Contextual multi-armed bandits have previously been used to personalize student support messages given to learners by supplying a model with relevant context about the user, problem, and available student supports. In this work, we propose using careful feature selection with relevant domain knowledge to improve the quality of student support…

Developing models and using mathematics are two key practices in internationally recognized science education standards, such as the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS). However, students often struggle with these two intersecting practices, particularly when developing mathematical models about scientific phenomena. Formative…

As we design increasingly complex systems, we run up against fundamental limitations of human imagination. To support practice, it becomes essential to use authentic data and algorithms as design materials to augment designers' intuitions. Recent work has explored some dimensions of using data as a design material, suggesting the contours of a new…

In analyzing exploratory repeated measures data with more than two measures, two competing tests must be administered simultaneously if one is to make an efficient and effective decision regarding the tenability of the null hypothesis of no differences among measurement means. Obviously, such a procedure is not without a cost vis-a-vis Type I…

This simulation study involved the design of two two-stage tests in which the routing tests and the second-stage measurement testlets took the form of a multidimensional knapsack problem with prespecified target informations and constraints to be enumerated using the algorithm of E. Balas. Two conventional tests of similar length to the two-stage…

The use of stepwise regression has been criticized for both interpretive misunderstandings and statistical aberrations. A major statistical problem with stepwise regression and other procedures that involve multiple significance tests is the inflation of the Type I error rate. General approaches to control the family-wise error rate such as the…

The graded response model for two-stage testing was applied to an attitudes toward science scale using real-data simulation. The 48-item scale was administered to 920 students at a grade-8 equivalent in Singapore. A two-stage 16-item computerized adaptive test was developed. In two-stage testing an initial, or routing, test is followed by a…

Advantages and disadvantages of standard Rasch analysis computer programs are discussed. The unconditional maximum likelihood algorithm allows all observations to participate equally in determining the measures and calibrations to be obtained quickly from a data set. On the advantage side, standard Rasch programs can be used immediately, are…

The extensive computer simulation work done in developing the computer adaptive versions of the Graduate Record Examinations (GRE) Board General Test and the College Board Admissions Testing Program (ATP) Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) is described in this report. Both the GRE General and SAT computer adaptive tests (CATs), which are fixed length…

Performance rating systems frequently use multiple raters in order to improve the reliability of ratings. However, unless all candidates are rated by the same raters, some candidates will be at an unfair advantage or disadvantage solely because they were rated by more stringent or lenient raters. To obtain fair and accurate evaluations of…