Setting Performance Standards: Theory and Applications

This book provides the most up-to-date and definite source of information currently available on setting performance standards. Chapters are grouped by common themes and provide diverse readers--educators, researchers, and policymakers-- ready access to the specific aspects of standard setting that interest them.

Part I presents perspectives on the nature and role of standard setting, focusing primarily on theoretical concerns. Part II provides practical details on various methods of standard setting and addresses such problems as how to identify and train participants in the standard-setting process. Part III covers the lingering dilemmas in standard setting that perplex theorists and practitioners.

By design, this book reflects the key aspects that dominate standard setting today and which are likely to do so in the coming years. Overall, it provides practitioners, scholars, and policymakers with the tools and perspectives that might fruitfully be applied to the challenges of standard setting today and to the unknown challenges that lie ahead.

This volume serves a number of purposes: literature review, handbook on standard setting methods, and guide to training judges for standard-setting activities....Readers will no doubt find Carson's Chapter, Legal Issues in Standard Setting for Licensure and Certification,' to be of considerable interest, not only for the overall legal perspective but for the discussion of specific court cases.
—CLEAR Exam Review

This book makes a major contribution to the area of setting measurement-influenced standards. It represents the state of the art in a rapidly evolving field. The primary themes of the book are clear and repeated often enough to serve a unifying purpose.
—Contemporary Psychology