The Comprehensive Tests of Basic Skills (CTBS) was administered to pupils in Grades 2 through 7, 9 and 11 during the 1979-80 school year as part of the Corvallis School District's testing program. Results of the CTBS, herein expressed as mean (average) percentile rank scores from each of the grades tested, are compared with those of prior years.…

Through the nineteen-forties, fifties, and up to the mid-sixties, achievement test scores steadily increased. Since then, many test scores drop. The reported test score declines are more dramatic in recent years and most evident for higher grades. They are specially pronounced in verbal tests, but hold for nearly all tested areas. Specially:…

Value-added models, which rate schools for effectiveness while taking into account the poverty and other socioeconomic status of the students, are generating increased interest. This paper describes the use of one such model to evaluate whether school ratings changed when three new programs were introduced: the "Target Teach" curriculum…

A study compared an integrated language arts reading program and a strong phonics basal reading program. Subjects were first graders from five eastern Greenbrier County schools in West Virginia. The control group consisted of students in 15 classrooms, during the 1994-95 school year, when a strong phonics basal reading program was taught and…

The purpose of the study was to compare two regression-based approaches for measuring educational effectiveness in Tennessee high schools: the mean residual approach (MR), and a more general linear models (LM) approach. Data were obtained from a sample of 1,011 students who were enrolled in 48 high schools, and who had taken the Comprehensive…

The results of standardized norm-referenced achievement tests via the state mandated California Assessment Program (CAP) and the Districtwide Testing Program for the 1979-80 school year are summarized. California Assessment Program tests were administered statewide to all third, sixth and twelfth grade students. The nationally standardized…

Describes a follow-up study that examined results of adopting the Teaching and Learning with Computers approach in a small rural school district. Use of the Jostens Learning Corporation integrated curriculum is explained, and evaluations of Comprehensive Test of Basic Skills results that show changes in scale scores and comparisons with national…

This study, part of a larger effort to develop a methodology for evaluating intelligent computer systems (Artificial Intelligence Systems), explores the use of benchmarking as an evaluation technique. Benchmarking means comparing the performance of intelligent computer systems with human performance on the same task. Benchmarking in evaluation has…