To increase opportunities for students to take more advanced math courses in high school, many school districts enroll grade 8 students in Algebra I, a gateway course for advanced math. But students who take Algebra I in grade 8 and skip other math courses, such as grade 8 general math, might miss opportunities to develop the foundational…

In response to concerns about using only standardized multiple-choice assessments, some school districts have moved to using alternative ratings of student achievement with authentic assessments. However, such assessments are often limited in terms of the psychometric validity data supporting their use. The present study mixed quantitative and…

Background: Evidence suggests that an insufficient fluid intake impairs cognitive performance. Drinking policies at schools--especially drinking during lessons--is a point of controversy. To provide a scientific base for this debate, more empirical evidence is needed on which aspects of fluid intake are crucial for cognitive performance. This…

Differential item/test functioning (DIF/DTF) are routine procedures to detect item/test unfairness as an explanation for group performance difference. However, unequal sample sizes and small sample sizes have an impact on the statistical power of the DIF/DTF detection procedures. Furthermore, DIF/DTF cannot be used for two test forms without…

This paper presents a rationale for and description of the professional development system designed to help teachers understand and use the Birthday Party (BP) Mathematics Assessment, a standardized assessment with child-friendly birthday party themed tasks, and ultimately to leverage their learning from the BP to conduct their own meaningful…

In the machine learning literature, it is commonly accepted as fact that as calibration sample sizes increase, Naïve Bayes classifiers initially outperform Logistic Regression classifiers in terms of classification accuracy. Applied to subtests from an on-line final examination and from a highly regarded certification examination, this study shows…

The aims of this research were to explore the relationship between parents and the UK government within primary education and to critically analyse neo-liberal modes and technologies of governmentality within the testing regime. This article focuses on the Let Our Kids Be Kids campaign, which was an online protest by parents. The protest aimed to…

The recently adopted TEKS for English I-IV that will be implemented in 2020-2021 require students to write for a variety of purposes and audiences, to practice the writing process, and to engage in reflective writing. These standards can be difficult to meet when literacy instruction is confined to classroom borders, where students often write…

The number of internationally mobile students pursuing higher education increases each year, with 8 million students expected to study abroad globally by 2025 (Farrugia, 2014). Many English-dominant universities require international applicants to provide standardized test scores as evidence of English proficiency. Accordingly, millions of…

Academic achievement disparities based on parental education are robust during the middle school years. The current study examined whether cross-class friendship (i.e., reciprocal relationships between peers with different levels of parental education) decrease class-based achievement differences during a developmental phase when friends are…

State accountability systems assume standards based instruction and test content are highly aligned and opportunities to learn the content exist equally for all students. This alignment between content taught and tested is important to understand achievement, yet it is rarely examined. Teachers from Grades 3 to 8 participated along with students…

Given growing disparities in college enrollment by household income, policymakers and researchers often are interested in understanding whether policies expand access for low-income students. In this brief, we highlight the limitations of a commonly available measure of low-income status--whether students receive a federal Pell grant--and compare…

If we wish to embed assessment for accountability within instruction, we need to better understand the relative contribution of different types of learner data to statistical models that predict scores and discrete achievement levels on assessments used for accountability purposes. The present work scales up and extends predictive models of math…

The purpose of this study was to investigate a set of teacher-level factors that educator preparation providers (EPPs) may be examining to anticipate how effective teachers might be in the classroom. An ordinal logistic regression was performed to determine impact on teacher effectiveness, given five predictor variables: level (undergraduate vs.…

The provision of high-quality early mathematics instruction and intervention is critical to ensure that all students are on track for academic success. Given this, identifying and utilizing assessments that can enable the detection of nonresponse to mathematics instruction is a critical aspect of early intervention. To this end, the current study…