The Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) administered Illinois Measure of Annual Growth in English (IMAGE) tests in Spring 2004. IMAGE tests are administered to Limited English Proficient (LEP) students who have been in either a Transitional Bilingual Education (TBE) or Transitional Program of Instruction (TPI) program since September 30 of…

Differential item functioning (DIF) occurs when the responses of students with approximately equal ability differ systematically based on their group membership. Idaho contracted with the Northwest Evaluation Association (NWEA) to provide the Idaho Standards Achievement Tests of reading, language arts and mathematics at grades 4, 8 and 10. The…

The bottom line is that each state decides what constitutes success under the No Child Left Behind Act. Under the NCLBA, schools are held accountable for the achievement of all students, not just average student performance. The first principle of accountability for results involves the creation of standards in each state for what a child should…

Educators have kept up a continual bombardment against one-room schools. It has been pointed out that one teacher working alone with all grades and with pupils of all ages can not be expected to accomplish results equal to the results made possible by the specialization of the well-graded school. The present-day practice of attempting to evaluate…

Is there a relationship between the dollar value of property behind each student in a school district and student achievement on standardized tests (or achievement in general)? This paper explains that probably due to the relationship between property taxes and school funding, there is a strong link between property value and student achievement.…

In recent years, conflicting reports have circulated about the number of colleges and universities that have made standardized tests optional, rather than required, for admission. The National Center for Fair and Open Testing, or FairTest, has widely publicized a list of 391 colleges and universities that, it claims, do not require admissions…

The authors outline a proposed student information system incorporating a cross-section of student characteristics to provide a basis for longitudinal analysis and an examination of changes in students. (Data might include standard biographical information, achievement test scores, and information obtained from a required test battery in…

Lecture given before the Annual Conference and Course on Reading (23d, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, Pa., July 10-21, 1967).

The cognitive determinants of number series completion performance were studied by presenting a systematic set of problems to college adults and to average- and high-IQ elementary school children. In each group, a combination of process and content-knowledge variables accounted for more than 70 percent of the variance in solution difficulty.…

Experiences with a combined computer-assisted and computer-managed pharmacology course that allows both scheduled and individual pacing are described. Students with low aptitudes achieved significantly higher scores on the pharmacology portion of a national medical examination after participation. (Author/MSE)

Changes to redress the inadequacies in American education are proposed: return to the ideal of genuinely liberal education for all, a nationwide system of standardized examination as the primary basis for educational promotion, and higher pay for teachers. (MLW)

Some little-understood facts about standardized test scores and how they are reported and interpreted are explained. In particular, the practice of score equating ensures that different test forms have comparable scoring. This and other practices are designed to enhance the equity of testing. (MSE)