The rubric, a canonical matrix of criteria presented to students as the road map to academic success. An "Ah-ha" moment, "that is what I'm looking for" utopia for the instructor. While rubrics provide the possibility for solving the complexity of some teaching problems, we have come to know them as a tool that is as useful as…

Written for both parents and educators who work with children of advanced abilities, the authors present practical strategies to identify and nurture exceptionally high ability in children. They promote the "mastery" (rather than the "mystery") model of gifted education, and challenge several common practices and assumptions. They offer ways to…

"Straight A's: Public Education Policy and Progress" is a biweekly newsletter that focuses on education news and events both in Washington, DC and around the country. The following articles are included in this issue: (1) "The High Cost of High School Dropouts": New Alliance Brief Says Dropouts from the Class of 2009 Represent…

Evaluation of the Humanities Education, Research, and Language Development (HERALD) Project in the San Francisco Unified School District (California), which focused on teacher empowerment, shows the value of close collaboration between external evaluators and teachers as internal evaluators. Evaluator-teacher collaboration made evaluation more…

Used an intervening mechanism design (H. Chen, 1990) in conjunction with structural equation modeling to test the plausibility of a model of participatory evaluation in a study involving 315 teachers participating in the British Columbia (Canada) school-accreditation program. Results support the model as an explanation of how participatory…

A second-order factor analytic model of conceptual, instrumental, and symbolic use of evaluation information was developed and tested with 308 British Columbia school teachers. Results confirm a three-factor structure of conceptual, instrumental, and symbolic use. (SLD)

Since educational criticism aims to reeducate teachers' perception in order to improve or illuminate educational practices, the audience's role is particularly important. In many ways, the intended audience determines the evidence presented. The evaluator must write the criticism in language which is meaningful to the audience (for example…

Discusses the challenges faced by evaluators in moving from results-focused evaluation to learning-oriented evaluative theory in the context of school-university partnerships with professional learning agendas. Also discussed are the influences of the transition on individual practitioners and their organizations. (Author/SLD)

The purpose of this study was to identify the beliefs of Tennessee principals and teachers about the knowledge and skills required of leaders when using data to improve educational decision-making. Personal interviews were conducted with 10 principals and 10 teacher leaders certified by the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards.…

In this article we chronicle a particular professional development initiative designed to promote the acquisition of an evaluation habit of mind within an educational context. After describing the rationale behind this initiative in some detail, we proceed to map the experiences of four of the participants--a principal, a vice principal, a…

The pay-for-performance plan recently implemented in Douglas County (Colorado) bases teacher salaries on performance rather than longevity, considers extra duties, and offers incentives to high-performing school teams. The school district hopes to strengthen the professional development possibilities of this plan, including teachers' uses of…

This paper presents the evolution of and the lessons learned from a research approach to assessment of student outcomes, specifically of student academic achievement, being used by the Puerto Rico Statewide Systemic Initiative (PR-SSI), which is one of the statewide systemic initiatives for science and mathematics sponsored by the National Science…

The purpose of this document is to address issues related to the release of test scores to a variety of audiences: parents, school board members, school staff, the news media, and the general public. Guidelines or recommendations for reporting test data are provided. The recommendations are based both on experiences in reporting test results and…

A survey of 90 teachers of agriculture, 15 administrators, and 95 teacher educators indicates that evaluation and research methods have been adopted in agricultural education preparation in 9 Nigerian states. The extent to which these methods are perceived as important by education students is not clear. (SLD)

The extent to which evaluation results answer different stakeholders' needs was explored in the evaluation of a business English course at Van Leer Institute for the Development of Executive Assistants in Tel-Aviv (Israel), using diagnostic tests. Students (n=52), teachers, curriculum team, and administrators could use the evaluation results. (SLD)