A survey was conducted of the literature pertaining to higher education program review. Many institutions of higher education have come under intense scrutiny and criticism, and have been required to respond to public pressure for accountability. Program review is one component of the assessment of institutional effectiveness. The following seven…

This article examines one of the challenges to the integration of classroom and large-scale portfolio assessment, a challenge posed by the use of a student's classroom portfolio for large-scale assessment of his or her individual competencies. When work is composed with the support of peers, teachers, and parents, whose work is being judged? The…

In 1990 the Kentucky state legislature passed the Kentucky Education Reform Act (KERA), which mandated a total overhaul of the state's kindergarten through grade 12 public school system and was designed to result in equitable education for all students. Accountability components of the KERA include financial incentives for staff in schools where…

This curriculum review presents and comments on state and county trends in the curriculum offerings of Oklahoma secondary schools. For comparison, it provides the secondary level curriculum offered by each secondary school in the state. Vocational education offerings are not included. The state mandates four units of English, two of mathematics,…

This study, which collected data through interviews and document review, was designed to identify strengths and weaknesses of Minnesota's Comprehensive Children's Mental Health Act (CCMHA) of 1989 and its implementation through December 1990. Three criteria for mental health reform were established for the study, including: care should be…

This document presents the vision of the West Virginia educational community in providing special education services to gifted and disabled students through the restructuring of schools. The approach was developed during a May 1991 meeting of special education leaders at which participants examined the major education reforms being discussed at…

This report reviews California higher education academic program evaluation activities from July 1988 through June 1989. An introductory chapter discusses the meaning and purposes of program evaluation, accreditation, and outcomes assessment at institutional and state levels and the Commission's role. The second chapter reports on planning for new…

This paper reviews the economic and political science literature, and the literature on Chapter 1/Title I in order to identify policy options that retain adequate fiscal accountability as well as insure program quality. Chapter 1 of the Education Consolidation and Improvement Act of 1981 is the successor to Title I of the Elementary and Secondary…

The Florida Statewide Assessment Program, defined by the 1976 Educational Accountability Act, collects and disseminates information on the effectiveness of its school systems to help its students achieve minimum performance standards (MPS) in mathematics, reading, and writing tasks. The 1980-81 regular assessment involved approximately 460,000…

The review of states' and local districts' progress in implementing the Education Amendments of 1976 regarding vocational education was the purpose of the Oversight Hearing on Vocational Education before the Subcommittee on Elementary, Secondary, and Vocational Education. Prepared statements and testimony were given by various persons, including…

The survey reported in this document was undertaken by ERIC/ChESS in the fall of 1973 to see how social studies fits into state accountability activities. The information obtained from the nationwide survey of state departments of education revealed social studies activity in accountability to be quite limited; therefore, general accountability…

In 1969-70 the Michigan Assessment Program gathered data from 320,000 students in approximately 4,000 schools in over 600 school districts across the state. The assessment battery included measures, at the fourth and seventh grade levels, of the following: socioeconomic status, attitude toward school, percentage of teachers with a master's degree,…

This report is a summary of responses to a national survey on the state-level governance of K-12 gifted and talented education in all 50 states and was conducted between June and August of 2002. The Tennessee Initiative for Gifted Education Reform conducted the survey to gather information in preparation for state policy and legislative…

This paper makes recommendations for developing the next generation of state accountability systems for postsecondary vocational education (PVE). It focuses on the need to improve the core indicators for PVE; reduce the burden and improve the value of Carl D. Perkins Vocational and Applied Technology Education Amendments of 1998 (Perkins III)…

These discussions of performance-based student assessment provide a record of a decade-long exploration of unsettled issues in assessment. The first section provides the elements of a basic rationale for performance-based assessment, while the second section contains accounts of efforts to develop new performance-based systems in one city and four…