creativity measure for high school students; (2) examine the quality of the science creativity scale of the created test; (3) establish a benchmark for scientific creativity scores for high school students; and (4) study a scientific creativity level of students in the senior high…

The present study attempts to identify difficulties that Japanese students encounter with metadiscursive nouns in writing second language (L2) argumentation essays. Metadiscursive nouns are abstract and unspecific nouns which can serve as cohesive markers by retrieving their meanings in the text where they occur. Using a selected number of nouns…

Purpose: This study examines the effect of age and task complexity on the macrostructure of story production in preschool- and school-age Kuwaiti Arabic--speaking children. It also compares the children's production of core and complementary macrostructure story elements. Method: A descriptive, cross-sectional research design was used to explore…

Many standardized tests are now administered via computer rather than paper-and-pencil format. The computer-based delivery mode brings with it certain advantages. One advantage is the ability to adapt the difficulty level of the test to the ability level of the test taker in what has been termed computerized adaptive testing (CAT). A second…

This paper examines a procedure measuring student competencies in numeracy using school-based assessments, and demonstrates how the procedure informs the school system on quality improvement. The sample consisted of 7648 students, attending three different types of urban schools including government, formal private and low cost private in poor…

The creators and supporters of the Common Core State Standards claim that the Standards require greater emphasis on higher-order thinking than previous state standards in mathematics and English language arts. We used a qualitative case study design with content analysis methods to test the claim. We compared the levels of thinking required by the…

In this article, preProgress in Reading Literacy Study (prePIRLS) 2011 data is used to compare the performance of different language of instruction groupings (English, Afrikaans and African languages) in primary schools on the more complex, higher-order reading comprehension items tested in a large-scale international test. PrePIRLS 2011…

To help students master challenging, threshold concepts in physiology, I used the flipped learning model in a human anatomy and physiology course with very encouraging results in terms of student motivation, preparedness, engagement, and performance. The flipped learning model was enhanced by pre-training and formative assessments that provided…

Reading and understanding a written text is one of the most important skills in English learning.This study attempts to benchmark Year Five students' reading abilities of fifteen rural schools in a district in Malaysia. The objectives of this study are to develop a set of standardised written reading comprehension and a set of indicators to inform…

In 2001, the Community College Survey of Student Engagement (CCSSE) was created to provide information about student engagement, a key indicator of learning and, therefore, of the quality of community colleges. The focus was helping colleges use survey data to guide efforts to improve student learning and retention. In 2003, to further assist…

Measurement and evaluation of students' achievement are an important aspect to make sure that students really understand the course content and monitor students' achievement level. Performance is not only reflected from the numbers of high achievers of the students, but also on quality of the grade obtained; does the grade "A" truly…

In information-rich environments, schools are often presented with a myriad of data from which decisions need to be made. The use of the information on a classroom level may be facilitated if performance could be described in terms of levels of proficiency or benchmarks. The aim of this article is to explore benchmarks using data from a monitoring…

The results of formative assessments are regularly used to inform important instructional decisions (e.g., targeted intervention) within a response to intervention (RTI) system of teaching and learning. The validity of such instructional decision-making depends, in part, on the alignment between formative measures and the academic content…