A standardized achievement testing program was begun in Alum Rock, California in the fall of 1972 as part of an evaluation of an Educational Voucher Demonstration. During each of the first three years of the demonstration both the form of test administration and the particular level of the standardized achievement test that a student is assigned…

Discusses the future of computerized adaptive testing (CAT), i.e., experimental tests developed by the Educational Testing Service in response to criticism of the Standardized Aptitude Tests (SATs). CAT examinations are individually tailored to each test taker, and researchers believe they are more predictive than conventional SATs. (JJD)

This brief overview notes that an adaptive test differs from standardized achievement tests in that it does not consist of a certain set of items that are administered to a group of examinees. Instead, the test is individualized for each examinee. The items administered to the examinee are selected from a large pool of items on the basis of the…

Teachers and test professionals must work together for responsible measurement in English to take place. Traditionally, they have refused to do so, a situation that has led to serious problems in at least three areas: research in the teaching of writing, classroom practice in teaching revision of writing, and some testing practices by such…

Presents some specific questions that educators ought to raise about standardized tests and some alternatives to standardized tests. (Author/IRT)

This paper describes an approach to large-scale assessment that uses tests that are delivered to students over the Internet and that are tailored (adapted) to each student's own level of proficiency. A brief background on large-scale assessment is followed by a description of this new technology and an example. Issues that need to be investigated…

Believes that the New Jersey Commission of Education's Policy of state-wide testing creates an atmosphere of repression against teachers'' and curbs imagination and innovation'' in children. (DS)

A study was conducted to ascertain whether use of an interpreter and/or a regular examiner in administering the WISC would affect test results of a group of Mexican-American children. Spanish administration of some scales of the performance test are likely to elicit optimum performance. (Author)

This article describes Minnesota Computerized Adaptive Testing Language program code for using the MicroCAT 3.5 testing software to administer several types of self-adapted tests. Code is provided for: a basic self-adapted test; a self-adapted version of an adaptive mastery test; and a restricted self-adapted test. (Author/SLD)

Examined equivalence of mode of administration of the Career Decision-Making System, comparing paper-and-pencil version and computer-based version. Findings from 61 undergraduate students indicated that the computer-based version was significantly more reliable than paper-and-pencil version and was generally equivalent in other respects.…

Author questions the widespread use of standardized tests as measures of academic potential, aptitude and ability. The Graduate Record Exam and the Admission Test for Graduate Study in Business are two examples used. (HB)

This study compared several item exposure control procedures for computerized adaptive test (CAT) systems based on a three-parameter logistic testlet response theory model (X. Wang, E. Bradlow, and H. Wainer, 2002) and G. Masters' (1982) partial credit model using real data from the Verbal Reasoning section of the Medical College Admission Test.…