Program content
Given the demands of No Child Left Behind and legislation that preceded it, states have perfected the process of collecting student test scores. But, only through the application of value-added longitudinal models can these data be used to develop a meaningful understanding of what students have learned and what their real potential is.
In this webcast, Dr. Bill Sanders, the nation's foremost expert on value-added analyses of student achievement data, will discuss value-added reporting and how it can provide critical insights into the work done by schools and teachers. Based on more than 20 years of experience analyzing longitudinal data, Dr. Sanders will explain the importance of tracking individual students when measuring the contribution of schools and teachers to student learning.
By measuring what a student has gained compared to what the student has done in the past -- not just last year's scores, but the total achievement history of the student over many years, more reliable measures of learning can be developed and far more reliable predictions of student performance can be made. Dr. Sanders will explain how, by building a meaningful database of student achievement data, and not just "collecting scores," data analyzed with value-added methods can be used to measure the effects of educational policy on students.
Participant level of understanding
This program is intended for participants with a basic or intermediate level of understanding on the topic.
About Dr. William L. Sanders
Dr. William L. Sanders is a senior research fellow with the University of North Carolina system and is manager of value-added assessment and research for SAS Institute Inc. in Cary, N.C. He assumed the SAS position in June of 2000, upon retiring after more than 34 years as professor and director of the University of Tennessee's Value-Added Research and Assessment Center. Sanders has served as an advisor to policy makers at the federal level; he has worked with many states and districts interested in developing a value-added component to leverage their testing data into more precise and reliable information for better decision making.
In addition to his assignment as director of the Value-Added Research and Assessment Center at the University of Tennessee, Sanders had leadership responsibilities for the Statistical and Computing Services Unit and served as an adjunct professor in the department of statistics within the College of Business Administration. Outside the area of education, he has been a statistical consultant to the agricultural, manufacturing, engineering and development industries. He has served as a statistical consultant to numerous regional research projects involving researchers from many universities and disciplines.
Sanders was the Jason Millman Memorial Lecturer at the National Evaluation Institute in San Jose, Calif.,(July 2000). He received his bachelor's degree and doctorate from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville.
