Three-fourths of the states have mandated some form of testing. Problems are discussed and practical recommendations about implementation are offered. (Author/MLF)

The minimum competency testing issue raises basic questions--who controls public education and what should be taught? (Author)

During the last decade many school systems began to define minimum levels of competency for their students and to construct tests to measure whether students had achieved these minimums. Many states have passed laws which require high school students to pass minimum competency tests in order to graduate. This digest overviews four areas of…

Barbara Jordan served as the hearing officer for three-day adversary evaluation hearings about the pros and cons of minimum competency testing (MCT). This report is the complete transcript of the third day of proceedings. The pro team testimony, led by James Popham, began with William Raspberry, who presented his view of the likely impact of MCT.…

Some general questions about minimum competency tests are discussed, and various methods of setting standards are reviewed with major attention devoted to those methods used for dichotomizing a continuum. Methods reviewed under the heading of Absolute Judgments of Test Content include Nedelsky's, Angoff's, Ebel's, and Jaeger's. These methods are…

Proceedings of the symposium on Implications for Minority Groups of the Movement Toward Minimum-Competency Testing (MCT) include the following papers: (1) "Implications of Minimum-Competency Testing for Minority Students" by A. Graham Down, who asserts that MCT offers more hope than any development in public school policy since 1954 for…

The responses to an informal survey of the states indicate that most states are either giving competency tests, developing them, or making plans to do so. Many aspects of the current practices and trends need study and discussion. (Author/IRT)

A brief report on status of state mandates for teacher testing considers: (1) the number of states that have or are establishing testing programs; (2) the type of competency testing being conducted by each state; (3) whether currently employed teachers should be tested; (4) whether such tests discriminate against minority group members; and (5)…

In the current educational reform movement, the most sobering issue is the relationship between achievement and race. None of the recent major educational reform reports face up to the reality that raising minimum standards and imposing minimum requirements simply increase the failure rate among Blacks. (CMG)

This satire about a school for animals lampoons the idea that students of varying abilities and talents can be fairly judged by a single set of proficiency standards developed by teachers. (SJL)

The New Jersey Education Association charges that serious reporting errors in the state's minimum basic skills (MBS) testing program are causing some children to be falsely labelled as failures and are leading to misallocation of State Compensatory Education Aid, which is based on a formula using MBS scores. (SJL)

Written by the Australian Education Council, this article outlines the purpose and the procedures for the Australian Studies in Student Performance program, a project to gather information on achievement in literacy and numeracy of a sample of 10 and 14 year olds. (HTH)

Development of survey test materials for the Australian national testing program in literacy and math skills is discussed. (HTH)

Radical, but nevertheless serious, suggestions are made to change ineffective schools. (MLF)

A rationale is provided for integrating steps that are necessary both in minimum competency testing programs and in the process required under Public Law 94-142 (the Education for All Handicapped Children Act) for developing individualized education programs for handicapped children. (Author)