One common procedure for oral performance testing of Foreign Language in the Elementary School (FLES) learners is one-on-one interviewing wherein the interviewer asks questions and the child candidate responds to them. While existing research has focused primarily on outcomes elicited by such procedures, this study examines the processes…

This article describes an interactive professional development unit that engages both novice and experienced evaluators in (a) learning about the Essential Competencies for Program Evaluators (ECPE), (b) applying the competencies to program evaluation contexts, and (c) using the ECPE to reflect on their own professional practices. The article…

The Higher Education Quality Committee's emphasis on the assessment of student learning in its criteria for institutional audits (June 2004) signals that institutional arrangements to ensure quality assessment practices are to come under the spotlight. One means to demonstrate institutional commitment to quality in assessment practice is to…

Purpose: A four-year longitudinal study was conducted on the school-to-work transition in four professions traditionally called "helping professions," namely education, social work, occupational therapy, and physiotherapy. One goal of the study was to understand the nature and process of the mentoring relationships that develop and sustain…

There has been a recent groundswell of support in the American Evaluation Association's Independent Consulting Topical Interest Group (IC TIG) for evaluating evaluators' work just as evaluators evaluate the work of their clients. To facilitate this self-evaluation, the IC TIG elected to create a peer review process that focuses on written…

Should evaluators care about the impact of evaluation on the public policy process? If the larger purpose of evaluation is social betterment, the public policy arena affords tremendous opportunities for evaluators to have both short- and long-term impact by influencing policy formulation, implementation, and outcomes. Working in the public policy…

This study was designed to compare teachers certified in South Carolina that were trained in two different methods: through traditional college preparation programs and through the Program of Alternative Certification for Educators (PACE). This study explored three research questions. The first question addressed differences in pedagogical…

The use of online rater self-training is growing in popularity and has obvious practical benefits, facilitating access to training materials and rating samples and allowing raters to reorient themselves to the rating scale and self monitor their behaviour at their own convenience. However there has thus far been little research into rater…

The purpose of the present study is to evaluate the use of a reinforcement package with four middle school students who were below grade level in reading. Data were gathered, independently by two observers, for on-task behavior for the number of correct words read for a two-minute timed trial, and for book pre- and posttests. These data were…

The 2008-2009 Annual Reading First Progress Report reflects on the final year of implementation for Round I schools and the third full year of implementation for Round II schools. This report focuses on the effect that Reading First implementation has had on selected schools across Nebraska with a special focus on vulnerable populations: English…

A study was undertaken to determine the effects on essay scores of intermingling handwritten and word-processed versions of student essays. A sample of 32 examinees, each of whom had produced both a handwritten and a word-processed essay, was drawn from a larger group who had participated in a pilot study of item types for The Praxis Series:…

Qualitative evaluation and quantitative evaluation are discussed, examining how the perspective of each can and should create a critical debate that encourages inquiry instead of hostility. To achieve the major goal of linking evaluation information to the organization's culture, the evaluator needs to use multiple methods in a responsive,…

This paper presents a model of scored cognition that incorporates two types of mental models: models of performance (i.e., the criteria for judging performance) and models of scoring (i.e., the procedural scripts for scoring an essay). In Study 1, six novice and five experienced scorers wrote definitions of three levels of a 6-point holistic…

Educators in North Carolina, recognizing a need to develop a more objective, performance-based teacher evaluation system, determined that evaluation of teachers should have both formative and summative outcomes and should focus on improvement of teacher skills. The Teacher Performance Appraisal System (TPAS), a companion to the North Carolina…

This book contains a series of papers presented at an Israel-American seminar on Educational Evaluation. Sol Kugelmass describes strategies employed to increase the utilization of evaluation results in the process of formulating educational policy. Nachum Blass illustrates the relationship between evaluation and policymaking by discussing an…