Many of the analytical models commonly used in educational research often aim to maximize explained variance and identify variable importance within models. These models are useful for understanding general ideas and trends, but give limited insight into the individuals within said models. Data envelopment analysis (DEA), is a method rooted in…

Item response models typically assume that the item characteristic (step) curves follow a logistic or normal cumulative distribution function, which are strictly monotone functions of person test ability. Such assumptions can be overly-restrictive for real item response data. We propose a simple and more flexible Bayesian nonparametric IRT model…