This paper reviews the reliability of several efforts by educational researchers to determine variables in teacher behavior that influence student attitudes and achievement. In particular, works by Rosenshine (1971), Dunkin and Biddle (1974), and Rosenshine and Furst (1970) are examined and evaluated in terms of research criteria developed by…

The effects of using different data analysis methods on estimates of treatment effects of educational programs were investigated. Various regression models, such as those recommended for Title I program evaluations, were studied. The first effect studied was the amount of bias that might be expected to occur in the various settings. Results…

In this paper it is suggested that current research methods are of questionable validity as they pertain to minorities, but that this problem may be solved by encouraging more minority input into the conceptualization, organization, and implementation of surveys that affect them. All phases of survey research are discussed in detail. Planning…

There is a need for clarity regarding different research strategies in order to assess the relative contribution of each. Using the framework of the Facet Design Technique (FDT) for problem structuring, eight general research strategies are identified as they relate to measurement fidelity, representativeness of units, and treatment…

Albuquerque's Title I evaluation staff is in the process of generating a comprehensive local evaluation design because it considers the federally required product evaluation unsatisfactory. The required mean-gain comparisons were extended beyond the dimension of program to the dimensions of school, grade, and Title I instructor. This evaluation…

Attrition, or the loss of study subjects, confounds the subject identification process. Design attrition occurs when subjects initially involved in the study are excluded because of changes in study focus or rationale. Data collection attrition occurs when subjects are excluded because they were not contacted by the data gatherer, or because the…

In discussing the problems of evaluating Canadian bilingual immersion programs, six related aspects are separately considered: (1) the research design, (2) the students tested, (3) the nature of the tests used, (4) the methods of analysis employed, and (5) the interpretation of findings. (Author/SJL)

Authors of the Wilms study on the effectiveness of public and proprietary vocational training respond to critical analysis of their report and call for new research studies to build on their research and corroborate or refute their findings. (Editor/JT)

Concludes that in addition to using multivariate methods to analyze their data, investigators need to begin thinking in terms of large-scale randomized controlled field trails (i.e., experiments). One of the challenges for the ethnographic educational researcher is to demonstrate the superiority of the anthropological field method over the more…

Triangulation strategy results in evidence characterized by the following: (1) convergence; (2) inconsistency; and (3) contradiction. In order to render the data sensible, the researcher or evaluator must report data collection procedures, as well as the three levels of information from which explanations of social phenomena are constructed. (BJV)

Evaluations of special education interventions are different from research on medical interventions. Educational evaluations would be more useful if they applied an actuarial, or probability approach. Information should be collected over time and using various measures, thus increasing the available data. (GDC)

Provides a descriptive overview of the design, revision, and execution of a research project undertaken at the Department of Library and Information Studies at the Manchester Polytechnic to evaluate the attitudes of library science students toward computers before and after the completion of a course in library automation. (JL)

The promise of the stakeholder approach to evaluation lies in its potential to counter criticism that evaluation is too narrow, unrealistic in its standards for success, unfair to program staff and participants, and irrelevant to decision makers. (Author)

Critiquing the stakeholder idea, the author states: if government chooses to take account of competing views in social program evaluation, it can get a better result if it encourages the competing views to find a voice of their own, not to speak through the government's chosen instrument. (Author/PN)