The North Carolina End-of-Grade Testing Program is based on the assessment of higher-level skills, the thinking and problem-solving strategies that enable people to access, sort, and digest information. The end-of-grade tests, which are aligned with the state's "Standard Course of Study," were designed to be administered at the end of…

This is the fourth biennial survey on the state of economic and personal finance education in the fifty states conducted by the National Council on Economic Education (NCEE). NCEE conducts these surveys to gauge how the state standards, their implementation, and state testing change from year to year. Since the last survey, published April 2003,…

Most states do not offer reciprocity for other state assessment tests. That practice has an adverse effect on school-aged, dependent children of military service members. President Clinton's 1997 solution was a national standardized assessment test for public school students. Critics stated it would cost $96,000,000 to deliver the test. Florida…

To help teachers, administrators, and parents understand student performance in writing, a state-level report is prepared each year to analyze students writing scores and provide guidelines for the interpretation of the results. This report compares students scores on the 2001 Delaware Student Testing Program (DSTP) with scores on the 2000 DSTP…

Since the passage of the 1997 amendments to the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, inclusion of all students with disabilities in accountability systems has been mandatory. By 2001, school personnel began to understand that alternate assessment needed to focus on students' performance on state standards, and nearly all states had created…

Introduces special journal issue on policy-driven assessment in elementary and secondary schools by highlighting themes in the 13 articles in the issue and by posing questions related to new policies and testing practices that are being implemented in the schools. Also presents conjectures about state and national testing programs. (NB)

Offers a preliminary assessment of the new Arizona Student Assessment Program (ASAP). Uses James Squire's model for analyzing reading and writing processes to analyze how well the tests assess reading processes. Includes some sample ASAP forms. Finds that the problems are minor in terms of evaluating the overall effectiveness of the new…

Deals with some of the lessons considered to have been learned from the studies of licensing and certification of the Center for Occupational and Professional Assessment, ETS, New Jersey, when one considers what educators can learn from testing in and for noneducational occupations. (Author/JM)

This paper shares the author's thoughts on the required New York State Regents examinations: namely, that the exams, now an integral part of social studies courses, are in some ways a real deterrent to relevant learning. Recommendations were made by the House of Delegates of the New York State Council for the Social Studies (the state-wide…

Mandatory exit exams are in place, or will soon be, in 27 states. Students must pass them as one condition for receiving a standard diploma. Because the standard diploma is considered a property right, states must carefully consider the opportunities that students have to pass graduation exams. Federal legislation has resulted in increased…

The current study investigates the effect of adding an individual growth measure to the primary definition of AYP. A variety of approaches to measuring growth have already been identified and are in use in schools across the country. In almost every statewide assessment system, a measure of the amount that individual students change from one year…

This document is designed to show the connection between the required state-written curriculum (courses of study) and the state-tested curriculum (the Alabama High School Graduation Examination and the Stanford Achievement Test, Ninth Edition [Stanford 9]) in Science. The document illustrates that courses of study content standards embody both…

This study was designed to contribute to the validity evidence for the Washington Assessment of Student Learning (WASL) by providing additional descriptive data about the performance standards in reading and mathematics at grades 4, 7, and 10. After the realignment of norm-referenced tests, large numbers of students taking the WASL had…

Alignment of content standards, performance standards, and assessments is crucial. This guide contains information to assist states and districts in aligning their assessment systems to their content and performance standards. It includes a review of current literature, both published and fugitive. The research is woven together with a few basic…

There is an appealing logic associated with current models of test-based accountability: the interplay among content standards, state tests, and accountability is a powerful tool to improve the quality of schools. However, when high-stakes consequences are attached to test results for schools, teachers, and students, unexpected consequences may…