Participation in the GED testing program plunged by nearly 44 percent during the most recent recorded year, a drop-off that the exam's sponsor attributes to an earlier rush by teenagers and adults to secure high school diplomas through the test before its minimum passing scores were raised. The overall number of teenagers and adults who took the…

This report presents the results of a research and development effort for SpeechRater? Version 1.0 (v1.0), an automated scoring system for the spontaneous speech of English language learners used operationally in the Test of English as a Foreign Language™ (TOEFL®) Practice Online assessment (TPO). The report includes a summary of the validity…

This handbook is intended to help high school and college counselors effectively use and interpret ACT results. It contains four main sections: Section 1, "Components of the ACT," which contains general information about the ACT tests, probably will be of interest both to high school counselors and to college advisors and other staff. …

States are increasingly focusing the mission of their elementary and secondary education systems on preparing all students for success in postsecondary education and 21st century careers. As standards have increased, so too have graduation requirements. Today, 20 states and the District of Columbia have adopted such high school graduation…

ACT maintains that monitoring academic strengths and weaknesses through the effective use of results from standardized tests can promote learning and intellectual growth. When schools use achievement test scores to guide curriculum choices and to provide feedback to students, opportunities for learning increase. The ACT Educational Planning and…

Research on globalization and education involves the study of intertwined worldwide discourses, processes, and institutions affecting local educational practices and policies. The four major theoretical perspectives concerning globalization and education are world culture, world systems, postcolonial, and culturalist. The major global educational…

This booklet contains the Writing Framework for the 1998 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). The Framework describes the basis for the 1998 Writing Assessment, the types of writing assessed, and the methods for scoring student responses. This Framework was developed during 1989-90 in preparation for the 1992 NAEP Writing…

This report highlights one of six language arts case study teachers whose classroom was studied for a 2-day period to observe writing instruction, to ask questions about the Kentucky Instructional Results Information System assessments, and to talk with her students about their writing. In this paper, the focus is on questions and how this…

This paper presents a focused case study of Ann and Kay, a team of exemplary elementary teachers, as they worked to modify their mathematics instruction to be consistent with the goals of the Kentucky Education Reform Act and Kentucky Instructional Results Information System (KIRIS), its innovative high-stakes assessment system. At the time of the…

The Michigan Educational Assessment Program presents an untimed, 100-question Social Studies Test (Form 65) for grade 7 students to assess social studies skills. This document contains the test booklet only. (PN)

The Tribal American Consulting Corporation (TACC) has been working toward development of both a special educational program for preschool Native American children in Los Angeles and a suitable evaluation program for these urban Indian children. (JC)

An experimental test battery (the Johnson O'Connor Research Foundation battery) designed to measure numerical facility was administered to 1,451 subjects at 12 testing centers across the United States over a 5-month period. Five work samples were included: (1) arithmetic; (2) counting backwards; (3) number reasoning; (4) rule learning; and (5)…

This study examines the accuracy of the self-scoring efforts of 306 eighth-graders on the Kuder General Interest Survey (GIS), and suggests possible methods to improve self-scoring accuracy. The GIS is widely used to assist junior high school students with their educational and vocational planning. After the administration of the test by English…

A review of procedures used to assess the educational needs of offenders in Florida's correctional institutions is presented in this report, along with recommendations for change. First, the report draws from a 1982 study of the state correctional system, presenting findings regarding the educational needs of youthful offenders, assessment…

Rescoring of Center for Occupational and Professional Assessment objective-referenced tests is decided largely by content experts selected by client organizations. A few of the test items, statistically flagged for review, are not rescored. Some of this incongruence could be due to the use of the biserial correlation (r-biserial) as an…