The landscape of undergraduate biology education has been shaped by decades of reform efforts calling for instruction to integrate core concepts and scientific skills as a means of helping students become proficient in the discipline. Assessments can be used to make inferences about how these reform efforts have translated into changes in…

There is an increased demand on nursing faculty to provide quality teaching and assessment. Nursing faculty are required to ensure accurate assessment of learning through testing and outcome measurement that are critical elements of the evaluation process. Likewise, nursing faculty should implement a logical evaluation system. However, the…

A great deal has been written on the topic of test validity. Guiding our work at ACT are "The Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing" (2014), which outlines best practices in test development and validation. As ACT transitions from an assessment company to a learning, measurement, and navigation organization, a framework for…

The research note focuses on the alignment aspect of English language proficiency (ELP) assessments, one of the required types of validity evidence for the federal peer review process of states' assessment systems. A basic tenant of current U.S. education policy is the alignment between what a test assesses and what content has been determined as…

In this article, the authors present the adaptation and validation processes conducted to render the American "Test of Financial Literacy" (TFL) suitable for use in Germany (TFL-G). First, they outline the translation procedure followed and the various cultural adjustments made in line with international standards. Next, they present…

This study examined the validity of trilingual test as a test accommodation to assess the Indigenous pupils' mathematical performance in Malaysia. The study employed two tests; BM-only test with items written in Malay language (BM) and trilingual test, which had items written in BM and English, and oral audio recording in their native Temiar…

The current study reports the results of a project aimed at assessing L2 listening comprehension by drawing on two approaches to dynamic assessment: interventionist and interactionist. The former approach was actualized by providing two graduated hints which were fixed and standardized for all test takers while the latter was actualized by asking…

This guide is designed to assist States, agencies, and/or facilities who work with youth who are neglected, delinquent, or at-risk (N or D). The information in the guide will benefit those who are (a) interested in implementing pre-posttests, (b) in the process of identifying an appropriate pre-posttest, or (c) ready to evaluate current testing…

This paper reports the development of a fixed-choice test for the assessment of basic knowledge in psychology, for use with undergraduate as well as graduate students. Test content is selected based on a core concepts approach and includes a sample of concepts which are indexed most frequently in common introductory psychology textbooks. In a…

Many of the instruments developed for research use by the chemistry education community are relatively new. Because psychometric evidence dictates the validity of interpretations made from test scores, gathering and reporting validity and reliability evidence is of utmost importance. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to investigate what…

This technical report provides an overview of the New York State Alternate Assessment (NYSAA), including a description of the purpose of the NYSAA, the processes utilized to develop and implement the NYSAA program, and Stakeholder involvement in those processes. By comparing the intent of the NYSAA with its process and design, the validity of the…

This primer should provide the reader with a deeper understanding of the concept of test validity and will present the recent available validity evidence on the relationship between SAT® scores and important college outcomes. In addition, the content examined on the SAT will be discussed as well as the fundamental attention paid to the fairness of…

Learning or performance gains are often measured in improvements of test scores over time. However, learners may also answer questions incorrectly which they appeared to master previously, making claims about overall learning gains problematic. Using data from 1,211 grade 6 learners in the Umgungundlovu district in KwaZulu-Natal, we interrogated…

This chapter introduces theory that undergirds the role of testing adaptations in assessment, provides examples of item modifications and testing accommodations, reviews research relevant to each, and introduces a new paradigm that incorporates opportunity to learn (OTL), academic enablers, testing adaptations, and inferences that can be made from…

This manual contains information about the American College Test (ACT) Plan® program. The principal focus of this manual is to document the Plan program's technical adequacy in light of its intended purposes. This manual supersedes the 2011 edition. The content of this manual responds to requirements of the testing industry as established in the…