This review critiques the highly-praised and influential 2001 study, "Getting Tough? The Impact of High School Graduation Exams," which concluded that "minimum competency," or high school "graduation exams," had no effect on student achievement. The review compares the test classifications of "Getting…

The effect of incarceration on the academic growth of learning disabled juvenile delinquents, as well as the relationship between rate of achievement during incarceration and tenure in the institution, were investigated. Results showed that incarceration did increase academic achievement but that a negative relationship existed between tenure and…

Test scores for fall and spring administrations for two consecutive years for Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) Title I students in the Tucson Unified School District are presented and compared. The students were given out-of-level tests: the 138 seventh-grade students and 106 eighth-grade students were given Level 2 of the…

This evaluation of the 1989-90 Cumulative Deficits in Basic Skills Program (CDBSP) in Washington (District of Columbia) public schools uses achievement gains on the Comprehensive Test of Basic Skills (CTBS) and teacher use of specially developed instructional materials to assess program effectiveness. Information was gathered from an analysis of…

The instructional effectiveness of elementary classroom teachers is investigated through the use of distributions of student achievement scores. The data used for this investigation were reading, language, and arithmetic subtest scores on the Comprehensive Tests of Basic Skills for fifth and sixth grade public school children. Students were…

Three hundred fifty-nine pupils in grades four through six were given a supplemental guided discovery mathematics program designed for Special Elementary Education For the Disadvantaged (SEED). The guided discovery group improved approximately twice as much as the control group in arithmetic computation, concepts, application, total score, and in…

The relationship of teachers' cognitive styles and their pupils' achievement was examined for second and fifth graders. Results indicated significant effects due to teachers' cognitive styles, but there was no significant outcome (main or interaction effect) associated with the matching of teachers' and pupils' cognitive styles, or with grade…

This report summarizes the results of achievement tests administered in the Spring of 1981 to students in court-identified minority-isolated schools in San Diego, California. An introduction outlines the court order and describes the tests and the participating schools. In 28 of the 36 subject-grade level instances analyzed, student achievement on…

Achievement in reading and mathematics of students at elementary schools participating in the Columbus (Ohio) 1989 School Improvement Program (SIP) has improved for the seventh year in a row, but achievement of low income students remains below that of other students. The goal of SIP, an effective schools project, is to improve the academic…

In Summer Learning and the Effects of Schooling, Barabara Heyns found that schooling has a marked impact on achievement. This conclusion is based on analyses that show school-year achievement gains are greater than summer gains, summer being considered a temporary absence of schooling. Heyns' data came from a household survey and…

The general emphasis of Project LONGSTEP was on the identification of changes in student achievement that occur as a result of exposure to intensive educational innovation. During the course of the project, questions were raised concerning (1) the relevance of the standardized achievement test utilized in the project to the stated objectives of…

The Portland Public Schools 1984-85 Chapter 1 project included 4 public high schools, 48 public elementary schools, and 14 nonpublic elementary schools. About 6,500 students received supplementary support in basic skills, reading and/or math, in the 66 schools. These schools implemented three types of programs: HOSTS, Prescription Learning System…

During spring 1983, approximately 12,000 students who were enrolled in the court-identified minority-isolated (MI) schools in the San Diego City Schools were administered the appropriate levels of the Comprehensive Tests of Basic Skills (CTBS). The content areas of reading, language, and mathematics were assessed. In Grades 5, 7, and 9, all…

Normative data reported by publishers of the California Achievement Test, the Comprehensive Tests of Basic Skills, and the SRA Assessment Survey were used to illustrate a procedure for specifying goals for Title I programs in terms of normal curve equivalent (NCE) gains. The procedure was based on the amount of growth reflected in student reading…

When a program evaluation is conducted on the basis of gains made in standardized achievement test scores between a pretest and a posttest, serious bias can result where a floor effect exists on one or both of the test levels. Based upon the expanded standard scores on the Comprehensive Tests of Basic Skills from three successive regular spring…