A primary goal of this study was to determine the extent to which item difficulty was related to item position and, if a significant relationship was found, to suggest adjustments to predicted item difficulty that reflect differences in item position. Item response data from the Medical College Admission Test (MCAT) were analyzed. A data set was…

The validity of the Communication Skills and General Knowledge portions of the NTE (National Teacher Examination) Core Battery as predictors of student performance was examined, including scores on the test of professional knowledge required for certification in teacher education programs. This predictive validity was compared to that of the…

The purpose of this report is to distill curricular and testing implications of brain research. The report will focus on three topics. One topic is the possibility that brain lateralization--that is, the degree to which the two brain hemispheres specialize in different types of information processing--is an individual differences variable that…

The purpose of the present longitudinal study was to determine how well a broad, comprehensive battery of tests administered in kindergarten predicts reading achievement in elementary school grades 1 through 6. The test variables were reduced to six predictive factors by factor analysis, and these, together with the variables, Child's Sex and…

A procedure for developing a nomogram that depicts expectancy of success on a criterion from performance on two predictors is presented. Data from 574 medical students attending Michigan State University College of Human Medicine's classes of 1979 through 1984 were used to develop a model for predicting the expectancy of success on Part I of the…

A study involving 9 male and 109 female graduate students in educational psychology, who are or have been teachers, was conducted to investigate the relationship between teacher burnout and personality type, self-perceptions, and critical thinking ability. Subjects included 23 blacks and 95 whites, and the mean age of the sample population was…

The accuracy of predictions of future student performance on the basis of graphing data on semi-logarithmic charts and equal interval graphs was examined. All 83 low-achieving students in grades 3 to 6 read randomly-selected lists of words from the Harris-Jacobson Word List for 1 minute. The number of words read correctly and words read…

The use of futures research to improve a college's ability to deal with changes brought about by social, economic, political, and technological developments is discussed, with attention to new planning strategies and forecasting methods. While traditional long-range planning tracks and forecasts the institution's internal development, strategic…

Based upon prior research in the College of Business and Public Administration and the first year of the university testing program at an upper division, midwestern university, implications for testing of older transfer students are drawn. Students should be tested before, or during, their first term of academic history. If remediation is not…

How accurately ability is estimated when the test model does not fit the data is considered. To address this question, this study investigated the accuracy of the maximum likelihood estimator of ability for the one-, two- and three-parameter logistic (PL) models. The models were fitted into generated item characteristic curves derived from the…

Studies about engineering students and their success and attrition in college are numerous and diverse. One set of research efforts has focused on the differences between academically successful and unsuccessful engineering students. Personality characteristics, academic preparation, and work values are among the variables which have been analyzed…

This paper examines the effectiveness of the Project MECCA (Make Every Child Capable of Achieving) model for early identification and mainstreaming of children with potential specific learning disabilities (SLD). The MECCA model incorporates collaboration between the learning disabilities teacher and the classroom teacher within the classroom…

Research on abstract categorical reasoning has shown that students with "A" grade point averages (GPA) have limited, better and often less, reasoning ability than students with lower GPA's. A similar effect was also found when testing "bright" and "dull" subjects. An analysis of this effect was conducted using the component model of categorical…

The prediction that differences in incomes of high school and college graduates will not change is tested by applying standard statistical procedures to data describing actual income differences. Data from the United States Bureau of the Census describe annual incomes of men twenty-five years old and older during 1956-75. Report 1 displays results…

Correlation, regression, and score interval analyses were conducted for academic tests including the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT), Test of Standard Written English (TSWE), and four subtests of the English Placement Test (EPT) for six different groups. The groups were men, women, Asians, blacks, Hispanics, and whites. The use of grade point…