Measurement models need to properly delineate the real aspect of examinees' response processes for measurement accuracy purposes. To avoid invalid inferences, fit of examinees' response data to the model is studied through "person-fit" statistics. Misfit between the examinee response data and measurement model may be due to invalid…

Current discourse about higher education focuses on issues like government funding, student debt, and admissions diversity; however, increasing attention is being paid to issues of speech and politics in the university. Alongside a series of events at several institutions, calls for 'safe space' on campus have grown familiar. Yet the…

A key part of determining cut-scores when performing Angoff standard setting is utilizing equating methods to place standard-setting ratings onto the scale used to report scores to examinees. This article describes three equating methods that can be employed to place Angoff ratings onto the scale used to report scores to examinees when applying…

Simulation studies are extremely common in the item response theory (IRT) research literature. This article presents a didactic discussion of "truth" and "error" in IRT-based simulation studies. We ultimately recommend that future research focus less on the simple recovery of parameters from a convenient generating IRT model,…

To reduce nonresponse bias in surveys, it has been suggested that researchers allocate additional fieldwork efforts to cases with low estimated response propensity. If these efforts are successful, nonresponse bias may be reduced by changing the variance of response propensities and hence the covariance between response propensities and variables…

Moral elevation is described as a state of positive emotion that includes uplifting feelings, positive views of humanity and a desire to be a better person. Numerous empirical studies have demonstrated that elevation has powerful effects on people's moral intention and behavior. The next step is to investigate how to maximize the emotion of…

Background: The Colorado General Assembly created the Educator Effectiveness Act in 2011. This legislation established the State Council for Educator Effectiveness (The Council). The Council was tasked with developing the purpose behind and structure for a new evaluation system for the state of Colorado. The purpose of the Colorado Model…

In educational and psychological measurement, researchers and/or practitioners are often interested in examining whether the ability of an examinee is the same over two sets of items. Such problems can arise in measurement of change, detection of cheating on unproctored tests, erasure analysis, detection of item preknowledge etc. Traditional…

The purpose of this study was to explore practices from the Reading First Grant implementation, which itself no longer exists, with an intent of identifying those practices that have continued to be utilized through the Response to Intervention process and the practices that have changed in the interim. This research reports the results of an…

One of the questions with the longest history in educational assessment is whether it is possible to increase the reliability of a test simply by altering the way in which scores on individual test items are combined to make the overall test score. Most usually, the score available on each item is communicated to the candidate within a question…

Personalized normative feedback (PNF) interventions provide corrective normative feedback and have been found to successfully elicit behavior change (e.g., related to alcohol consumption, gambling). There are no known PNF interventions that explicitly target risky sexual behavior (RSB). PNF interventions have demonstrated significant reductions on…

Although design is part of everyday experience, increased proficiency in managing and reflecting while designing signify greater proficiency as a designer. This capacity for regulation in design is crucial for learning, including from failure experiences, while designing. Failure and iteration are integral parts of design, with potential cognitive…

Methods for assessing the response class structure of challenging behavior utilizing the concepts of the response class hierarchy and precursor responses have been evaluated. However, the lack of a cohesive examination of the current literature or practice guidelines may impede practitioners' efforts to evaluate the methods for their relevance to…

The introduction to interpersonal communication course (IPC) is popular for both communication majors and nonmajors alike, and as such, many departments have designed online versions of the course. Teaching IPC in this format has challenges, given its dual emphasis on theoretical understanding and skill-building. This reflection essay explores the…

Resurgence in college-level reading research has led to studies on rhetorical reading and reading transfer, but often absent from these discussions are student emotions about reading and themselves as readers. Our qualitative study explores these emotions by examining how basic writing students perceive ideal readers and reading difficulties. Our…