This study examined the relationships between enabling structures, academic optimism, and student achievement to determine whether academic optimism served as a mediator between the two. Student achievement was measured using both criterion-referenced and norm-referenced tests. Findings indicated a relationship between academic optimism, enabling…

In the twenty-first century, the use of standardized tests as the primary means to evaluate schools and teachers in the United States has contributed to severe dilemmas, including misleading information on what students know, lower-level instruction, cheating, less collaboration, unfair treatment of teachers, and biased teaching. This article…

This study examined the relationship of two climate constructs in academic optimism and organizational climate as each relates to school effectiveness. Academic optimism is an academic environment comprised of three dimensions: academic emphasis, collective efficacy, and faculty trust (Hoy, Tarter, & Hoy, 2006). The Organizational Climate…

Suggests that whether U.S. education is a catastrophe depends not on whether students can answer questions on the Standard Achievement Tests (SAT) but on their ability to survive in the modern world. Stresses that the challenge to the social studies is to teach students to integrate their learning not to play the testmakers game. (NL)

This study investigated six statistical merit school selection methods using student scores on a nationally normed, standardized achievement test to identify merit schools. More specifically, its purpose was to select a method for the Palm Beach County School system which meets the Florida merit school program criterion of fairness in terms of…

This study tested the hypothesis that there is no significant difference in reading achievement among children in grades 2 through 5 related to family structure. Researchers administered the Stanford Achievement Test to 119 students in an Alabama city suburban school system. Of the sample, 69 children lived in intact families and 50 lived in…

This study, focusing on 165 public elementary schools in Hawaii, examined the use of test scores as measures of curriculum effectiveness and identified context and input variables that may impact on these measures of effectiveness. Demographic characteristics and test data on approximately 12,000 third graders were used to obtain 165 school…