High-quality measurement tools are critical to school improvement efforts. Education researchers frequently employ surveys in order to assess a host of variables associated with school improvement. This article asserts that Rasch modeling techniques enhance the quality of a measurement tool because they comprise elements of both qualitative and…

Two quantitative measures of school performance are currently used, the average points score (APS) at Key Stage 2 and value-added (VA), which measures the rate of academic improvement between Key Stage 1 and 2. These figures are used by parents and the Office for Standards in Education to make judgements and comparisons. However, simple…

The Michigan Context and Performance Report Card measures school performance by adjusting standardized test scores to account for student background. Comparing schools using unadjusted test scores ignores the significant relationship between academic performance and student socioeconomic background--a dynamic outside a school's control. The…

The criteria for determining the student outcomes that define a school as having "turned around" are not well defined, and the definition of turnaround performance varies across studies. Although current policy initiatives offer guidelines for identifying CLP schools, there is no standard definition or methodology in common usage. This…

This study outlines and demonstrates a methodology for identifying effective schools using a random sample of student data generated by the operation of a school district's Instructional Accomplishment Information (IAI) system. (IAI systems are designed to provide school districts with information for reviewing and planning their instructional…

A Performance Indicators in Education program has been developed in New York to serve both local and State needs. The performance of a school or school district may be defined as the difference between its actual output and its expected output. To obtain an equation for computing expected output, the academic status of students and a number of…

This manual is designed to aid school administrators and other staff members in interpreting and understanding the Educational Quality Assessment Inventory for Pennsylvania elementary and secondary schools. This volume is keyed to elementary schools, with a sample status profile for the fifth grade. The statistical data in these profiles are…

The concept of career education in the Dallas Independent School District maintains that each student should have the option of preparing for a neaningful, fulfilling career while enrolled in school. Career education programs are divided by grade level and stress career awareness (3-7), career exploration (7-9), and career preparation (10-12).…

Volume II contains six appendices to Volume I, including short summaries of the 18 schools that were studied. Appendices included in this report are: (1) Evaluation Methodology; (2) Promising Reform Strategies; (3) Descriptions of the Research-Based Methods or Strategies Being Used; (4) Short Summaries of 18 Comprehensive School Reform…

In April, 1919, at the request of the Board of Education of Memphis, Tennessee, the United States Commissioner of Education submitted the conditions on which the Bureau of Education would make a survey of the public school system of that city. This study of the Memphis schools is intended to be a study of policies and practices; not of persons.…