Stanley Rabinowitz

Bio: Stanley Rabinowitz is an academic researcher. The author has contributed to research in topics: Academic standards & Mainstreaming. The author has an hindex of 3, co-authored 5 publications receiving 49 citations.

Evaluation of the Technical Evidence of Assessments for Special Student Populations.

Abstract: Since the enactment of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB), and particularly in relation to Title I and Title III, assessments for special student populations are undergoing increased scrutiny. Ensuring the technical adequacy of assessments for English language learners (ELLs) and students with disabilities (SWDs) is critical, given the high stakes associated with the outcomes of these measures. State departments of education, policymakers, and test developers have attempted several strategies to satisfy the NCLB requirements for valid, reliable, and accessible assessments for special student populations. In practice, however, several challenges affecting technical adequacy have impacted states’ abilities to meet the needs of their special student populations (Rabinowitz, Ananda, & Bell, 2005). These challenges include demonstrating technical adequacy and comparability of assessments for special student populations and their general education counterparts and ensuring consistency of meaning across assesse x c e l l e n c e i n r e s e a r c h , d e v e l o p m e n t , & s e r v i c e ments for general population students and students with special needs (Abedi, 2004; Bowe, 2000; Center for Equity and Excellence in Education, 2005; Rochester, 2004). Recent research has shown that the technical adequacy of assessments for special student populations is relatively undeveloped compared to their general education counterparts; that is, the technical evidence provided and the methods by which this evidence is established do not necessarily account for the unique charac-

Measuring Teacher Effectiveness: An Overview of State Policies and Practices Related to Pre-K-12 Teacher Effectiveness or Teacher Evaluation. AACC Report.

Abstract: Alabama • Delivering Well-Prepared Teachers: C• Expanding the Teaching Pool: C+ • Identifying Effective Teachers: D • Retaining Effective Teachers: C• Exiting Ineffective Teachers: C• Best Practice State in 2-E Licensure Reciprocity • Teacher and student records can be matched by course/ subject and state assessment results. • State requires all evaluators to receive formal training. • State requires all teachers’ performance to be formally evaluated. • State publishes pass rates/ rankings of teacher-preparation institutions. • Teacher preparation programs are accountable for graduates’ performance in classroom setting. • Administrators evaluate teachers against state standards by observing classrooms, discussing practices, and documenting other knowledge; teachers complete self-assessment. • Data are used to create a professional learning plan and make decisions about teachers. • Student achievement data are not included.

National board for professional teaching standardsの設立と現状に関する考察

Abstract: Social studies/history teachers deal with big issues: Who are we, and where do we come from? Why do people believe the things they do, and how do they find meaning in their lives? Why have people organized their societies, economies, and environments in so many different ways, and why do they still? What causes conflict, and how can it be prevented—or should it be? What accounts for poverty and inequality, prejudice and discrimination, or the success and failure of nations? What influences the choices people make? How can we treat each other more humanely, and how can we communicate across our differences? And how do we come to know the answers to any of these questions? In exploring such issues, social studies/history teachers engage students in the most fascinating, exhilarating, maddening, and even confusing topics known to humanity: The origin and spread of scientific ideas, religions, and ideologies; the nature of people, places, and environments; the meeting of cultures and the exchange of ideas; changes in love, marriage, and the family; the rise of democracies and dictatorships. Students learn about the Holocaust, civil rights, women’s suffrage, slavery, torture, natural disasters, immigration, Confucius, international trade, the Enlightenment, human rights, Hiroshima, gender roles, Crazy Horse, the end of apartheid, Normandy, the printing press, Thomas Jefferson, revolutions, disease, and even rock and roll.

Distorting value added: The use of longitudinal, vertically scaled student achievement data for growth-based, value-added accountability

Abstract: Longitudinal, student performance-based, value-added accountability models have become popular of late and continue to enjoy increasing popularity. Such models require student data to be vertically...

Putting growth and value-added models on the map: A national overview

Abstract: BackgroundWithin the last few years, the focus on educational accountability has shifted from holding students responsible for their own performance to holding those shown to impact student perform...

“I never thought of it as freezing”: How students answer questions on large‐scale science tests and what they know about science

Abstract: Education policy in the U.S. in the last two decades has emphasized large-scale assessment of students, with growing consequences for schools, teachers, and students. Given the high stakes of such tests, it is important to understand the relationships between students' answers to test items and their knowledge and skills in the tested content area. Due to persistent test score gaps, students from historically non-dominant communities, and their teachers and schools, are differentially affected by the consequences of large-scale testing. As a result, it is particularly important to understand how students from historically non-dominant communities interact with test items on large-scale tests. We report on a study in which we interviewed 36 students about their responses to six multiple-choice science test items from the Massachusetts state science assessment for fifth grade. The 36 students included 12 students from low-income households, 12 English Language Learners, and 12 middle-class native English speakers. We found that for five of the six selected test items, students' descriptions of the science content knowledge they used to answer the test items frequently did not match the content knowledge targeted by the items. In addition, students from low-income households and English Language Learners were more likely than middle-class native English speakers to answer incorrectly despite demonstrating knowledge of the targeted science content for the items. We argue that such evidence challenges the expectation that students' answers to individual test items reflect their knowledge of the targeted science content, and that evidence of this kind should be included in investigations of the validity of large-scale tests. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 49: 778–803, 2012