Early education programs are increasingly being promoted by states and the federal government as an integral part of their efforts to ensure that all children enter school ready to learn. As these programs and their enrollments have grown in recent years, so too have efforts to monitor their quality and performance. A common focus is on…

States and districts have launched unprecedented efforts in recent years to build new feedback and evaluation systems that support teacher growth and development. These systems depend on trustworthy information about teaching effectiveness--information that recognizes the complexity of teaching and is trusted by both teachers and administrators.…

As the education reform movement increasingly focuses on teachers and teaching, educators, policy-makers, and researchers need valid and reliable measures that can be used to evaluate individual teachers, provide guidance for improving teaching performance, and support research in ways that advance instruction and classroom dialog and practice. A…

There is a growing consensus that teacher evaluation in the United States is fundamentally broken. Few would argue that a system that tells 98 percent of teachers they are "satisfactory" benefits anyone--including teachers. The nation's collective failure to invest in high-quality professional feedback to teachers is inconsistent with…

Research has long been clear that teachers matter more to student learning than any other in-school factor. Improving the quality of teaching is critical to student success. Yet only recently have many states and districts begun to take seriously the importance of evaluating teacher performance and providing teachers with the feedback they need to…

No one has a bigger stake in teaching effectiveness than students. Nor are there any better experts on how teaching is experienced by its intended beneficiaries. Only recently have many policymakers and practitioners come to recognize that--when asked the right questions, in the right ways--students can be an important source of information on the…

Quality measures were originally developed for research aimed at describing the settings that children spend time in and identifying the characteristics of these environments that contribute to children's development. They were also developed to guide improvements in practice. Increasingly, however, measures of quality are being used for further…

Discusses the necessity for the use of test score data in measuring school effectiveness. Outlines the types of tests best suited to particular schools. (MD)

Higher elementary student scores on standardized tests do not mean educational improvement. Scores can be affected by teaching "to" the test, coaching on test taking, and skewed norms. Test scores have been declining at the secondary level. Included is a discussion of secondary tests. (MD)

Discusses the need for a method to measure computer user abilities, and presents an instrument that identifies individuals' technical, modeling, and applications skills. An evaluation of the instrument in terms of validity and reliability is reported, and applications in user education research are suggested. (12 references) (CLB)

This book offers a descriptive account of the world of the British external examiner: who they are, what they do, how they are appointed, and what problems they face. Findings are based on a questionnaire survey of and personal interviews with examiners. The external examiner is independent of the university awarding the degree and quite…

Intended for administrators and policymakers as well as teachers, this digest explores approaches to, problems with, and trends in large scale writing assessment. The digest first compares direct and indirect assessment approaches, then examines three approaches to scoring: holistic, primary trait, and analytic. It then discusses issues and…

School districts need valid and reliable information before they make difficult decisions. Objective research can provide a reliable base of information. (MD)

This presentation examines the history of merit pay and analyzes studies and research on merit pay to discover directions for developing effective procedures. Reasons for failure of merit pay plans include administrative problems, personnel problems, collective bargaining, financial problems, unsatisfactory evaluation, staff dissension,…

Outlines 11 essential qualities needed in a good school board president. (MD)