In an era of test-based accountability, school inspections can offer a more nuanced understanding of why schools fail. Yet, we have limited knowledge of how inspectors arrive at their decisions on school quality. Analyzing inspectors' decision-making can reveal the underlying views regarding school accountability and open opportunities for school…

Institutional ethics review procedures aim -- in principle -- to minimise harm and evaluate risks, providing an important space to consider the safety of participants and researchers. However, literature has questioned the effectiveness of the process, particularly for reviewing 'risky' topics in a risk-averse environment. This article reports the…

This paper aims to survey the current landscape of education policy evaluation across OECD countries and economies by examining recent trends and contextual factors that can promote more robust education policy evaluation, as well as identifying key challenges. It takes a view of policy evaluation as an activity that takes place throughout the…

Pressure on evaluators has been investigated recently by surveys in the USA, the UK, Germany, and Switzerland. This study compares the results of those studies regarding pressure on evaluators in different countries. The findings suggest that independence of evaluations does not exist for many respondents. Moreover, the person who commissioned the…

Efforts to monitor and improve responsive caregiving for young children, because of its importance for child development, are part of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. Two brief observational measures of responsive caregiving have been developed and validated (Responsive Interactions for Learning-parent [RIFL-P] and educator…

The quality of sign language interpreting (SLI) is a gripping construct among practitioners, educators and researchers, calling for reliable and valid assessment. There has been a diverse array of methods in the extant literature to measure SLI quality, ranging from traditional error analysis to recent rubric scoring. In this study, we want to…

Evaluation professionals need to be nimble and innovative in their approaches in order to be relevant and provide useful evidence to decision-makers, stakeholders, and society in the crowded public policy landscape. In this article, we offer serious games as a method that can be employed by evaluators to address three persisting challenges in…

This paper examines whether a web-based training on English discourse intonation leads to better spontaneous speech quality for Mandarin Chinese speakers who reside in the U.S. and in China. The four-week fully online training consisted of meta-instruction videos as well as listening and speaking activities, including instant visual pitch contour…

Increasing rates of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and younger age at diagnosis pose a challenge to preschool intervention systems. In Sweden, most young autistic children receive intervention service in community-based preschool programs, but no tool is yet available to assess the quality of the preschool learning environment. This study adapted…

There is emerging evidence that collocation use plays a primary role in determining various dimensions of L2 oral proficiency assessment and development. The current study presents the results of three experiments which examined the relationship between the degree of association in collocation use (operationalized as t scores and mutual…

This article focuses on the assessment procedures of Norwegian PhD theses as viewed by external members of evaluation committees from three countries with different examination systems; the USA, the UK and Sweden. Their viewpoints give useful information not only on the pros and cons with the Norwegian system, but also on the strengths and…

It is currently unknown how many Institutional Review Boards (IRBs) exist at community colleges. This study investigates the percentage of public and Tribal community colleges that have active IRBs. It also examines the potential relationships between states that allow community colleges to confer baccalaureate degrees, or that have articulation…

Peer review of teachers is controversial for several reasons. Some say peer reviewers encroach on the rightful domain of the principal as instructional leader. Others argue that, because peer evaluators are fellow teachers, they may be biased or unwilling to make hard decisions. Many teachers find the prospect of peer evaluation unsettling because…

Nearly all private, government and non-governmental organizations that receive government funding to run social or health promotion programs in the United States are required to conduct program evaluations and to report findings to the funding agency. Reports are usually due at the end of a funding cycle and they may or may not have an influence…

A review of the history and purpose of accreditation followed by a brief case study of how a small specialist institution outside of the USA went through the process of becoming accredited. The changes needed inside the curriculum and inside the organization in order to make this significant organizational development are reviewed and discussed.…