The use of standardized tests for outcome assessment has grown dramatically in recent years. Two driving factors have been the No Child Left Behind legislation, and the increase in outcome assessment measures by accrediting agencies such as AACSB, the international accrediting body for business schools. Despite the growth in usage, little effort…

The field of evaluation faces a number of serious challenges in light of No Child Left Behind legislation, among them feasibility, resources, and blurring lines among research, evaluation, and assessment. At the same time, these challenges open the door for opportunities in evaluation. Now more than ever, the expertise of evaluators is needed and…

This study explored the performance of sixth grade students with and without disabilities on a mathematics assessment aligned to state standards when provided a calculator as an accommodation. The study utilized a pre/posttest design. No student was given access to a calculator on the pretest, and approximately half of the students were randomly…

Value-added methods refer to efforts to estimate the relative contributions of specific teachers, schools, or programs to student test performance. In recent years, these methods have attracted considerable attention because of their potential applicability for educational accountability, teacher pay-for-performance systems, school and teacher…

Classrooms are a primary site of evidence about learning. Yet classroom proceedings often occur behind closed doors and hence evidence of student learning is observable only to the classroom teacher. The informal and undocumented nature of this information means that it is rarely included in statistical models or quantifiable analyses. This…

The Academic Pathways of People Learning Engineering Survey (APPLES) was deployed for a second time in spring 2008 to undergraduate engineering students at 21 US universities. The goal of the second deployment of APPLES was to corroborate and extend findings from the Academic Pathways Study (APS; 2003-2007) and the first deployment of APPLES…

The purpose of this research study was to understand the construct of usability from the perspective of 74 students enrolled in six online courses offered by one online and distance learning program at a large, public university in the Midwest. Six courses, designed and developed by two different groups, professional and nonprofessional…

The problem is that 5th-grade students are not achieving sufficient writing scores on Georgia state-mandated writing assessments, which the researcher hypothesized was due to the teacher-directed instructional approach utilized at the school. The purpose of this mixed-methods study was to determine whether discovery learning, a method based on the…

Research on student profiles, student experiences and outcomes, admissions, credit transfer practices and on student mobility plays an important role in how the British Columbia Council on Admissions and Transfer (BCCAT) discharges its mandate. Given the importance of such research to its mandate, the Council commissioned this report with the…

The Individualizing Student Instruction (ISI) classroom observation and coding system is designed to provide a detailed picture of the classroom environment at the level of the individual student. Using a multidimensional conceptualization of the classroom environment, foundational elements (teacher warmth and responsiveness to students, classroom…

This important book expands the notion of inclusion well beyond special education to include English language learners, students with refugee status, LGBTQ children, poor children, and other underrepresented populations. Employing real-world vignettes and up-to-date research findings, this hands-on resource provides strategies that school leaders…

This case study provides an illustration of the heuristic practices of a high-performing research department, which in turn, will help build much needed models applicable in the context of large urban districts. This case study examines the accountability, planning, evaluation, testing, and research functions of a research department in a large…

Two decades of research have documented what now is common knowledge: no in-school factor matters more to students' educational experiences and outcomes than the effectiveness of their teacher. As a result, the national airspace is increasingly crowded with proposed reforms and initiatives designed to boost teacher performance, including new…

When comparing data derived from tests or questionnaires in cross-national studies, researchers commonly assume measurement invariance in their underlying scaling models. However, different cultural contexts, languages, and curricula can have powerful effects on how students respond in different countries. This article illustrates how the…

This volume includes two sections of the 2018 NORDSCI international conference proceedings: (1) Education and Educational Research; and (2) Language and Linguistics. Education and Educational Research includes 22 papers relating to scientific topics in the full spectrum of education, including history, sociology and economy of education,…