This report investigates the prediction of labor force status using observed variables, such as gender, age, and immigrant status, and more importantly, measured skill variables, including literacy proficiency and a categorical rating of educational attainment based on the 1994 International Adult Literacy Survey (IALS), the 2003 Adult Literacy…

Kindergarten readiness has received significant attention in recent years in response to concerns regarding preparing young children for school and beyond and mitigating persistent achievement gaps. Currently, there is little consensus around what factors drive and define kindergarten readiness. In this study, we sought to expand understanding of…

While many researchers have studied the relationship of socioeconomic status (SES) to adult learners' English language proficiency levels, little is known about this relationship for young learners (i.e., teenagers). In this study, we investigated the degree to which access to English language learning, as reflected by learners' SES, is associated…

Despite near universal acceptance in the value of higher education for individuals and society, college persistence rates in 4-year and community colleges are low. Only 57% of students who began college at a 4-year institution in 2001 had completed a bachelor's degree by 2007, and only 28% of community college students who started school in 2005…

This paper presents the theoretical and empirical foundations of the "TOEFL Junior"® assessment and its development process. The TOEFL Junior test was developed to address the increasing need for objective measures of English language proficiency for young adolescent learners, who are being introduced to English as a second or foreign…

Language test preparation has often been studied within the consequential validity framework in relation to ethics, equity, fairness, and washback of assessment. The use of independent and integrated speaking tasks in the "TOEFL iBT"® test represents a significant development and innovation in assessing speaking ability in academic…

This study attempts to identify different patterns of cognitive growth in kindergarten and first grade associated with selected subpopulations. The results are based upon a nationally representative sample of fall kindergartners who were retested in the spring of their kindergarten year and then again in the fall and spring of their first grade…

This study examined scores from 133,906 operationally scored Test of English as a Foreign Language™ (TOEFL®) essays to determine whether the choice of composition medium has any impact on score quality for subgroups of test-takers. Results of analyses demonstrate that (a) scores assigned to word-processed essays are slightly more reliable than…