This paper addresses the issues raised in a recent review of postcompulsory education and training in Victoria. In the interim report (April 2000) it is stated that employers found that the skills of new graduates appear to be most deficient in the areas of creativity, flair, problem solving, oral business communication, and interpersonal skills.…

This paper states that today's newspaper and educational journal articles complain that only half the school population can read on grade level. Yet standardized tests are written to spread pupils out from the first to the 99th percentile, or from three or more standard deviations above to three or more standard deviations below the mean.…

There is a need for more precise descriptions of the claims to truth of standardized tests, of their interpretive authority, and of the limits of understanding which are reached through their processes. Typically minority students who score poorly on such tests do because their schools fail to connect with them. Pedagogy, therefore, must somehow…

Drawing from the latest research, this book explains how little standardized test results really say and how harmful a test-driven curriculum can be. The central message is that the use of standardized tests can be reversed, and that teachers, parents, and students can reverse the trend toward testing to create classrooms that focus on student…

The problems of cheating on tests and what to do about it are explored, beginning with information on the methods used to cheat. Methods to detect cheating, circumstances that promote cheating, and ways to respond at the individual and institutional levels are outlined. The chapters are: (1) "An Introduction to Cheating: The Wrong and the Short of…

Black college students from three socioeconomic levels were compared on the variables of Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) scores, attrition after a two year period, grade point averages (GPA) and correlation between the SAT and first semester GPA. The middle socioeconomic group consistently performed most poorly on GPA. (Author/KM)

Demonstrates the effect of race of test administrator on the responses of experimental groups of white undergraduate subjects on a comprehensive battery of attitudinal measures. (JM)

A number of empirical studies are suggested to answer certain questions in connection with flexilevel tests. (MS)

Based on a paper delivered at the 80th Annual Meeting of the Association of American Medical Colleges, Cincinnati, Ohio, November 1969. (IR)

Review of the literature reveals that even with recently developed instruments, there is no effective control for social desirability of alternatives presented, nor for "fake proof devices. (Author/CJ)

Statistical procedures for measuring heterogeneity of test item distractor distributions, or cultural variation, are presented. These procedures are based on the notion that examinees' responses to the incorrect options of a multiple-choice test provide more information concerning cultural bias than their correct responses. (Author/PN)

Evaluated techniques for identifying faking on the Personality Inventory for Children (PIC). Undergraduate students (N=70) completed PICs on their child either faking bad, faking good, or legitimate. Results were cross-validated against a clinical sample. Results indicated a clinician cannot be certain a PIC profile is valid. (JAC)