Early childhood education programs play an important role in child family-to-school transition. In 1998, California voters passed Proposition 10, the California Children and Families Act, which levied a 50-cent tax on each pack of cigarettes and other tobacco products to finance programs for children ages 0-5. In less than two decades, First 5…

This article proposes that sampling design effects have potentially huge unrecognized impacts on the results reported by large-scale district and state assessments in the United States. When design effects are unrecognized and unaccounted for they lead to underestimating the sampling error in item and test statistics. Underestimating the sampling…

This report on a statewide telephone survey describes child care use in Minnesota among households with children 12 and younger. Minnesota has an estimated 908,000 children ages 12 and younger; 24 percent are ages 0 to 2, 24 percent ages 3 to 5, 30 percent ages 6 to 9 and 23 percent ages 10 to 12. Of the nearly 500,000 households with one or more…

The National Education Association's Task Force on Testing has stated its opinion that standardized tests are overused. The task force suggests that the application of sampling techniques and a variety of alternatives to current testing practices would accomplish the same purposes. Representatives of the testing industry have indicated that the…

Pennsylvania's Educational Quality Assessment Program provides each participating school with a building level report in which state percentiles are a prominent part. Multiple matrix sampling was being considered as a technique to reduce testing time. However, there was great concern that the error associated with estimating the school mean might…

This report contains the results of the first statewide educational learner pilot assessment in Wisconsin. The objectives of the program were: (1) to develop and refine the statewide assessment process including instrument development, instrument administration, analysis, interpretation, and dissemination of the results; (2) to provide a…

This study addressed statistical techniques that might ameliorate some of the sampling problems currently facing states with small populations participating in State National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) assessments. The study explored how the application of finite population correction factors to the between-school component of…

This report contains an interpretive analysis of individual test items used in the 1973 Wisconsin State Mathematics Assessment at grades 3 and 7. The sampling procedures, organization, interpretation of data, limitations, and useful definitions of the test, and test results are discussed. The analysis includes an evaluation of each test item and…

The reading assessment undertaken by the Department of Public Instruction in May 1973 was a pilot study. As such its primary purpose was to provide information for future assessment instruments, administration procedures, sampling procedures, and data analysis alternatives. Thus, this document contains a critical examination of the pilot…

The paper, one of a series written as the Management Information System for Occupational Education (MISOE) was conceptualized, examines relationships between the anticipated census and sample data to be developed and maintained by the system. Two related information sources are planned: one is a census information system which includes data about…

This paper examined the status of assessment of writing as it is currently performed in the United States. All fifty states and the District of Columbia responded to a survey requesting information on their testing programs. Twenty-six states and the District of Columbia were found to assess writing on the statewide level, and eight states were in…

The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) measures the educational achievement of nationally representative samples of students in grades 4, 8, and 12. Local educational agencies tend to view the NAEP as a benchmark to which the educational achievement of their students can be compared. In particular, state departments of education…

California Assessment Program's application of matrix sampling and item response curve theory to the scaling and reporting of state assessment data is described. It is designed to express educational outcomes in an efficient and interpretable form that is both immediately informative and suited to analysis over extended periods of time.…

Ohio's Statewide Needs Assessment is designed to provide baseline data about students' learning in cognitive areas. Over several years, students at various grade levels will be assessed. The areas to be assessed, as well as the grades of the students to be assessed, will be considered and advised upon by the ESEA Title III State Advisory Council.…

This report describes the comprehensive evaluation study of the California State Preschool Program which involved elementary school children in educationally disadvantaged areas throughout California. Various test scores of approximately 6000 children in kindergarten, first, and second grade who had previously participated for at least a year in…