| ACT | Testing and research organization in Iowa City; also the name of its college admissions test. Originally the letters stood for American College Testing Program. |
| AEA | Area Education Agencies in Iowa; part of Iowa Department of Education. |
| AEA | American Evaluation Association |
| AERA | American Educational Research Association |
| AERJ | American Educational Research Journal - a journal |
| AIR | American Institute of Research; testing and research organization |
| AME | Applied Measurement in Education - a journal |
| ANOVA | ANalysis Of VAriance |
| AP | Advanced Placement program and test sponsored by the College Board; allows high school students to earn college credit. |
| APA | American Psychological Association |
| APM | Applied Psychological Measurement - a journal |
| ASAP | As soon as possible |
| ASVAB | Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery, a multi-aptitude test battery |
| AYP | Adequate yearly progress, a component of NCLB |
| BILOG | Software for IRT |
| CASMA | Center for Advanced Studies in Measurement and Assessment at UI |
| CAT | Computerized adaptive testing |
| CCSSO | Council of Chief State School Officers |
| CEA | Center for Evaluation and Assessment at UI |
| COE | College of Education at UI |
| College Board | College Entrance Examination Board, organization that developed the SAT college entrance exam. |
| CR | Cedar Rapids, city near Iowa City |
| CRESST | National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards, and Student Testing at University of California-Los Angeles |
| DE or DOE | Department of Education - can refer to state (Iowa) or federal |
| DI | Daily Iowan, UI's student newspaper |
| DIF | Differential item functioning |
| DIMTEST | Software for dimensionality assessment |
| Ed Meas 4 | Educational Measurement, 4th edition edited by Dr. Robert Brennan. Important reference book in the field of measurement. |
| ELA or ELAR | English Language Arts (and Reading) |
| ELL | English Language Learners (see also LEP) |
| ELP | English Language Proficiency, as in ELP tests, ELP standards |
| EMIP | Educational Measurement: Issues and Practice - a journal |
| EOC | End of course, as in EOC test; usually used in secondary education settings |
| EPM | Educational and Psychological Measurement - a journal |
| ERIC | Education Resources Information Center, database for journal articles and research reports in the field of education. |
| ETS | Educational Testing Services; testing and research organization; administers tests such as the TOEFL and GRE. |
| FAQ | Frequently asked questions |
| FYI | For your information |
| GA | Graduate Assistant (graduate student) |
| GENOVA | Software for generalizability theory |
| GSAC | UI Graduate Student Advisory Committee for Educational Measurement & Statistics |
| G-theory | Generalizability theory |
| HAPI | Health and Psychosocial Instruments; database to find articles in which certain assessments and tests are used for research |
| HLM | Hierarchical linear modeling |
| IC | Iowa City |
| IEREA | Iowa Educational Research and Evaluation Association |
| IES | Institute of Education Sciences, part of U.S. Department of Education |
| IRT | Item response theory |
| ITBS | Iowa Tests of Basic Skills |
| ITED | Iowa Tests of Educational Development |
| ITP | Iowa Testing Programs at UI; developer of ITBS and ITED |
| JAM | Journal of applied measurement - a journal (not online) |
| JEBS | Journal of educational and behavioral statistics - a journal |
| JEM | Journal of Educational Measurement - a journal |
| JER | Journal of Educational Research - a journal |
| LC | Lindquist Center at UI; home of College of Education |
| LEA | Local educational agency;can refer to a public school district, or a body that oversees multiple schools. |
| LEP | Limited English Proficient students (see also ELL) |
| LISREL | Software for factor analysis |
| Lord & Novick | Refers to the classic book Statistical Theories of Mental Test Scores by Frederic M. Lord and Melvin R. Novick published in 1969 |
| measstat or M&S | Educational Measurement & Statistics program at UI |
| MMY | Mental Measurements Yearbook database of test reviews |
| MANOVA | Multivariate ANalysis Of VAriance |
| McREL | Mid-continent Research for Education and Learning |
| MAP | Measures of Academic Progress, achievement test produced by NWEA |
| MULTILOG | Software for IRT |
| MWERA | Mid-Western Educational Research Association |
| NAEP | National Assessment of Educational Progress, also known as "the Nation's Report Card" |
| NCES | National Center for Education Statistics |
| NCLB | No Child Left Behind |
| NCME | National Council on Measurement in Education |
| NCTM | National Council of Teachers of Mathematics |
| NCTE | National Council of Teachers of English |
| NAGB | National Assessment Governing Board; sets policies for the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) |
| NWEA | Northwest Evaluation Association; testing & research; developer of MAP test |
| PARE | Practical assessment, research and evaluation - a journal |
| PARSCALE | Software for IRT |
| P & Q | Psychological and Quantitative Foundations Department at UI |
| PIRLS | Progress in International Reading Literacy Study, an international comparative study of the reading literacy |
| PISA | Programme for International Student Assessment, an internationally standardised assessment |
| PsycINFO | Database of articles, books, dissertations related to psychology |
| Q and A | Questions and answers |
| R | Software for statistical analysis |
| RA | Research Assistant (graduate student) |
| REL | Regional Educational Laboratory Program; part of U.S. Department of Education. 10 regions: Appalachia - Central - Mid Atlantic - Midwest - Northeast and Islands - Northwest - Pacific - Southeast - Southwest - West. |
| RER | Review of educational research - a journal |
| RIT | Rasch Unit, a scoring scale named for Georg Rasch, a Danish mathematician |
| RRE | Review of research in education - a journal |
| RTTT | Race to the Top Race; competitive federally funded program intended to reward states for K12 educational innovation and reform. |
| SAS | Software for statistical analysis |
| SAT-10 | Stanford Achievement Test, 10th edition. Achievement test for kindergarten-12 grade. Produced by Pearson Assessment company. |
| SAT | College admissions test (formerly Scholastic Aptitude Test and Scholastic Assessment Test) |
| SEA | State education agency (or state department of education); formal governmental label for the state-level government agencies within each U.S. state. |
| SEM | Standard error of measurement |
| SEM | Structural equation modeling |
| SEM | Structural equation modeling - a journal |
| SIBTEST | software for dimensionality-based DIF analysis |
| SPSS | software for statistical analysis |
| SSI | Scientific Software International company |
| T and T | UI Course 7P:258 Educational Measurement: Theory and Techniques |
| TA | Teaching assistant (graduate student) |
| TBA | to be arranged |
| TBD | to be decided |
| TESTFACT | Software for multidimensional IRT |
| TIMSS | Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study |
| TOC | Table of contents |
| UI or U of I | University of Iowa |