With this important work, written around current behavioral psychology research and practice as it applies to school-age children, the authors address both experimental and applied issues in the assessments and interventions used with this population. Among the issues examined are the legal, bureaucratic, and psychological complications involving the newly mandated Functional Assessment law. Included with this book is a software package designed specifically to provide tools to conduct and calculate outcomes for functional assessment procedures on notebook computers.

Bernard R. Gifford and Linda C. Wing Standardized testing has become a ubiquitous feature of American life. As a major source of information for reducing uncertainty in the alJocation of merit based educational, training, and employment opportunities, testing affects the life chances of individuals. Moreover, testing inOuences the way in which our societyjudgesitselfandprovides for ourcollective future. Test scores may determine a child's admission to lcindergarten and promotion to the fIrst grade. Most states award the high school diploma only ifa student has passed a minimum competency test. Major institutions of higher education typically require applicants to supplement their records of academic achievement with scores on college admissions tests. In the labor market, as a condition of employment or assignment to training programs, more and more employers are requiring workers to sit for personnel selection tests. Additionally, it has become commonplace to use test scores to calibrate our national sociopolitical condition and our capacity to compete with other countries in the global economy. In short, with increasing frequency and intensity, scores on examinations that purport to be objective and precise measures of individual knowledge, abilities, and potential are playing a critical role in the opportunity marketplace. Similarly, test scores are exercising growing influence in assessments of our social and economic institutions and in policy decisions about the relative invesunents that should be made in each. In all these instantiations, test scores are at the center of high-stakes decision making about the future of individuals and of the nation itself."

Standardized testing in the United States has been increasing at a rapid pace in the last twenty-five years. The market for tests has not only been expanding rapidly, but has also been changing sharply in structure into a fractured marketplace. Indeed, one of the main features of this book is that the market for standardized testing is highly fractured - with segments of the market facing monopoly conditions, others facing oligopoly conditions and still others where near free-market conditions exist. One of the main premises of the book is that the structures of markets have strong implications for how those markets perform. While this notion is widely accepted among economists, it is not widely appreciated in educational research. A second motivation for the book is that very little scholarly attention has been focused on the standardized testing industry. This topic - the structure of the testing industry and implications for the quality of tests and test use - affects how we evaluate the learning of students, the effectiveness of teaching, the quality of schools and the educational health of the nation. Of particular concern to the authors is one vital aspect of test quality: test validity. This book is the most current and authoritative review and analysis of the market for standardized testing.

Bernard R. Gifford As we edge toward the year 2000, the information age is a reality; the global marketplace is increasingly competitive; and the U.S. labor force is shrinking. Today more than ever, our nation's economic and social well-being hinges on our ability to tap our human resources-to identify talent, to nurture it, and to assess abilities and disabilities in ways that help every individual reach his or her full potential. In pursuing that goal, decision-makers in education, industry, and government are relying increasingly on standardized tests: sets of question- with identical directions, time limits and tasks for all test-takers-designed to permit an inference about what someone knows or can do in a particular area. CALIBRATING DIFFERENCE Our emphasis on standardized testing rests on a premise that is so basic it often escapes notice: that we humans are different from each other in ways that are both meaningful and measurable. We differ in terms of cognitive ability; aptitude for performing different kinds of mental and physical tasks; temperament; and interests. But somehow, without sufficient examination, we have taken a great collective leap from that commonplace to the notion that there are precise, measurable gradations of innate ability that can be used to direct children to the right classrooms, and adults to the right job slots.

Promoting high standards in education while striving for equal opportunities under the budget constraints - these are the new global objectives of education systems. This book brings together research-based evidence on the effectiveness of major Australian, Dutch, and UK improvement efforts in education at both primary and secondary level, whilst making comparisons with similar US initiatives. The book addresses several major questions in this new environment. Those questions include: how to combat educational disadvantages, how to integrate pupils with special educational needs in regular education, how to implement educational standards initiatives, how to restructure secondary education, how to implement decentralized policy-making, and how to implement a class size reduction initiative? Finally, the authors suggest directions for future research in order to increase our understanding of what works in education and why.

Drawing upon experiences at state and local level project evaluation, and based on current research in the professional literature, Payne presents a practical, systematic, and flexible approach to educational evaluations. Evaluators at all levels -- state, local and classroom -- will find ideas useful in conducting, managing, and using evaluations. Special user targets identified are state department of education personnel and local school system administrative personnel. The volume can be used by those doing evaluation projects in the field', or as a text for graduate courses at an introductory level. The book begins with an overview of the generic evaluation process. Chapter Two is devoted to the criteria for judging the effectiveness of evaluation practice. Chapter Three addresses the all important topic of evaluation goals and objectives. Chapters Four, Five and Six basically are concerned with the approach, framework, or design of an evaluation study. Chapter Four contains a discussion of four major philosophical frameworks or metaphors and the implications of these frameworks for conducting an evaluation. Chapters Five and Six describe predominantly quantitative and qualitative designs, respectively. Design, implementation and operational issues related to instrumentation (Chapter Seven), management and decision making (Chapter Eight), and reporting and utilization of results (Chapter Nine) are next addressed. The final chapter of the book (Chapter Ten) considers the evaluation of educational products and materials.

The goals and content for this book are derived from three important and ongoing efforts: to advance the institution of education and to promote educational opportunities to children and youth worldwide, to promote effective assessment policies and practices that enhance sound educational practice, and to address the need to develop tests and other assessment practices in less developed countries as well as to augment and alter a number of traditional assessment practices in developed nations. These three issues provided the focus for a four-day conference that was held at St. Hugh's College, Oxford University, in June 1993. The conference theme-Test Use with Children and Youth: International Pathways to Progress-underscores the importance of addressing testing issues as efforts to improve educational opportunities for children and youth move forward. Leaders from more than seventy nations met at the United Nations sponsored World Summit for Children in 1990 to support ratification of the Convention on the Rights of the Child. Worldwide recognition that every individual has the right to develop her or his potential led to the ratification of provisions setting minimum standards for children's education."

Measuring Up revisits vital issues of equity and assessment through the research efforts and insights of many of the nation's most prominent educators and assessment experts. As its most urgent purpose, the publication aims to sensitize readers to the unfairness and inappropriate uses of testing instruments which under optimal circumstances have the potential to benefit all students. With America fervently espousing both national and state testing, the differential performance by race and social class raises the specter of tests as barriers to life milestones such as promotion, graduation, and college admissions. In response to such punitive testing, the papers included here explore a host of models and practices that are currently being piloted both in America and abroad as educators grapple with the effects the assessment is having on minority and disadvantaged students and school systems. In the process, outcomes of innovative portfolio and authentic assessments are weighed against important standards and principles of validity and consequences. As the various authors probe the gap between African-American and White test scores, they raise important questions of resources, family background and educational opportunity. Beyond their value of their recommendations to educators, their papers help to identify causes of pupil deficiencies in ways that can be addressed by policymakers. To reinforce the emphasis on equity, several authors present a definitive defense of affirmative action as a critical counter-measure to the lack of fairness in school quality, family and social supports, and educational resources.

Corporate training and effective performance have become major issues in the 1980s and '90s. Reviews of the training research literature show that, parallel to the growing attention to corporate training, research has also increased in the field, giving a better understanding of the subject and providing fundamental expertise on which trainers can build. The contributions to the book differ in the degree to which they are related to performance issues, but all chapters underline the necessity of thinking from the perspective of effective performance.

What goals should be addressed by educational programs? What priorities should be assigned to the different goals? What funds should be allocated to each goal? How can quality services be maintained with declining school enrollments and shrinking revenues? What programs could be cut if necessary? The ebb and flow of the student population, the changing needs of our society and the fluctuation of resources constantly impinge on the education system. Educators must deal with students, communities, and social institutions that are dynamic, resulting in changing needs. It is in the context of attempting to be responsive to these changes, and to the many wishes and needs that schools are asked to address, that needs assessment can be useful. Needs assessment is a process that helps one to identify and examine both values and information. It provides direction for making decisions about programs and resources. It can include such relatively objective procedures as the statistical description and analysis of standardized test data and such subjective procedures as public testimony and values clarification activities. Needs assessment can be a part of community relations, facilities planning and consolidation, program development and evaluation, and resource allocation. Needs assessment thus addresses a xiii XIV PREFACE broad array of purposes and requires that many different kinds of procedures be available for gathering and analyzing information. This book was written with this wide variation of practices in mind.

Every school district needs a system of sound superintendent performance evaluation. School district superintendents are and must be accountable to their school boards, communities, faculties, and students for delivering effective educational leadership. To assure that they are evaluated fairly, competently, and functionally, superintendents need to help their school boards plan and implement evaluation systems that adhere to the evaluation standards. Superintendent Performance Evaluation outlines some of the problems and deficiencies in current evaluation practice and offers professionally-based leads for strengthening or replacing superintendent performance evaluation systems. This book focuses on the on-the-job performance of school district superintendents as they implement school board policy. The decision to focus on performance evaluation reflects the importance of this kind of evaluation in the move to raise educational standards and improve educational accountability. Boards and superintendents are advised to make superintendent performance evaluation an integral part of the district's larger system for evaluating district needs, plans, processes, and accomplishments.

We are glad to have the opportunity to work together again in the planning and preparation of this edited volume on the evaluation of corporate training. Our respective professional careers have provided us with experience in this area, both as practitioners and as academicians. It is from both of these perspectives that we approached the preparation of this volume. Our purpose is to provide training professionals in business and industry, and students of human resources development with an overview of current models and issues in educational evaluation. The book is organized around three themes: context, models, and issues. The chapters in the context section are intended to provide the reader with an understanding of the social, organizational, and interpersonal factors that provide background and give meaning to evaluation practice. The models section brings together contributions from some of the most influential thinkers and practitioners in the field. The chapters in this section provide perspective on the dominant themes and emergent trends from individuals who have been, and continue to be, the drivers of those trends. Contributions to the issues section highlight some pervasive themes as well as illuminate new areas of concern and interest that will affect how we assess learning interventions in the organizations of today and tomorrow.

This book details a unique training evaluation approach developed by David J. Basarab, Sr. currently the Manager of Evaluation at Motorola University. This approach was developed in part based on information from his graduate coursework with Dr. Darrell K. Root, professor of program evaluation and educational administration at the University of Dayton. It enabled Motorola to evaluate their corporate training programs to determine whether money spent on training was an investment or an expense. This evaluation approach is also significant in determining either the effectiveness of or the opportunities to improve corporate training programs. In this text, The Training Evaluation Process, David Basarab and Darrell Root provide commercial industry training with a step-by-step approach to use when evaluating training progrruns, thus allowing training to be viewed as an investment rather than an expense. This text focuses on assessing training programs, so that they may be improved. This approach provides a successful procedure to use when evaluating training programs. Included in the text is a comprehensive explanation of the evaluation model developed by D. L. Kirkpatrick (Kirkpatrick, D. L., November 1959) in which he described four levels of evaluating training progrruns: Level 1 -Reaction: Evaluate to learn participants' perception to the training program. Level 2 -Learning: Evaluate to determine whether participants have learned the course subject matter. Level 3 -Behavior: Evaluate participants' use of newly acquired job skills on the job. Level 4 -Results: Evaluate the organizational impact of training on company's workforce.

5 TABLE I Average Reading Proficiency and Achievement Levels by RacelEthnicity Grades 4 8 and 12 1992 Reading Assessment Percentage of Student At or Above Percentage of Average Proficient Basic Below Basic Advanced I Students Proficiency I Grade 4 White 71 226 6 31 68 J2 69 16 193 0 Black 7 31 Hispanic 9 202 2 13 41 59 Asian/Pacific Islander 2 216 2 21 55 45 American Indian 2 208 2 15 50 50 Grade 8 70 White 268 3 34 77 23 Black 16 238 0 8 44 56 Hispanic 10 242 I 13 49 51 AsianlPacific Islander 3 270 6 38 77 23 American Indian 1 251 I 18 60 40 Grade 12 White 72 297 4 43 82 18 Black 15 272 0 16 54 46 9 277 Hispanic 1 21 61 39 Asian/Pacific Islander 4 291 4 39 74 26 American Indian 0 272 I 24 S2 48 Source: National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), 1992 Reading Assessment. Reprinted from "NAEP 1992 Reading Report Card for the Nation and the States. " l be reading at the advanced level . A much higher percent of White Americans are performing at the proficient and advanced levels.

There has been longstanding interest in affective characteristics in both educational and corporate environments. While each domain has produced its own set of theorists and researchers, the work of some, such as Bandura, has found a place in the literature of both areas. In each of these settings, theorists and researchers have agreed on the causal connections between such constructs as self-efficacy and perceived satisfaction and success, whether that success is measured by academic achievement or corporate quality and performance resulting in profitability. Along with this interest, comes the need for the development of valid and reliable instruments to assess affective characteristics. It is clear that no matter whether your interest lies in the relationship between self-efficacy and academic success or employee satisfaction and corporate success, it is essential that the instruments used be carefully designed and tested to assure that they are measuring what they are intended to measure in a consistent manner. This work offers the theoretical perspective, modern psychometric techniques, real examples, and data needed to enable the instrument developer to produce such valid and reliable instruments.

Although anecdotal reports of loss of once-acquired reading ability was noticed in the individuals who had sustained brain damage as early as the year AD. 30, systematic enquires of alexia were not undertaken until the latter part of the nineteenth century. The two anatomo-pathological studies carried out by Dejerine in 1891 and 1892 mark the beginning of scholarly investigation of reading failure. Interestingly, the study of de velopmental reading disability also began to receive attention at about the same time when Pringle Morgan described the case of a 14-year-old boy who had great difficulty in reading and writing. Since then sporadic reports of developmental reading-writing failure began to appear in medi cal and educational journals even though such investigation went on at an unhurried pace. In the past two decades, however, the situation has changed enormously and hundreds of articles that have investigated developmental and acquired cognitive disabilities have been published. Disorders of spoken language and written language are two areas that have been extensively addressed by these articles. Those who study disorders of language come from a wide variety of backgrounds and their reports are also published in a variety of journals. The purpose of the present volume is to bring some important research findings of written language disorders together and present them in a coherent format. In Chapter 1, Joshi and Aaron challenge the validity of the notion of the putative "poor speller but good reader'."

This book was first published in 1977.

In an age that dictates accountability and verifiability of educational programs, institutions of higher education are called on to justify their programs. To meet these demands, there is a need for improved methods for the evaluation of teacher education programs. More importantly, there is a need for the development of methods and procedures to conduct continuous and on-going evaluation that can aid the process of program improvement. Many institutions have had difficulties in developing and implementing satisfactory systems for conducting needed evaluation. In recent years the standards for the approval of teacher education programs in all of the states were strengthened as were the standards for approval by the National Council for the Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE). These revised standards put even more emphasis on accountability and the need for both summative and formative evaluation in a teacher education program. Tennessee Technological University has long been recognized as an institution with an exemplary project in program evaluation. As a result, in 1986, the state of Tennessee established at Tennessee Technological University, a Center for Teacher Education Evaluation. The Center began work in July 1986, on the development of models and systems for conducting teacher education program evaluation. To most, teacher education program evaluation is simple and straightforward. Evaluation includes a set of options, a set of criteria, data collection and interpretation, x and then use in meeting accountability needs.

Since test items are the building blocks of any test, learning how to develop and validate test items has always been critical to the teaching-learning process. As they grow in importance and use, testing programs increasingly supplement the use of selected-response (multiple-choice) items with constructed-response formats. This trend is expected to continue. As a result, a new item writing book is needed, one that provides comprehensive coverage of both types of items and of the validity theory underlying them.

This book is an outgrowth of the author s previous book, Developing and Validating Multiple-Choice Test Items, 3e (Haladyna, 2004). That book achieved distinction as the leading source of guidance on creating and validating selected-response test items. Like its predecessor, the content of this new book is based on both an extensive review of the literature and on its author s long experience in the testing field. It is very timely in this era of burgeoning testing programs, especially when these items are delivered in a computer-based environment. Key features include

Comprehensive and Flexible No other book so thoroughly covers the field of test item development and its various applications.

Focus on Validity Validity, the most important consideration in testing, is stressed throughout and is based on the Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing, currently under revision by AERA, APA, and NCME

Illustrative Examples The book presents various selected and constructed response formats and uses many examples to illustrate correct and incorrect ways of writing items. Strategies for training item writers and developing large numbers of items using algorithms and other item-generating methods are also presented.

Based on Theory and Research A comprehensive review and synthesis of existing research runs throughout the book and complements the expertise of its authors.

The arrival of the computer in educational and psychological testing has led to the current popularity of adaptive testing---a testing format in which the computer uses statistical information about the test items to automatically adapt their selection to a real-time update of the test taker's ability estimate. This book covers such key features of adaptive testing as item selection and ability estimation, adaptive testing with multidimensional abilities, sequencing adaptive test batteries, multistage adaptive testing, item-pool design and maintenance, estimation of item and item-family parameters, item and person fit, as well as adaptive mastery and classification testing. It also shows how these features are used in the daily operations of several large-scale adaptive testing programs.

The media now regularly feature breakthroughs on the influence of prenatal hormones on the brain and behavior, for instance the link to financial performance or risk management. Based on these findings and their own experiments, the authors present the Hormonal Quotient (HQ) as a scientific, holistic and reliable career management and personal development tool for professionals. Eight HQ profiles and their corresponding typical business skills and preferences are presented and enable the reader to benchmark their HQ with peers, design an ideal career plan, build a winning team in business and find the perfect work-life balance. A complimentary website allows readers to easily measure their HQ online.

By the author of "The Right Sensory Mix," Berry-AMA Book Prize Finalist 2011 - one of the four best marketing books in 2011 according to the American Marketing Association Foundation.

The Berry-AMA Book Prize is awarded annually be the American Marketing Association Foundation (AMAF) and recognizes books whose innovative ideas have had significant impact on marketing and related fields.

This book provides an alternative method for measuring individual differences in psychological, educational, and other behavioral sciences studies. It is based on the assumptions of ordinal statistics as explained in Norman Cliff's 1996 Ordinal Methods for Behavioral Data Analysis. It provides the necessary background on ordinal measurement to permit its use to assess psychological and psychophysical tests and scales and interpret the data obtained. The authors believe that some of the behavioral measurement models used today do not fit the data or are inherently self-contradictory. Applications of these models can therefore lead to unwarranted inferences regarding the status of the derived variables. These methods can also be difficult to apply, particularly in small-sample contexts without making additional, unrealistic assumptions. Ordinal methods more closely reflect the original data, are simple to apply, and can be used in samples of any size. The book's approach is in essence a return to simple empiricism in psychological measurement. Ordinal Measurement in the Behavioral Sciences provides: *methods for analyzing test responses; *extensive discussions of ordinal approaches to analyzing data that are judgments of stimuli; *methods for treating psychological data in ways consistent with its ordinal nature so as to stimulate new developments in this area; and *ordinal test theory and the unfolding methods that are applicable to cross-cultural studies. Advanced students, researchers, and practitioners concerned with psychological measurement should find this book relevant. Measurement professionals will find it provides useful and simple methods that stimulate thought about measurement's real issues.

The rediscovery of the value of apprenticeships has been one of the most significant trends in vocational education in recent years, and has prompted an array of research and development projects in countries around the world. In this volume, the renewed interest in the apprenticeship tradition and the various steps towards the implementation of innovative apprenticeship programmes are analysed and discussed from different perspectives.

Beginning with a number of chapters that describe recent developments in apprenticeship training in different national contexts, the book moves on to analyze the way in which both the quality and profitability of apprenticeship act in concert as the most influential drivers of innovation in this field.

In sum, this book makes an important contribution to the international literature on apprenticeship. It draws together some of the leading researchers in the area, and with its overview of a number of national Vocational Education and Training (VET) projects, provides a body of knowledge on current practices and issues that has previously been lacking in this complex interdisciplinary field. The lessons learned from countries' experiences, as presented in this book, provide a valuable platform for policy-makers and scholars alike.

A detailed historical account of the origins of the modern examination system in England from 1850 to 1900. At the beginning of the nineteenth century public examinations were almost unknown, yet by its end they were established as the most generally acceptable method of assessment and selection; with many they had become almost an article of the Victorian faith, though their objectivity and efficacy were already becoming matters of public controversy. The Oxford and Cambridge honours examinations provided a major source for Victorian ideas of open competition and public examinations. It was seen that this model could be applied to a whole range of educational and administrative purposes. The crucial developments came between 1850 and 1870: major landmarks were the Northcote Trevelyan Report of 1853 on the Civil Service, the foundation of the Oxford and Cambridge Local Examinations of 1857 and 1858, and Gladstone's introduction in 1870 of open competition into the Home Civil Service.