Differential Expectations of Student Performance on Occupational Skill Assessment Among Industry Practitioners: A Pennsylvania Example

Assessments in occupational competency were developed and administered by the National Occupational Competency Testing Institute (NOCTI). The written components of these tests were criterion-referenced benchmarked by industry representatives and career and technical education instructors using the Nedelsky method, utilizing from 12 to 15 participants for each Job Ready test. The purpose of this study was to determine if there were any statistically significant differences in predicted cut scores between career and technical education instructors and their respective industry representatives. An analysis of the results indicated that the estimated p-value item difficulty as determined by industry representatives was higher than that of classroom/shop instructors. Also the expected performance cut score of a minimally competent entry-level worker as determined by industry representatives was generally higher than that from their instructor counterparts. They showed statistically significant differences in 10 of the 17 tests