Ninety-six high school students from school districts across Minnesota who received special education services for learning disabilities or mild cognitive impairments agreed to participate in an interview on their participation and accommodation use on Minnesota's Basic Standards tests, minimum competency tests in Mathematics, Reading, and Writing…

This is the 21st year of statewide student testing under the Arizona Student Achievement Program, which mandates the use of a nationally standardized norm-referenced achievement test in reading, mathematics, and language in the state's schools. In the 2000-2001 school year, students in grades 1 through 9 were tested using the Stanford Achievement…

The results from the third administration of the 8th and 11th grade science and social studies portions of the Delaware Student Testing Program (DSTP) represent an important step in Delawares efforts to educate all students to a higher level. Science and social studies data for grades 8 and 11 are summarized here, and the results for grades 4 and…

This is the 17th year of statewide student testing under the Arizona Student Achievement Program. To fulfill the requirements of Arizona law, a nationally standardized, norm-referenced achievement test in the subjects of reading, language, and mathematics must be adopted and implemented for Arizona schools. For the 1996-97 school year, the State…

This report examines issues concerning the provision of accommodations for students with disabilities participating in state and district assessments. The report considers what an accommodation is, what kinds of accommodations are available, who should make the decision regarding accommodations, when accommodations should be used, and how…

This publication is the fifth issue of "Report Card" in a series that provides information about how well North Carolina schools are serving the youth of the state. The "Report Card" presents information related primarily to the outcomes of education based on student achievement. Statewide performance results are presented…

This guide is designed to give the student helpful information about Arizona's Instrument To Measure the Standards (AIMS) for grade 8. The guide provides examples of the type of questions students see on AIMS and explains how items are scored. It does not teach what the student needs to know to do well on AIMS, but it will help the student know…

This report presents detailed information about the student assessment results of the Colorado Student Assessment Program. Included among the data is information on student achievement by gender, ethnicity or race, disability, and accommodation categories. In addition, achievement data are presented for each school district and for schools…

This report contains the results from the first administration of the 8th and 11th grade science and social studies portions of the Delaware Student Testing Program (DSTP). As such, they are an important part of the state's efforts to educate all students to a higher level. Science and social studies data for grades 8 and 11 are summarized here;…

The Bookmark Standard Setting Procedure (Lewis, Mitzel, and Green, 1996) is an item-response-theory-based standard setting method that has been widely implemented by state testing programs. The primary purposes of this study were to: (1) estimate standard errors for cutscores that result from Bookmark standard settings under a generalizability…

The Maryland School Performance Assessment Program (MSPAP) offers a relatively new way to measure achievement in schools. Six content areas are tested in grades 3 and 5. The use of the MSPAP to differentiate among schools in terms of success was studied using data for the 775 Maryland elementary schools that were active in 1995. Test results for…

This paper uses data collected from the 50 states in year 2000 by the Consortium for Policy Research in Education (CPRE) to describe how states are holding schools accountable for student performance. The data collection process focused on policies in place during the 1999-2000 school year. Profiles prepared from this data represent the policy…

The Cognitive Skills Assessment Battery (CSAB) measures student readiness to begin first grade. It is the assessment used by South Carolina to measure the readiness of each student and to plan an appropriate program for each child. In fall 1998, 81.2% of the first graders (43,568 of 53,640 students) met the readiness standard for South Carolina (a…

The primary objective of this research was to examine the effect of scoring items known to be multidimensional using a unidimensional model. Although several simulation studies have examined this, few studies have been conducted using data obtained from actual test administrations. In this study, open-ended mathematics items from a mandated state…

This manual documents the technical aspects of the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS). In May 1999, Massachusetts public school students in grades 4, 8, and 10 participated in the second annual administration of the MCAS tests in English Language Arts, Mathematics, and Science & Technology. This report provides information…