The role of the state government in higher education assessment is clearly expanding as both the state's interest and investment in higher education grows. Currently, patterns of state involvement vary widely--from indirect incentive programs to direct legislation or regulatory action. Institutional assessment and the resulting reform must be…

Kansas law requires setting passing scores for the reading and mathematics competency test for 2nd, 4th, 6th, 8th, and 11th grade students, administered annually since April of 1980. New objective-referenced tests are prepared each year. Both judgmental (Angoff, Ebel, and Nedelsky) methods and empirical (contrasting groups and borderline) methods…

A study was conducted to determine the licensing and certification procedures for major State and national agencies and occupational governing bodies throughout the country. The project focused on two objectives: (1) Compilation of self-study programs leading directly to certification or licensing, and (2) development of general and specific…

One Midwestern state has chosen a model of state assessment in which local school districts are responsible for developing the strategies to measure and report their students' performance on state-adopted content standards. When students are not measured on common instruments, district accountability becomes an added challenge. This paper presents…

The Delaware Student Testing Program (DSTP) is designed to assess progress toward the Delaware Content Standards. Every year a certain number of items are removed from the test and then selected for public release. This booklet contains items released from the 1998 administration of the DSTP mathematics component tests. Taken as a whole, these…

This guide contains information to help teachers understand and use reports from the Delaware Student Testing Program (DSTP). The DSTP is designed to be a measure of progress toward Delaware's content standards that helps ensure that students can apply their academic skills to realistic, everyday problems. The DSTP aims to promote better…

Kentucky has been implementing test-based accountability for almost a decade, making it a good site for studying the effects of the milepost testing model. In 1996, a study was undertaken of the impact of standards-based assessment on classroom practices in Kentucky. Kentucky teachers (n=365) were surveyed about their classroom practices and other…

This field memo to all teachers and administrators of public and nonpublic schools is the first of three in a series of updates from the Deputy Commissioner of the Office of Elementary, Middle, Secondary, and Continuing Education on standards and assessments in New York. This document contains information on New York's learning standards and the…

Surveys the legal challenges to teacher certification based on objective competency tests; analyzes the theories of the challenges; and discusses implementation of these tests with particular reference to the declining number of eligible minority candidates. Describes "custom designed" certification programs used by a few states. (MLF)

Over the past five years the Colorado Department of Education (CDE) has used the results of the Colorado Student Assessment Program (CSAP) to rate public school performance on the School Accountability Report (SAR). The public often considers the school ratings as indicative of the school's quality. There appears to be a lack of quantitative…

This report on competency testing in vocational and technical education is a follow-up to previous reports published in 1988 and 1990. Section 1 summarizes the data. It describes competency testing in the 13 states that currently mandate competency testing and identifies the 11 states in which voluntary testing is occurring, the 9 states either…

In 1987, General Educational Development (GED) test passing score requirements were raised in Wisconsin. To study the effect, data were gathered from samples of 480 examinees each for 1986 and 1989 through site visits and follow-up surveys mailed to 900 of the 960 in the samples. Responses were received from 206 persons (37 percent). Chi-square…

Student assessment programs in Florida's community and junior colleges are described in this report in terms of theory, practice, and policy. Following introductory material on the background and purpose of the study, which involved statewide surveys of coordinators of student assessment programs, an extensive literature review is presented. The…

The ability to practice a profession is earned through educational preparation, experience, the passing of rigorous examinations, and commitment on the part of the practitioner to public service. Responsibilities are carried out by the professional in accordance with ethical standards developed through the years and in accordance with state laws…