The "TOEFL® Essentials"™ test is a new English language proficiency test in the "TOEFL"® family of assessments. It measures foundational language skills and communication abilities in academic and general (daily life) contexts. The test covers the four language skills of reading, listening, writing, and speaking and is intended…

This report discusses frameworks and assessment development approaches to consider fairness, opportunity to learn, and consequences of test use in the design and use of assessments administered to diverse populations. Examples include the integrated design and appraisal framework and the sociocognitively based evidence-centered design approach.…

New Meridian Corporation has developed the "Quality Testing Standards and Criteria for Comparability Claims" (QTS) to provide guidance to states that are interested in including New Meridian content and would like to either keep reporting scores on the New Meridian Scale or use the New Meridian performance levels; that is, the state…

Test-takers' interpretations of validity as related to test constructs and test use have been widely debated in large-scale language assessment. This study contributes further evidence to this debate by examining 59 test-takers' perspectives in writing large-scale English language tests. Participants wrote about their test-taking experiences in…

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. The purpose of this report is to document the technical aspects of the 2013-14 NYSAA.…

The Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-Third Edition (WISC-III) is an individually administered test of intelligence for assessing children aged 6 through 16 years, 11 months. The WISC-III consists of several subtests, each classified into a verbal or performance scale. The child's performance on these measures is summarized in three…

Assessing complex teaching performance in the National Board of Professional Teaching Standards (NBPTS) has caused the Educational Testing Service to wrestle with fundamental scoring issues that are both conceptual and technical. This report reviews the challenges encountered, how they are being addressed, and what the NBPTS effort has learned…

Results are presented from a study of portfolio use for large-scale assessment in the Pittsburgh (Pennsylvania) public schools that are more encouraging for the use of this form of assessment than many other studies have been. Requirements for the psychometric integrity of portfolio assessment are discussed. (SLD)

The Detroit Tests of Learning Aptitude, 3rd Edition (DLTA-3) is a battery of 11 subtests that measure different but interrelated mental abilities. These are clinically assessed by the battery, which further attempts to delineate the factors that contribute to Spearman's factor for general intelligence. The DLTA-3 has age norms expressed for test…

Credentialing agencies that use multi-test examinations (MTEs) should be concerned with the quality of pass/fail outcomes as well as with the proportion of candidates passing. This study addressed three questions: (1) the effects on passing rate of MTE reliability, number of tests comprising a MTE, and correlations between pairs of component…

The Advanced Placement (AP) program is a cooperative educational effort of secondary schools, colleges, and the College Board that consists of 30 college-level courses and examinations in 17 academic disciplines for highly motivated students in secondary schools. AP courses are offered in more than 11,000 high schools and are recognized by nearly…

In July 2001, the Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs (MCEETYA) agreed to the development of assessment instruments and key performance measures for reporting on student skills, knowledge and understandings in primary science. It directed the newly established Performance Measurement and Reporting Taskforce…

The Singer-Loomis Inventory of Personality (SLIP) was developed by two Jungian analysts to allow examination of personality from the perspective of Jung's typology and to solve problems perceived with the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, based on Jungian dichotomies. The SLIP is designed to clarify and describe the user's personality based on the…

The Values Scale (VS) is a self-report inventory of 106 scored items yielding 21 separate scales for the individual assessment of upper elementary school and middle school students as well as adult members of semi-skilled, skilled, clerical, managerial, and professional occupations. The VS, available in seven languages, measures several intrinsic…

The Career Beliefs Inventory (CBI) is a counseling tool with the purpose of identifying beliefs as they relate to occupational choice and the pursuit of a career. The inventory can be administered individually or to a group ranging in age from grade 8 to adult. The CBI is a 96-item paper-and-pencil test written at an eighth-grade reading level.…