Nearly all school reforms, regardless of their scope or intended target, share a number of characteristics. This report reviews the essential elements of planning, implementing, and sustaining school reform and presents eight key lessons to guide prospective reformers. The lessons are drawn from 12 major studies of education reform funded by the…

A study documented, evaluated, and compared the quality of education provided to 3- and 4-year-old children in diverse settings in the United Kingdom. The study also explored the relationship between different forms of child care settings and children's educational experiences, and considered the use of a combination of an evaluation of…

Comparative results are presented for procedures recently appearing in literature related to standard setting on the National Assessment of Educational Progress--the paper selection method and the contrasting group method. For this comparison, a probabilistic model with normal distribution of performance and a six-point scale were assumed. The…

An interview with Linden Nelson presents his views on peace education and conflict resolution. Nelson, a professor of Psychology at California Polytechnic State University, has a long term interest in research on cooperation, competition, and conflict resolution and in the promotion of instruction about conflict and peace. Nelson answers 13…

The linkage of planning and evaluation in vocational education is a conceptual as well as an operational phenomenon. In an ideal situation, planning and evaluation are not two distinct sets of activities but rather interrelated aspects of a dynamic and inquiring system with the overall mission of reconciling policy design and policy action.…

Outcomes of a collaborative project among policymakers, researchers, and practitioners in Scotland to develop a framework of qualitative performance indicators for school self-evaluation and development planning are described in this paper. Following an introduction, the second section presents an overview of the Scottish public education…

The need for study programs that fit better to the characteristics of learners, their interests, and the labor market has led education from being supply driven toward being demand driven. The construction of individual study programs requires appropriate assessment methods. The technologies generally available for assessment seem to reinforce the…

Assessment is an integral part of the systemic reform of the educational process. This pamphlet seeks to reflect a vision for student assessment that will engage students, teachers, parents, policymakers, and the public in progress toward attainment of the National Educational Goal of U.S. students being the first in the world in science and…

The quantity of information obtained by performance assessments, compared to traditional testing methods, not only offers the potential for a great deal more feedback to educators, students, parents, and policy makers, but also presents educational personnel with the additional challenge of developing new techniques for effectively disseminating…

A previous simulation study of methods for assessing item functioning (DIF) in computer-adaptive tests (CATs) showed that modified versions of the Mantel-Haenszel and standardization methods work well with CAT data. In that study, data were generated using the three-parameter logistic (3PL) model, and this same model was assumed in obtaining item…

The applicability of a standardized performance measurement procedure is critically investigated, in order to assess reading growth for students with severe reading difficulties in a longitudinal design. To establish an appropriate growth model, several approaches are reviewed. Among them, a simplex model is chosen and tested with various…

A conceptual framework is developed for analyzing the costs of alternative assessment instruments. The framework will be used in future analyses by the Center for the Study of Evaluation to determine the costs of alternative assessment programs in a number of states. It is important that a distinction be made between costs and expenditures. Costs…

Standards-driven school reform is the national strategy to raise U.S. schools to a world-class level by the year 2000. Schools and school districts must develop plans, that show how to integrate the sets of national goals, standards, and assessments. This paper describes a school-improvement model (SIM) developed by the Gilbert (Iowa) Community…

This digest examines issues concerning performance assessment of students receiving special education services. Issues addressed are: (1) need to infuse performance assessment into national programs including the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) and the National Adult Literacy Survey (NALS); (2) current lack of inclusion of…

Information about Colorado's second year of progress toward its 1995 educational goals is summarized. Data were based on a review of progress reports submitted to the State Board of Education by individual districts. Progress in addressing each of the state goals and priority objectives is evaluated in the following areas: (1) graduation rate…