This description of the use of IBM Series/1 minicomputers to implement a library automation system includes discussion of current functions of the system, the system configuration, communications capabilities, software, and cost factors. (CLB)

Public debate over higher education has changed from questions about education, learning, scholarship, and professional service to performance criteria measured in quantitative, business-like indicators, such as revenues and costs of operation. The rules have changed, and new consumers have new concerns and challenges for higher education. Faculty…

A system was developed to evaluate the impact and effectiveness of transition services for special education students in Maine. The project's three phases included preliminary activities relevant to the development of the evaluation system; activities in developing, field testing, and revising the evaluation strategy; and selecting and evaluating…

This volume contains tables of results to accompany an executive summary produced for a project which evaluated the impact and effectiveness of transition services for special education students in Maine. The tables contain data for each of the 21 participating school districts, covering the following program evaluation components: staff survey…

Describes several problems encountered when using the Boolean model of information retrieval, and for each problem offers a nontraditional design principle that overcomes the difficulty. The problems discussed are the unfriendliness of Boolean formulas, null output and output overload, undifferentiated facets, interpreting weights, and term…

Discusses the distinctive differences between the English and Chinese languages from the system designer's point of view and explores the potential problems for Chinese information retrieval systems, focusing on character entry and retrieval. The advantages and disadvantages of current approaches are discussed, and a regular expression search…

Psychometric considerations that must be addressed in planning a faculty evaluation system for higher education are discussed. Constructing a framework for evaluation is reviewed through the example of evaluation of instructional competence, research productivity, and professional service. (SLD)

To address system problems and other management weaknesses, in 1998 Congress created the Office of Federal Student Aid (FSA) within the Department of Education. This office adopted a new approach to systems integration using middleware (software that can allow an application to access data residing indifferent databases) and Extensible Markup…

This study examined the general nature of school-based student assessment in a small sample (five elementary and three middle schools and one high school). It relies on descriptive analyses and the presentation of data obtained during site visits. The schools have been separated into those with well-developed student assessment systems and those…

This paper reports on a transaction log analysis of 51,473 queries from 18,113 users of Excite, a major World Wide Web search engine. Approximately 2,500 of these queries were from the use of relevance feedback. Given the high level of research activity and historical success of relevance feedback in assisting users in locating relevant…

The Legislative Office of Education Oversight (LOEO) assessed the planning and implementation of Ohios Education Management Information System (EMIS). The EMIS was mandated in 1989 as a provision of one of the most comprehensive educational reform bills ever passed in Ohio. The EMIS was developed based on an existing computer network, the Ohio…

The need for and applicability of general systems theory in human services evaluation is discussed. The role of evaluation in human services agencies is described and the necessity of combining the programs to be evaluated and the evaluation process itself in a single unifying conceptual model is demonstrated. (Author/AL)

Introduction: Website accessibility is a problem that affects millions of people with disabilities. While most current accessibility initiatives target government or commercial sites, a growing segment of online content is being created by non-professionals. This content is often inaccessible to users with disabilities. Everyday inclusive Web…

This white paper proposes bringing the federal government, state governments, and the private sector together as part of a new approach to making high-speed Internet services available across the country. It proposes the creation of a new federal Universal Broadband Fund (UBF) that, together with matching funds from the states and the private…

The first of two articles discusses the obstacles to and advantages of cooperative systems planning and development by a team of academic librarians and computing center staff. The second examines the differences in funding approaches to libraries and computer centers, and budgetary problems involved when the two organizations share computer…