Throughout the United States school principals are subject to increasingly high demands for student accountability. Under the pressures and mandates of this federal legislation, principals are asking themselves what specific leadership practices affect student achievement. A review of literature shows that principals are regarded as a major factor…

Developments in school education in Australia over the past decade have witnessed the rise of national efforts to reform curriculum, assessment and reporting. Constitutionally the power to decide on curriculum matters still resides with the States. Higher stakes in assessment, brought about by national testing and international comparative…

The U.S. Department of Education released regulations governing the development of alternate assessments for students with persistent learning problems who are eligible for Modified Academic Achievement Standards (MAAS) in 2007. To date, state regular assessments or alternate assessments based on Alternate Academic Achievement Standards have not…

Much of the argument about comparability of examination standards is at cross-purposes; contradictory positions are in fact often both defensible, but they are using the same words to mean different things. To clarify this, two broad conceptualisations of standards can be identified. One sees the standard in the observed phenomena of performance…

Robert Coe has claimed that three broad conceptions of comparability can be identified from the literature: performance, statistical and conventional. Each of these he rejected, in favour of a single, integrated conception which relies upon the notion of a "linking construct" and which he termed "construct comparability".…

Organized around the four key areas outlined in the U. S. Department of Education's Race to the Top program, this volume presents a collection of seminal articles on standards and assessment; using data to improve learning; recruiting and retaining great teachers and leaders; and turning around failing schools. Following a foreword by Robert B.…

Using the political-economic analysis of globalisation and education as well as a culturalist approach to education policy borrowing, the paper analyses the role of local actors, specifically, national newspapers and the Ministry of Education, in mediating the potentially homogenising curricular policy pressure of globalisation exerted through the…

The summary information contained in this report provides teachers, school administrators, students, and the general public with an overview of the results from the June 1998 administration of the Mathematics 33 Diploma Examination by the Alberta Department of Education in Canada. This information is most helpful when used with the detailed school…

The summary information contained in this report provides teachers, school administrators, students, and the general public with an overview of the results from the January 1997 administration of the Chemistry 30 Diploma Examination by the Alberta Department of Education in Canada. This information is most helpful when used with the detailed…

The summary information contained in this report provides teachers, school administrators, students, and the general public with an overview of the results from the January 1997 administration of the Biology 30 Diploma Examination by the Alberta Department of Education in Canada. This information is most helpful when used with the detailed school…

The summary information contained in this report provides teachers, school administrators, students, and the general public with an overview of results from the January 1997 administration of the Physics 30 Diploma Examination by the Alberta Department of Education in Canada. This information is most helpful when used with the detailed school and…

The aim of the third National Education Goal is for all U.S. students to be competent in academic subject matter. The aim of the fifth National Education Goal is for U.S. students to perform at world-class levels in mathematics and science. The purpose of this report is to summarize the amount of progress that each state has made in raising…

The summary information contained in this report provides teachers, school administrators, students, and the general public with an overview of results from the January 1997 administration of the Science 30 Diploma Examination by the Alberta Department of Education in Canada. This information is most helpful when used with the detailed school and…

This paper describes (1) the procedures developed to set achievement levels for the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) that contribute to establishing the validity of the levels and (2) the research studies designed to collect information related to the validity of the achievement levels and the outcomes of the process. The central…

The validity of interpretations of National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) achievement levels is evaluated by focusing on evidence regarding three types of discrepancies: (1) between standards; (2) among descriptions of achievement levels; and (3) between assessments and content standards. All of these discrepancies raise serious…