This guide--written for school administrators, teachers, counselors, parents, and the community--describes educational tests and measurements and test-related statistics. While specifically intended to help readers interpret the tests administered in the Los Angeles (California) Unified School District, this information may also be used to…

This report was prepared to provide recommendations for testing adult dyslexics for employment purposes. Since the literature on dyslexia does not deal directly with this topic, the recommendations are based primarily on inferences from what is known about the diagnosis, etiology and treatment of dyslexia in children. A summary of the major…

Resolutions presented at the NAACP 67th Annual Convention concerned armed services and veterans affairs; civil rights (particularly basic civil rights); federal government compliance with Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964; affirmative action legislation; consolidated procedural rules for civil rights enforcement; the Hatch Act; violence…

Three do-it-yourself intelligence test handbooks, five mini-textbooks, and five consumer protection guides are reviewed. Each type of publication reflects different social ideologies and communicates favorable, cautiously neutral, or critical messages, respectively, about testing. Psychologists Jules Leopold, Martin Lutterjohan, and Victor…

The increasing use of criterion referenced testing (CRT) among the various branches of the federal government is described. The requirements of the merit system have tended to promote the use of norm referenced tests except for uses such as pass/fail performance tests. The two areas in which criterion-referenced tests have been most useful are…

A bill introduced in the New York State Legislature on April 26, 1979, would require that all tests used for postsecondary or professional school admissions become "public records" after they have been administered. The New York State Education Department is opposed to this bill because it would greatly increase the cost of test…

Differences in 164 fifth grade students' reading comprehension scores were obtained with four different tasks typically used to measure comprehension (multiple choice, recall, cloze, and maze), using four different reading passages that were equated according to readability formulas. Data analyses revealed significant effects for passage, task,…

This IRCD Bulletin issue contains two brief papers. One, on contingency management, describes the application of this aspect of operant conditioning theory to the manipulation of behavior through reinforcement methods. Examples of the technique of managing high and low probability behaviors are offered as it is used with preschool children,…

This guide is a compilation of factors considered important in the selection of tests for bilingual/bicultural programs. It is intended for use by test selectors or teachers in bilingual education, and does not presume to be exhaustive or authoritative. Basically the guide consists of questions the test selector or teacher should ask when…

A discussion of selected applications of new tests developed within the context of a large-scale curriculum for educable mentally retarded (EMR) children, the Social Learning Curriculum (SLC), is presented in this paper which investigates three types of reliability that need to be demonstrated in order to provide a basis of these applications. The…

This paper is concerned with the accusations made by such groups as the Association of Black Psychologists in their call for a moratorium on testing, that standardized tests are biased. A biased test measures one trait in one group of people but a different trait in a second group. Evidence about the amount of bias in tests is thin. Bias must be…

The author surveys literature and practice, primarily in Great Britain and the United States, about multiple-choice testing, comments on criticisms, and defends the state of the art. Varous item types, item writing, test instructions and scoring formulas, item analysis, and test construction are discussed. An extensive bibliography is appended.…

This article asks if testing can serve minority needs. The review suggests that testing can serve a useful purpose if it will help ensure quality to all students. (MFD)

Examines some of the problems in interpreting data from attitude measures when the dimensionality of the instrument and sources of heterogeneity in the population are ignored. Illustrates this point by describing the development of an instrument designed to measure children's attitude toward science-related activities. (TW)

Describes an evaluation program which is aimed at providing well-designed, comprehensive, and objective tests to a specific category of engineering students. Involves the use of a computerized statistical analysis. Provides recommendations for organizing such an activity. (TW)