The purpose of this study is to examine step-wise admission to two medical programs with regard to selection effects. By using data from a large-scale longitudinal project, the influence of background variables on regular and step-wise admission is estimated. Characteristics of both applicants and those admitted are investigated using descriptive…

Concerns about students' difficulties in statistical reasoning led to a study which explored form five (14- to 16-year-olds) students' ideas in this area. The study focussed on descriptive statistics, graphical representations, and probability. This paper presents and discusses the ways in which students made sense of information in graphical…

Previous research has shown that, unlike novice physicians' performance, diagnostic quality of expert physicians improves when contextual information (the "Enabling Conditions") about a patient is available. The present study was designed to explore these findings further by systematically varying the typicality of enabling conditions…

Studies in psychology and clinical decision making have shown that research subjects and physicians are often overconfident in the accuracy of their judgments. In these studies, groups of 20 first-year and 27 third-year osteopathic medical students at the Ohio University College of Osteopathic Medicine (Athens) were slightly underconfident in…

Hierarchical Bayes procedures were compared for estimating item and ability parameters in item response theory. Simulated data sets from the two-parameter logistic model were analyzed using three different hierarchical Bayes procedures: (1) the joint Bayesian with known hyperparameters (JB1); (2) the joint Bayesian with information hyperpriors…

Procedures for determining cutting scores have been proposed by Angoff and by Nedelsky. Nedelsky's approach requires that a rater examine each distractor within a test item to determine the probability of a minimally competent examinee answering correctly; whereas Angoff uses a judgment based on the whole item, rather than each of its components.…

The assumptions of the Criterion-Referenced Test (CRT) model proposed by Kriewall are compared to those of Emrick and Adam's Mastery-Learning (ML) model. Testing, in the context of instructional management, serves three general purposes: performance evaluation (achievement of objectives), placement (classification of students for instruction), and…

This Brief reports on a new study that begins to fill this research gap. Using longitudinal unit record transcript data on a cohort of first-time community college students in Florida, the study sought to determine whether remedial pathways, such as enrolling in a developmental math course, and enrollment milestones, such as completing a certain…

The Maui Hawaii Educational consortium (the Maui School District and Maui Community College) sought scientifically based evidence for the effectiveness of the "Cognitive Tutor (CT) Algebra I Curriculum" to inform adoption decisions. Decision makers were particularly interested in whether the use of the "CT" program affects…

Most research on information utilization in judgment and decision making has followed two basic approaches: "regression" and "Bayesian." Each has characteristic tasks and characteristic information that must be processed to accomplish these tasks. There has been a tendency to work within a single approach with minimal communication between the…

In this study we test the performance of some nonexperimental estimators of impacts applied to an educational intervention--reduction in class size--where achievement test scores were the outcome. We compare the nonexperimental estimates of the impacts to "true impact" estimates provided by a random-assignment design used to assess the…

During the last years, development of open learning environments that support effectively their users has been a challenge for the research community of educational technologies. The open interactive nature of these environments results in users experiencing difficulties in coping with the plethora of available functions, especially during their…

"University of Chicago School Mathematics Project (UCSMP) Algebra," designed to increase students' skills in algebra, is appropriate for students in grades 7-10, depending on the students' incoming knowledge. This one-year course highlights applications, uses statistics and geometry to develop the algebra of linear equations and…

This report examines the extent to which California high school students fail to meet the high school course requirements for admission to California's four-year public universities. It investigates students' course-taking patterns and whether the courses they take meet the universities' entrance requirements. Because students from a variety of…

This study compared essay scores from paper-based and computer-based versions of a writing test for prospective teachers. Scores for essays in the paper-based version averaged nearly half a standard deviation higher than those in the computer-based version, after applying a statistical control for demographic differences between the groups of…