Argues that when tests equate proficiency, competency, and literacy with writing academic essays, they maintain a severely understated and mistaken notion of what it means to write well and usefully and vigorously. (FL)

The accuracy issues involved in detecting student writing skill deficiencies, factors to be dealt with or controlled, and procedural and statistical methods for controlling these factors are the focus of this article. The accuracy needed for effective instructional planning requires stability in writing assessment programs. (DWH)

Argues that teachers of writing and literature need to make connections between the classroom experience and personal and community values. (MM)

This essay discusses the shift during the 1930s of black voters form the party of Lincoln to that of Franklin Delano Roosevelt. A select list of books and articles on blacks is also provided for secondary and college teachers who wish to treat this theme in the classroom. (Author/RM)

The author forthrightly declares in this book of essays on school reform that teachers are no more saintly than anyone else, that poor schools should be closed and lousy teachers should be fired, that philanthropy may sometimes do more harm than good, that teaching experience is not essential to being a school principal, that schools should be…

This paper describes a study on rater training that involved the analysis of ratings given to English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) compositions by 8 inexperienced and 8 experienced raters both before and after rater training, using FACETS (Linacre, 1990, 1993), which provides measures of rater severity and consistency. The testing text was a…

In the belief that questions about peace, justice, freedom, and security are vital to civic education, the United States Institute of Peace established the National Peace Essay Contest, which is designed to promote discussion of international peace and conflict resolution, complement existing curricula, and strengthen students' research, writing,…

This paper provides an overview of some recent work in automated essay scoring that focuses on writing improvement at the postsecondary level. The paper illustrates the Vantage Intellimetric (tm) automated essay scorer that is being used as part of a Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education (FIPSE) project that uses technology to grade…

Six hundred and six essays written during 1969 and 1970 are compared in terms of the main themes or events described; the pupils individually chose to write on either the topic of What happened on Saturday night' or My Street.' (JM)

"Students in a college course were given written criteria, divided into teams, and asked to score their own essay examination... The results support the generalization that subjective scoring standards are readily communicable. (Author)

Change in educational objectives must reflect an awareness of the realities of our country's changing values and culture. Adults must be prepared to accept and answer youth's questions. (JB)

Discusses the importance and influence of Cadiz, a town in Southern Spain, on nineteenth century Spanish Romanticism. (DS)

Paper presented as first public lecture in comparative literature, University of Toronto. Second part of a longer essay, "The Quest for Imagination: Essays in Aesthetic Criticism," to be published by Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio. First part appeared in "Modern Language Notes," v78 n5 p471-488 Dec 1963. (DS)

Describes an essay writing assignment that combines points from R. D. Kepes' futuristic point of view and V. E. Frankl's real life projections. (FL)

Examines Martin Buber's educational philosophy and his criticisms of the philosophies of Georg Kerschensteiner, John Dewey, Johann Pestalozzi, and John Ruskin, among others. (CK)