Theses and Dissertations from UMD
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New submissions to the thesis/dissertation collections are added automatically as they are received from the Graduate School. Currently, the Graduate School deposits all theses and dissertations from a given semester after the official graduation date. This means that there may be up to a 4 month delay in the appearance of a give thesis/dissertation in DRUM
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Item NONPARTICIPATION OF THE 12TH GRADERS IN THE NATIONAL ASSESSMENT OF EDUCATIONAL PROGRESS: UNDERSTANDING DETERMINANTS OF NONRESPONSE AND ASSESSING THE IMPACT ON NAEP ESTIMATES OF NONRESPONSE BIAS ACCORDING TO PROPENSITY MODELS(2009) Chun, Young I.; Abraham, Katharine; Robinson, John; Sociology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This dissertation examines nonparticipation of 12th graders in the year 2000 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), using a model of nonresponse developed by Groves and Couper (1998). NAEP is a continuing assessment of American student knowledge in various subject areas including mathematics and science, and the possibility that its results could be contaminated by a low response rate was taken as very serious. The dissertation evaluates the statistical impact of nonparticipation bias on estimates of educational performance in NAEP, by applying response propensity models to the NAEP mathematics and science survey data and the corresponding school administrative data from over 20,000 seniors in the 2000 High School Transcript Study (HSTS). When NAEP and HSTS are merged, one has measures of individual- and school-level characteristics for nonparticipants as well as participants. Results indicate that nonresponse was not a serious contaminant, and applying response propensity based weights led to only about a 1-point difference out on average of 500 points in mathematics and of 300 points in science. The results support other recent research (e.g., Curtin, Press and Singer, 2000; Groves, 2006) showing minimal effects on nonresponse bias of lowered response rates.Item Fourth graders' expository text comprehension: Indicators from NAEP on the role of income, out-of-school reading experiences, and in-school reading experiences(2008-06-01) Schugar, Heather Ruetschlin; Dreher, Mariam J; Curriculum and Instruction; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Researchers have long supported the notion that students' out-of-school and in-school experiences with reading may be related to their overall academic success (Snow, Barnes, Chandler, Goodman, & Hemphill, 1991), and some have argued that these experiences may be particularly important for children from low-income backgrounds (Darling-Hammond, 1995). Others have claimed that fourth grade may be a pivotal year for students from low-income families because this is when the demands of reading and comprehending exposition often become apparent (Chall, Jacobs, & Baldwin, 1990). Given these perspectives, the purpose of my study was to explore the contributions of fourth graders' out-of-school and in-school reading experiences to their expository text comprehension. In addition, I investigated the associations between students' family income and their abilities to comprehend exposition. This study was a secondary analysis of data collected as part of the 2005 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). Using hierarchical linear modeling (HLM), I modeled the associations between fourth graders' expository text comprehension and their out-of-school reading experiences, in-school reading experiences, and their family income using background information from the NAEP student questionnaires and achievement data. At the student level, I found that fourth graders' reported out-of-school reading engagement, and the in-school factors of discussions and cross-curricular reading were all positively associated with their expository text comprehension. However, students' reported frequency of in-school reading-related activities (e.g., writing book reports, making presentations, doing projects) was negatively associated with achievement. Low-income students' out-of-school reading engagement was associated with additional boosts in expository text achievement. Discussions and cross-curricular reading were not associated with low-income students' achievement any differently than it was for fourth graders overall. For low-income students, reading-related activities were associated with even lower expository text achievement than for fourth graders overall. At the school level, being in schools where students reported frequently out-of-school reading engagement and whole-class and small group discussions was associated with higher expository text achievement, while being in schools where students reported frequently engaging in reading-related activities was negatively associated with expository text achievement. School-wide reported frequency of cross-curricular reading was not significantly associated with students' expository text achievement.Item MULTIDIMENSIONALITY IN THE NAEP SCIENCE ASSESSMENT:SUBSTANTIVE PERSPECTIVES, PSYCHOMETRIC MODELS, AND TASK DESIGN(2008-03-05) Wei, Hua; Mislevy, Robert J; Measurement, Statistics and Evaluation; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Educational assessments are characterized by the interplay among substantive theories, task design, and measurement models. Substantive theories define the nature of inferences to be made about students and types of observations that lend support to the targeted inferences. Task design represents the schemes for the design of tasks and extraction of evidence from student behaviors in the task situations. Measurement models are the tools by which observations of students' performances are synthesized to derive the targeted inferences. This dissertation elaborates on the interplay by specifying the entities that are involved and how they work in concert to produce an effective assessment and sound inferences. Developments in several areas are contributing to interest in more complex educational assessments: Advances in cognitive psychology spark interest in more complex inferences about students' knowledge, advances in technology make it possible to collect richer performance data, and advances in statistical methods make fitting more complex models feasible. The question becomes how to construct and analyze assessments to take advantage of this potential. In particular, a framework is required for understanding how to think about selecting and reasoning through the multivariate measurement models that are now available. Illustrations of the idea are made through explicating and analyzing the 1996 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) Science Assessment. Three measurement models, each of which reflects a particular perspective for thinking about the structure of the assessment, are used to model the item responses. Each model sheds light on a particular aspect of student proficiencies, addresses certain inferences for a particular purpose, and delivers a significant story about the examinees and their learning of science. Each model highlights certain patterns at the expense of hiding other potentially interesting patterns that reside in the data. Model comparison is conducted in terms of conceptual significance and degree of fit. The two criteria are used in complement to check the coherence of the data with the substantive theories underlying the use of the models.