Explores certification and license testing and questions the extent to which scientific standards are actually governing policies and practices. Compares the practices of two states that have developed licensure programs for the same field and points out differences in these examinations. (SLD)

Highlights some of the major questions facing the measurement community in deciding how to conceptualize validity in the revised "Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing" of the American Association for Educational Research, the American Psychological Association, and the National Council on Measurement in Education. Focuses on…

Clarifies the differences between two different approaches to the reporting of National Assessment of Educational Progress results using standards: anchor levels and achievement levels. Identifies critical issues related to the use of these approaches and provides a balanced view of their advantages. (SLD)

A strength of this exploration of testing and test use in the United States is the concern for how tests affect student conceptions of learning and student relation to knowledge. A weakness is a persistent confounding of classroom and large-scale assessment for state and national purposes. (SLD)

Six distinguishable aspects of construct validity are discussed as they apply to performance assessment, emphasizing content, substantive, structural, generalizability, external, and consequential aspects. Taken together, these aspects provide a way to address validity questions in score interpretation and use. (SLD)

The application of generalizability theory to the reliability and error variance estimation for performance assessment scores is discussed. Decision makers concerned with performance assessment need to realize the restrictions that limit generalizability such as limitations that lead to reductions in the number of tasks possible, rater quality,…

If annual performance assessments are to yield results that can be compared from year to year, many technical problems must be addressed. It is essential that tests to be equated measure the same construct. Methods of equating performance assessment scores, ways of equating system assessments, and standard setting are discussed. (SLD)

A newly developed performance standard-setting procedure, termed iterative judgmental policy capturing (JPC), is applicable to assessments composed of distinct multidimensional exercises. The procedure is described, and results are reported from the application of JPC in a study involving a panel of 20 teachers and 6 performance exercises. (SLD)

The extent to which performance assessments can have unintended and undesirable consequences is not yet clear, but preliminary evidence suggests several issues of bias and fairness. Among these is the sheer difficulty of scoring complex performance assessments, as Vermont's experiences with portfolio assessment illustrate. (SLD)

This commentary discusses three essential themes in performance assessment and its scoring. First, scores should mean something. Second, performance scores should permit fair and meaningful comparisons. Third, validity-reducing errors should be minimal. Increased attention to performance assessment may overcome these problems. (SLD)

The Internet is a large and growing resource for those interested in educational assessment issues. Internet resources of particular interest to the assessment community are identified and discussed. These include gopher sites, Web sites, and listservs. (SLD)

This article examines how psychometric models based on certain assumptions have come to be used counterproductively by many practitioners in ways that limit the kinds of conclusions that can be made. The general problem of the context's influence on performance is discussed, and some implications are drawn. (SLD)