The effects of an experimental geometry course on gender differences in standardized test performance were studied. The experimental approach involved: (1) reading new concepts and materials followed by class discussion; (2) relating applications to real-life situations; and (3) conducting a spiraling review of concepts throughout the year.…

The differential performance of black and white college freshmen on a direct measure of writing skills, the essay portion of the American College Testing Program's Collegiate Assessment of Academic Proficiency (CAAP), was studied. The data consisted of responses of a sample of 998 black and 3,727 white examinees to two individual prompts for…

Performance-based assessment has the potential to support a richer curriculum and more accurately assess the skills of low-income minority students than standardized tests. Performance-based assessment has the following advantages: (1) it allows a wide range of expression; (2) it permits assessment of learning in a natural context while students…

The decontextualized nature of literacy has been a recurrent issue in discussions of the consequences of literacy over the last twenty years. The central thesis of these discussions is that the nature of written discourse itself leads directly or indirectly to changes in cognitive processing, linguistic progressing, cultural development, and/or…

This paper describes evaluation planning for the Cancer Education Program (CEP) at Ohio State University (OSU). The three-year OSU CEP project was designed as a multidisciplinary cancer education program. A responsive method, which trades off some measurement precision in order to increase the usefulness of the findings, was employed in the…

Through a 1984 nationwide random sample of 371 chief liberal arts academic officers, this study examines respondents' careers and administrative behavior and their reports about the condition of the liberal arts in their institutions. The study describes grants administration, evaluation mechanisms, satisfactions and frustrations, and career…

This study identifies distinguishing differences in lecture delivery styles of lecturers rated by students in a large multi-instructor course: the Introduction to Clinical Medicine Course (ICM). The 20 lowest- and highest-rated lecturers of the 1982 and 1983 ICM courses served as the target group. Non-student raters observing the 1984 lectures…

Fifty-four high aptitude undergraduates and 46 moderate-to-low aptitude undergraduates were divided into four treatment groups and were given a pretest during which they learned and recalled a map of a small town in five successive trials. Two weeks later, each group was given a different treatment with a varying degree of explicitness of…

These competencies for drafting are designed to cover basic principles and practices for beginning drafters. Each competency appears in a one-page format. It is presented as a goal statement followed by one or more "indicator" statements, which are performance objectives describing an ability that, upon attainment, will establish…

A study of exceptional secondary school biology teachers was conducted to determine what factors might be important in encouraging young women to remain on the "science track" during high school. Each teacher had a record of encouraging his/her female students to enroll in further science and mathematics courses. Three questions were…

This report, one of four studies on roles of participants in high school change, presents data about activities of department heads in 30 schools throughout the nation. The report analyzes background research on the subject as well as popular perceptions, perceptions of teachers and administrators, and perceptions of department heads themselves…

Descriptions of 10 college programs involving collaborative learning are presented, along with Karen T. Romer's essay, "Collaboration: New Forms of Learning, New Ways of Thinking." The essay identifies various kinds of collaborative learning as well as the benefits of collaborative models. The following programs and schools are…

The initial phase of the University of Washington's International Teaching Assistant Training (ITA) Training Program is discussed. In addition to collecting demographic data for ITAs, English proficiency and student ratings of ITAs were assessed in order to design the training program. The pilot group was extremely diverse in background and…

Two questionnaires were constructed in 1985 as part of the overall Study of Stanford and the Schools. The survey instruments focused respectively on high school student and teacher opinions of their various Advanced Placement (AP) classroom experiences and their academic expectations for AP students based on these classroom experiences. The…

This executive summary describes a study conducted to determine whether different kinds of employer-supported child care services had differing effects on service users. Turnover and attendance data on 891 randomly selected female employees were gathered from 39 companies and hospitals offering on-site or off-site child care, information and…