Ultimately, measures in research, testing, assessment and evaluation are used, or have implications, for ranking, intervention, feedback, decision-making or policy purposes. Explicit recognition of this fact brings the often-ignored and sometimes maligned concept of consequences to the fore. Given that measures have personal and social…

The OECD and its U.S. administrator, McGraw-Hill Education CTB, have recently concluded the first cycle of the OECD-Test for Schools in the U.S. This test is being marketed to local schools and is designed to compare 15-year-olds from individual participating schools against peers nationally and internationally using the OECD's PISA test as its…

Teachers are now experiencing the age of quantitative test-driven assessment, in which there is little weight accorded to teacher-based judgement about student progress. In the Australian context, the NAPLaN test has become a driving force in school and teacher accountability. The language of NAPLaN is one of bands and numerical scores and…

Demands for accountability have seen the implementation of large scale testing programs in Australia and internationally. There is, however, a growing body of evidence to show that externally imposed testing programs do not have a sustained impact on student achievement. It has been argued that teacher assessment is more effective in raising…

This paper represents one outcome from the "Invitational Research Symposium on Technology-Enabled and Universally Designed Assessments," which examined technology-enabled assessments (TEA) and universal design (UD) as they relate to students with disabilities (SWD). It was developed to stimulate research into TEAs designed to make tests…

The use of standardized tests for outcome assessment has grown dramatically in recent years. Two driving factors have been the No Child Left Behind legislation, and the increase in outcome assessment measures by accrediting agencies such as AACSB, the international accrediting body for business schools. Despite the growth in usage, little effort…

This study examines the practical implications of using state tests to measure student achievement in impact evaluations that span multiple states and grades. In particular, the study examines the sensitivity of impact findings to (1) the type of assessment used to measured achievement (state tests or an external assessment administered by the…

This report examines the availability and quality of predictive validity data for a selection of benchmark assessments identified by state and district personnel as in use within Mid-Atlantic Region jurisdictions. Based on a review of practices within the school districts in the region, this report details the benchmark assessments being used, in…

In practice, vertical scales have been continually used to measure students' achievement progress across several grade levels and have been considered very challenging psychometric procedures. Recently, such practices have been drawing many criticisms. The major criticisms focus on dimensionality and construct equivalence of the latent trait or…

This technical report provides an overview of the New York State Alternate Assessment (NYSAA), including a description of the purpose of the NYSAA, the processes utilized to develop and implement the NYSAA program, and Stakeholder involvement in those processes. The purpose of this report is to document the technical aspects of the 2013-14 NYSAA.…

This study was designed to address two frequent criticisms of the SAT essay--that essay length is the best predictor of scores, and that there is an advantage in using more "sophisticated" examples as opposed to personal experience. The study was based on 2,820 essays from the first three administrations of the new SAT. Each essay was…

The importance of student assessment, particularly for summative purposes, has increased greatly over the past thirty years. At the same time, emphasis on including all students in assessment programs has also increased. Assessment programs, whether they are large-scale, district-based, or teacher developed, have traditionally attempted to assess…

This document describes the breadth of the research that the ETS (Educational Testing Service) Research & Development division is conducting in 2010. This portfolio will be updated in early 2011 to reflect changes to existing projects and new projects that were added after this document was completed. The research described in this portfolio falls…

Securing data on students' academic achievement is typically one of the most important and costly aspects of conducting education experiments. As state assessment programs have become practically universal and more uniform in terms of grades and subjects tested, the relative appeal of using state tests as a source of study outcome measures has…

A Teacher Survey was developed for administration to Illinois teachers whose students take the Illinois Inventory of Educational Progress (IIEP). The IIEP are the achievement tests of the state assessment program. The purposes of the Teacher Survey range from determination of a test's curricular validity to investigations of teachers' abilities to…