As more instructors articulate learning objectives for their students within one course, or academic staff collaborate to articulate learning outcomes for programs, a robust means to assess student performance within these becomes increasingly important. The Examinations Institute of the American Chemical Society (ACS), Division of Chemical…

Medicine has become a profession with increasing accountability to the needs of society. To meet this need, real-world, community-located experiences and reflection are frequently used to promote students' learning and personal growth. This article reports first-year medical students' reflective writing after visiting a primary healthcare clinic.…

The "Jeanne Clery Disclosure of Campus Security Policy and Campus Crime Statistics Act" (the "Clery Act") is a consumer right-to-know law originally passed by Congress in 1900. The law requires colleges and universities receiving federal student aid to publish annually their security-related policies and crime statistics. The…

Educational systems throughout the world serve students from diverse populations. Often students from minority populations (i.e. racial, ethnic, linguistic, cultural, economic) face unique challenges when learning in contexts based on the cultural traditions and learning theories of the majority population. These challenges often leave minority…

Recently, the authors have been exploring the use of propensity score methods for developing evidence of program impact. Specifically, they have been developing evidence (after one year of implementation) of the effects of the Math Science Partnership in New York City ("MSPinNYC2") on high school students' achievement--both in terms of…

This study compares the use and efficacy of assessment grading tools within postgraduate education courses in a regional Australian university and a regional university in the US. Specifically, we investigate how the quality of postgraduate education courses can be improved through the use of assessment rubrics or criterion referenced assessment…

To fulfill the European Higher Education context in the subject of the Chemical Engineering Undergraduate Degree of University of Barcelona named "Chemical Engineering Experimentation II" team work, written and oral communication generic skills were developed and assessed by means of rubrics. In order to appraise the methodological…

This article reports on an investigation of the role raters' language background plays in raters' assessment of test takers' speaking ability. Specifically, this article examines differences between American and Indian raters in their scores and scoring processes when rating Indian test takers' responses to the Test of English as a Foreign…

This study examined whether discourse and topic knowledge separately predicted the overall quality and the inclusion of basic genre elements in 5th grade students' stories, persuasive papers, and informational text once the other type of knowledge as well as topic interest, spelling, handwriting fluency, length of text, and gender were controlled.…

This paper outlines the process and results of an authentic assessment of student work using a revised version of the AAC&U's Information Literacy VALUE rubric. This rigorous assessment, which included the scoring of nearly 900 student papers from four different stages across the undergraduate curriculum, revealed much about the process of…

"Scientific argumentation," defined as the ability to develop and analyze scientific claims, support claims with evidence from investigations of the natural world, and explain and evaluate the reasoning that connects the evidence to the claim, is a critical component of current science standards and is consistent with "Common Core…

The purpose of this study was to research the effect of the rubric on the level of learners' cognitive engagement and to explore the effectiveness of Web-based concurrent discussions experienced by learners. The participants were 20 undergraduate students of D Women's University and they were divided into six groups for concurrent discussions in…

There are numerous variations surrounding the utilization of instructional coaches in education. This paper quantitatively examined the relationship between principals and outside instructional coaches and how this relationship impacts the principals' perception of the coaches' support on the school improvement within the large urban K-12 New York…

The 6+1 Trait[R] Writing model (Culham 2003) emphasizes writing instruction in which teachers and students analyze writing using a set of characteristics, or "traits," of written work: ideas, organization, voice, word choice, sentence fluency, conventions, and presentation. The Ideas trait includes the main content and message, including…

The Cognitively Based Assessment of, for, and as Learning ("CBAL"™) research initiative is aimed at developing an innovative approach to K-12 assessment based on cognitive competency models. Because the choice of scoring and equating approaches depends on test dimensionality, the dimensional structure of CBAL tests must be understood.…