James Wollack, PhD - University of Wisconsin - Madison

TITLE: College-Level Placement Testing and the Common Core (March 2013) (49 min.) LEARNING OBJECTIVES: 1. Define the concept of placement testing. 2. Identify placement test validation. 3. Discuss Common Core state standards. ABSTRACT: Placement testing is an essential component of student success during college, with proper placement affecting outcomes such as course grades, drop rates, and student satisfaction. This introductory-level presentation will include an introduction to the placement testing solution at one Big Ten campus, an overview of validation approaches appropriate for placement tests, and a discussion of the future of college-level placement testing in the face of the Common Core State Standards. BIOGRAPHY: James Wollack is an Associate Professor of Educational Psychology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he serves as the Director of Testing & Evaluation Services and the University of Wisconsin Center for Placement Testing, and as the Research Director for the General Education Assessment. Wollack has published numerous journal articles and book chapters and is a frequent presenter at national conferences on topics such as detection of answer copying, test security, score scale stability, test construction, and test speededness, including having co-authored the chapter on test administration, security, scoring, and reporting for the 4th edition of Educational Measurement. Wollack frequently serves as a consultant or expert witness on cases involving suspected cheating on high-stakes exams, and has presided over many cases of alleged student academic misconduct at the University of Wisconsin. He currently sits on the Board of Directors for the National Council on Measurement in Education (NCME), and is very active in the American Educational Research Association (AERA), the Measurement Services Special Interest Group of AERA, the Association of Test Publishers (ATP), and the National College Testing Association (NCTA). Wollack earned a B. S. with honors in Psychology from the University of California at Davis, and a M.S. and Ph.D. in Educational Psychology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.