Parents and guardians of children in the Indianapolis Public Schools' Montessori Option Program for kindergartners through sixth graders were surveyed. Parents and guardians were surveyed on: (1) the pupil progress report, which was used on a pilot basis during the 1988-89 school year; (2) the Montessori method; (3) strengths and weaknesses of the…

This study investigated whether academic achievement (as reflected on report cards) would have an effect upon children's self-esteem. Subjects were 46 third- and 40 sixth-grade students. Thirty of the third-graders and 28 of the sixth-graders completed Harter's Self-Perception Profile 2 weeks before report cards were distributed and again the week…

Summarizes findings of a project that reviewed eight commercial gradebook programs to determine range of features offered, e.g., menu and group organization, calculations and weighting of grades, error checking and correction, reports and printouts, documentation, and special options. Information on producer, hardware requirements, and cost is…

This report provides a comprehensive summary of statistical data on the state of education in Alabama. It is divided into eight sections: (1) General school information (students, staffing); (2) State accountability (adequate yearly progress status, adequate yearly progress summary); (3) Student academic performance (Alabama reading and…

This study focused on parents' reactions to the implementation of a curriculum-embedded performance assessment for young children. It examines the Work Sampling System (WSS) (S. Meisels, J. Jablon, D. Marsden, M. Dichtelmiller, A. Dorfman, and D. Steele, 1994), a continuous progress performance assessment system that offers an alternative to…

As part of a larger study, variables that significantly influenced the grades of young girls were investigated. The sample included 52 middle-level girls (grade 7), all of whom were participants in a project examining factors that support or inhibit rural and urban girls' participation in science, mathematics, and technology. Preliminary analyses…

The New York State School Report Card is an important part of the effort to raise learning standards for all students. It is designed to provide information to the public on student performance and other measures of school and district performance. The 2000 report card has been changed to focus on measures of student progress on the new standards.…

The No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) requires states to prepare and disseminate an annual state report card. This requirement became effective at the beginning of the 2002-03 school year. The state agency also must ensure each local district collects appropriate data and includes this data at the district level and for each school in its annual…

Describes a system of grading and grade reporting adopted at the Chapel Hill-Chauncy Hall School, Massachusetts, for classes in science and mathematics. Attempts to make grades more truly indicators of a level of performance by pointing out an individual's strengths and weaknesses in a given subject area. (JR)

When parents objected to a new performance-based achievement scale, a Wisconsin school revised its report card to reflect traditional letter grades for each main subject area, using the new scale to measure component skill areas. Schools can weather controversy by making report cards reflect school philosophy, involving school personnel and…

Describes one elementary school's multiage assessment plan. Describes how standards were developed, and describes the assessment plan's guiding element: the progress report arranged as a continuum of objectives that serve as a goal indicator and a reporting mechanism. Discusses how objectives are assessed, record keeping and documentation, and the…

This article reviews changes in the accountability landscape that have occurred for foundations in recent years and several precedents for foundation performance assessment. The authors then present a model of portfolio assessment that is used for organizational accountability and learning. This model, which was piloted in 2002 and 2003 for the…

The no child left be act of 2001 (NCLB) emphasizes educational accountability for all students. Twenty-eight states have policies to aggregate student participation and proficiency data for schools for the deaf in NCLB reports. The remaining states account for these students in other ways: referring student data to "sending" schools and…

Education decentralization requires that substantial information be available to local and regional stakeholders. Increasing transparency, establishing a basis for accountability, and providing tools for effective management at the local level help parents, teachers, and school officials assess school performance and status. Several countries have…

The authors collaborated to create a model of school reform that has successfully transformed a failing school into a successful school. Working as a team, they have developed a research-based system to effectively improve school performance on the South Carolina School Report Card System. It enhanced the overall quality of a failing school in the…