THE CONCURRENT AND PREDICTIVE VALIDITY OF SELECTED SUBTESTS OF THE NEBRASKA-ASSESSMENT BATTERY OF ESSENTIAL LEARNING SKILLS

The purpose of this study was to compute the concurrent validity of selected subtests of the Nebraska-Assessment Battery of Essential Learning Skills (N-ABELS) by comparing the students\u27 N-ABELS performance with their performances on standardized achievement tests and earned letter grades; and to compute the predictive validity of the subtests of N-ABELS by comparing the grade point averages of students in the eighth grade with their sixth grade grade point averages. There were two groups of students randomly selected to compare for determining any relationships. They were those successfully having mastered subtests of N-ABELS and those not having successfully mastered the same subtests. The research questions asked were: (1) Is there a relationship between success on selected N-ABELS subtests (reading, spelling, mathematics and reference skills) and similar subtests included in the Science Research Associates (SRA) achievement tests? (2) Is there a relationship between success on selected N-ABELS subtests (reading, spelling, mathematics and reference skills) and success measured by grades in those same school courses? (3) When students who successfully completed all N-ABELS subtests before exit from the sixth grade are compared with students from the same class who did not successfully complete all N-ABELS subtests, are there significant differences by the end of the eighth grade in cumulative grade point averages (based upon grades issued for English, spelling, reading, mathematics and social studies)? The subjects for the study were 204 students who attended grades five through eight in a rural central Nebraska school district. The samples for the relationships included twenty to thirty randomly selected students who mastered selected N-ABELS subtests and twenty to thirty randomly selected students who did not master selected N-ABELS subtests. The t-test was used to determine the level of significance for the relationships of research questions one and two. The chi-square test of significance was used for research question three. There were statistically significant findings for the spelling and mathematics relationships, but no statistically significant findings for the reading, reference skills or predictive relationships. The reading and reference skills subtests lacked sufficient scores of students not mastering those tests