This article examines the impacts of Arkansas charter schools on the academic achievement of participating students. Our findings are that charter schools have small but statistically significant, negative impacts on student achievements for both math and literacy. Such negative effects, however, tend to decline with the number of years of charter…

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to identify various U.S. state education departments' criteria for determining the severity of language impairment in children, with particular focus on the use of norm-referenced tests. A secondary objective was to determine if norm-referenced tests of child language were developed for the purpose of…

The patterns of brain activation during norm-referenced and criterion-referenced feedback were compared, using the functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Twenty-two healthy right-handed individuals performed a series of perceptual judgment tasks while their brain activity was recorded. The participants responded to a performance-approach…

The appropriate analysis of students' responses to an assessment is an essential step in improving the quality of the assessment itself as well as staff teaching and student learning. Many academics are unfamiliar with the formal processes used to analyze assessment results; the standard statistical methods associated with analyzing the validity…

State program practices in norm-referenced testing (NRT) are described as found in the 1990-91 school year and prior years to provide information on years of administration of the same test and the age of the norms. All 50 State Departments of Education were surveyed in 2 stages. States without NRT were asked to described their testing policies;…

The purpose of this technical report is to describe the Tests of General Ability and Tests of Reading of the Inter-American Series, to give a brief account of their construction, and to present related statistical data. Norms and suggestions on the use and interpretation of the tests are published separately. The Inter-American Series discussed in…

John J. Cannell's late 1980s "Lake Wobegon" reports suggested widespread deliberate educator manipulation of norm-referenced standardized test (NRT) administrations and results, resulting in artificial test score gains. The Cannell studies have been referenced in education research since, but as evidence that high stakes (and not cheating or lax…

The 4,987 freshmen who entered the Bloomington campus of Indiana University in the fall of 1977 were used to establish two schemes for predicting first-semester grade point averages. Three sets of prediction equations and a graphic scheme for determining probable grade point averages were provided. Entering freshmen norms were included for SAT…