An analysis of teachers' rating scales as sources of evidence for a standardised Greek reading test

Until recently there has been no nationally acceptable test for assessing reading for the higher grades (Five and Six) of the elementary schools in Greece. As part of an effort to validate such a test, evidence was gathered from teachers' rating scales. Seventy‐two teachers from Fifth and Sixth Grades all over Greece evaluated their 1377 students' reading ability prior to the administration of a standardised reading test. The teachers were instructed to rate each student's reading achievement, disregarding effort, intelligence, behaviour and attendance. Within class correlation coefficients were computed to determine whether teachers' personal judgement (ratings) and students' actual performance on the reading test were correlated. The standardised reading test and the teachers' ratings were found to have a strong correlation. The match between Greek teachers' assessments of student reading levels and the scores obtained using a newly standardised reading test is reported, in order to examine the extent to which teacher ratings and standardised test results of students yield the same information. The rationale of this study is to investigate whether a new standardised Greek reading test can provide an alternative tool for the assessment of Greek primary education.     

College physical chemistry students' conceptions of equilibrium and fundamental thermodynamics

Hour-long structured interviews were conducted with 16 volunteer students from four undergraduate physical chemistry classes. Many student alternative conceptions and nonconceptions were expressed about important material covering equilibrium and thermodynamics. Twenty-nine of these were prevalent (present in >25% of the students.) The student conceptions expressed in their interviews were compared with those expressed by experts in textbooks and rated using a 6-point rubric. These ratings were averaged into a rating in each of four subjects and an overall rating. Correlation indices were computed. The “quality of student conception” rating was best predicted by an aggregated t score for the results on instructor-designed in-class exams. This result indicates that instructor's exams and grades do in fact demonstrate the level of a student's understanding of this course material. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 35: 1151–1160, 1998.     

Student ratings of college teaching: a comparison of faculty and their students

Based on the review of student ratings myths by Aleamoni (1987, 1999), a survey research design was used to analyse differences between college students' (n = 968) and faculty's (n = 34) perceptions. Generally, students held stronger beliefs in these myths, in that they believed faculty with excellent publication records were better qualified to evaluate teaching and that student ratings on single general items are accurate measures of teaching effectiveness. On the other hand, faculty believed that student ratings were invalid and unreliable. Further examination of student characteristics revealed that male students held stronger beliefs in these myths. Finally, students' beliefs in these myths were correlated with their actual ratings of nine dimensions of the Student Evaluation of Educational Quality. A discussion as well as suggestions for using student ratings is provided.     

Effectiveness of the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test with Seventh-Grade Pupils

Abstract

This is an exploration of college students’ motivations that affect their performance, and that might eventually provide educators with suggestions for program modifications. S's were 343 women's college freshmen. Student responses to the author's College Assessment Inventory gave information on eight student motivational variables. Students’ perceptions of meaningfulness of daily college tasks were positively related to overachievement, with r=.22, significant at .001 level. Field of interest (liberal arts and professional), relevance of college to the student's future goals, and warmth of interpersonal relations predicted voluntary dropout, with chi-squares significant beyond the .05 level. A combination of liberal arts, low on future goals, and low on warmth resulted In a 55 percent chance of a student's staying and a 41 percent chance of voluntarily dropping. A professional field" high on future goals, high on warmth combination indicated an 82 percent chance of staying and a 10 percent chance of voluntarily dropping. Further explorations seem called for, but practical applications are not yet warranted.     

Teachers’ academic appraisals and referral decisions: The effect of sharing health information when diabetes is present

Two prior studies showed that giving teachers more information about a student's illness led them to make better attributions about that student's classroom problems and better classroom accommodations. In this study, 235 teachers appraised academic competence and judged whether to seek help or make a referral for a hypothetical student with type 1 diabetes mellitus (T1DM). Teachers received one of five levels comprising increasing disease disclosure and classroom‐relevant information about T1DM. Contrary to prior studies, teachers in this study who were given a student's T1DM diagnosis and details about T1DM's classroom risks failed to make better judgments about the student's academic skill levels or to award more accurate grades. Instead, teachers seemed swayed by this student's apparently careless and inconsistent schoolwork, which was presumably disease related. Likewise, better‐informed teachers were no better at selecting accommodations. However, once it was disclosed that the hypothetical student had T1DM, most teachers seemed knowledgeable about the most appropriate potential Individuals With Disabilities Education Improvement Act category for service delivery. Regarding practice issues, school psychologists were rarely selected as a first choice for consultation, and the more information teachers were provided with about T1DM and the student's disease status, the less likely they were to select a school psychologist as a consultant.     

What Students Don't Tell Their Parents:

This article deals with the usually unverbalized aspects of a college student's emotional life, and how this affects communication with parents. During college the student essentially recreates her or himself. College students find themselves in a "Largely unrecognized turmoil," confronted with new rules for interaction, new lifestyles, and a lack of familiar structure. This leads to a great deal of self-evaluation, comparing previous structures (from the home and high school) with new ideas. Within these circumstances of uncertainty, questioning, and experimentation, the student is particularly vulnerable and greatly wishes for strong expressions of parental support. The issue of communication with parents is clouded by the student's wish for the parents to see her or him as adult and "together"; therefore, the student will rarely express the need for support. If parents are more aware of the student's unverbalized circumstances, as well as appreciative of what they themselves can gain from the changes their daughter or son experiences, both student and parent will feel more at ease and can grow personally. The article suggests certain guidelines for communication between parents and students.     

美国第三方评估机构“好学校”的高中学校综合性评价及其启示

作为一种在线学校评估方式,综合性评价是美国近年来出现的一种对高中学校进行评价的新方式,由全美非营利性第三方评估机构"好学校"(Great Schools)于2017年最先推出。其基本理念是:学生增值是衡量一所学校更准确的指标,应为家长提供学校的质量和优势方面的信息以及反映家长认为有意义的东西。评估由学生进步(学术进步)评定、大学准备评定、平等性评定、考试成绩评定等四大"主题评定"构成。其特点包括评价的内容强调针对性、评价的重点突出"为学生增值"和为弱势群体服务、评价过程与结果强调透明性与动态性、评价方法追求持续改进性,对深化新时代我国高中学校评价改革具有启发意义。     

Factors influencing the college choice decisions of graduate students

This paper examines the relative influence of factors affecting the college choice decisions of graduate students. It is based on a 1986 survey of 2,834 admitted students at a major research university, to which 38 percent of the sample responded. Factor analysis of ratings of importance of 31 college characteristics yielded dimensions upon which student decisions are based. These results were used to build five scales of importance and preference, which were then tested with other variables in a regression model in which the dependent variable was the decision to enroll or not to enroll at the surveying institution. The following were found to influence decisions: residency status, quality and other academic environment characteristics, work-related concerns, spouse considerations, financial aid, and the campus social environment.A paper presented at the Annual Forum of the Association for Institutional Research, New Orleans, May 29–June 1, 1994.     

Relationship with instructor and other variables influencing student evaluations of instruction

This study examined some of the factors which influence college students’ evaluations of their instructors. Data were collected from 557 students enrolled in a basic speech communication course. Overall, a student's relationship with the instructor was the best predictor of the student's evaluation of the instructor. This study lends partial support to the idea that students evaluate male and female instructors differently. The variables examined in this study were better predictors of student evaluation of female than male instructors.     

A study of the validity of four types of student ratings of college teaching assessed on a criterion of student achievement gains

The purpose of the study was to investigate relationships between student ratings of college teaching using four types of student rating instruments and pre- vs. post-student achievement gains in 36 sections of an undergraduate analytic geometry and calculus course. Student rating instruments used varied according to type of items (high vs. low inference) and focus (students rating their own perceived growth vs. rating the instructor). Data were collected on 799 students (66% freshmen; 16% sophomore; and 15% juniors) at the University of Florida, and relationships were analyzed using the Pearson product-moment correlation technique. Significant relationships were not found between student ratings and student achievement.     

Another look at college student’s ratings of course quality: data from Penn State student surveys in three settings

This study assessed the relationships of student attributes, course characteristics and course outcomes to college students’ ratings of course quality in three types of settings. The analysis utilised data from online surveys of samples of college students conducted in 2011 and 2012 at the Pennsylvania State University. Included in the analysis were: (1) 1805 students at the main campus; (2) 1453 students at 19 smaller satellite campus locations of the university scattered across the state; and (3) 522 students participating in online degree programmes through Penn State’s World Campus. Students were asked to rate the quality of instruction they received in a randomly selected course in which they had been enrolled during the previous semester, and to respond to a number of questions about the course, the instructor’s behaviour and themselves. The relationships of these factors to how students rated the course were assessed for subjects in the three study settings. In all three settings, student and course characteristics, course difficulty and amount of required work had little effect on course ratings. Grade received was modestly related to course rating. However, instructor’s use of selected recommended pedagogical practices and students’ perceptions of how much they felt they learned were by far the strongest correlates of students’ course evaluations. Implications of these findings are discussed.     

The Counselor's Assessment and Intervention with the Suicidal Student

This paper summarizes the major demographic and dynamic risk factors associated with suicide in terms of using this information to determine whether or not the college student needs to be hospitalized. If the decision is made not to hospitalize, an ecological approach to suicide prevention is suggested for both initial stabilization of the student, and as a problem solving strategy to address those issues that precipitated the student's suicidal inclination.     

It takes two to tango: In dynamic inquiry,the self-directed student acts in association with the facilitating teacher

The current research presents a qualitative view of a teacher–student association within the context of dynamic inquiry, as encouraged by a new biology curriculum, “Biomind”. This curriculum enables open inquiry learning through teacher guidance. We characterized the various aspects of the student's functioning as a self-directed student during the open inquiry learning process. The student's functioning corresponds closely to the teacher's efforts to facilitate the student's scientific literacy, initiative, responsibility, and motivation. Dynamic inquiry does not separate teaching from learning, but creates a learning community of teachers and students that is crucial to the success of the inquiry process.     

Chapter 7: Fostering Development

Summary

This chapter reports a case of college student psychotherapy involving short 1doses” of counseling over the course of a student's four-year college career. During treatment, the student addressed and increasingly came to terms with issues involving relationships with his family, friends, and love interests. By his own report, he gained considerably from this experience.     

Utility of school psychologists' recommendations: Perception of elementary teachers

This study was designed to investigate perceptions by elementary school teachers of the usefulness and ease of implementation of traditional recommendations that attribute the cause of referral problems to the individual student's characteristics or environmental conditions, as compared to recommendations that address a student's problem with varying degrees of specificity. Teachers rated recommendations that contained specifics for implementation as being more useful than those that attributed the cause of the problem to individual characteristics or environmental conditions. In spite of their high ratings on usefulness, the most specific recommendations, written in contract form, were rated as being difficult to implement, as were the recommendations that mentioned individual characteristics or nonspecific environmental condition as causes of the problem.     

The relative importance of teaching evaluation criteria from the points of view of students and faculty

Abstract

The student evaluation of teaching (SET) tool is widely used to measure student satisfaction in institutions of higher education. A SET typically includes several criteria, which are assigned equal weights. The motivation for this research is to examine student and lecturer perceptions and the behaviour of the students (i.e. ratings given by them to lecturers) of various criteria on a SET. To this end, an analytic hierarchy process methodology was used to capture the importance (weights) of SET criteria from the points of view of students and lecturers; the students' actual ratings on the SET were then analysed. Results revealed statistically significant differences in the weights of the SET criteria; those weights differ for students and lecturers. However, analysis of 1436 SET forms of the same population revealed that, although students typically rate instructors very similarly on all criteria, they rate instructors higher on the criteria that are more important to them. The practical implications of this research is the reduction of the number of criteria on the SETs used for personnel decisions, while identifying for instructors and administrators those criteria that are perceived by students to be more important.     

Satisfaction with Business Education: A Comparison of Business Students and Their Parents

ABSTRACT

The study examined relationships between ratings of college services and program quality among 57 pairs of parents and students. The study revealed that the relationships between parent and student ratings of the institution were relatively small. However, parents who believed that they had greater influence over student choice of institution were more satisfied with the institution. Satisfaction also was associated with amount of parental contribution to payment of tuition and fees. Marketing implications for universities are indicated.