Awards

Annual Award for Exceptional Achievement in Educational Measurement

The NCME Annual Award for Exceptional Achievement in Educational Measurement was established to recognize exceptional achievement during the previous three years. An award for 2024 would be for work completed after the 2021 Annual Meeting.

  1. The award may be given to recognize an outstanding technical or scientific contribution to the public or the field of educational measurement, which could include a book or publication which is an application of technology, or innovative ways of solving practical and theoretical measurement problems, inventive instrument development techniques, creative testing procedures or products, or scientific contributions of measurement to research methodology.
  2. The award may also be given to recognize exceptional service, such as a practitioner might provide to a state, district, consortia, or client, excellence in teaching, or outstanding mentorship. Exceptional service might include novel, technically sound methods of addressing real-world issues, facilitating data usage in making decisions, such as designing exceptionally informative score reports, and so on. To be eligible for this award, the contribution must have occurred initially during the previous three years.

2024 AWARD

Nominating procedure: All individuals and groups in the field of educational measurement are eligible for this award. The candidate must be a member of NCME or he/she must become a member by the time the award is presented at the 2024 NCME Annual Meeting. NCME members are encouraged to submit nominations. Self-nominations are also encouraged.

Submission details: A nomination consists of a 3- to 5-page statement summarizing the contribution. The materials should clearly describe and demonstrate the importance of the contribution to the field of educational measurement. Additional supporting documentation (up to five documents) is also welcome. Materials should include the names and addresses of at least two persons familiar with the specific application and its impact/results, the names and all contact information on all nominees. The committee may request further materials and may contact others who are likely able to evaluate the contribution.

Deadline: The submission deadline for the 2024 NCME Annual Award is January 5, 2024. All materials must be submitted by this date.

Awards: Awards are determined by the Annual Awards Committee. The recipient of the Annual Award receives a plaque and a $1,000 cash payment.

Contact: All award materials must be submitted via email to Sandra Sweeney (sandra.sweeney@cognia.org) with CC to the NCME Awards Board Liaison, Li Cai (cai@cresst.org), and the NCME management office (ncme@ncme.org). For additional information, please contact sandra.sweeney@cognia.org.     

Past Recipients

  • 2016 Mark J. Gierl & Hollis Lai
  • 2017 Kyung (Chris) Han
  • 2018 Dr. Sean Reardon, Dr. Andrew Ho, Dr. Benjamin Shear, Dr. Erin Fahle, Dr. Demetra Kalogrides, Dr. Ken Shores, and Dr. Katherine Castellano 
  • 2019 Robert Mislevy
  • 2020 Michael J. Kolen and Won-Chan Lee
  • 2021 No recipient
  • National Center for the Improvement of Educational Assessment (NCIEA)
  • 2023 Hong Jiao, Qiwei He & Bernard Veldkamp

Note: Prior to 2016, the Annual Award was given in one of the following three categories each year

Outstanding Dissemination of Educational Measurement Concepts to the Public

  • 1983 Carol Robinson and Sandra O'Neal, Albuquerque Public Schools
  • 1986 James Mitchell, Buros Institute for Mental Measurement
  • 1992 Australian Council for Educational Research
  • 1995 Admission and Guidance Services Division, The College Board
  • 1998 The Seattle Times
  • 2001 Rebecca Zwick and Richard J. Stiggins
  • 2004 Larry Rudner
  • 2007 Gregory J. Cizek
  • 2010 Damian W. Betebenner and Richard J. Wenning

Outstanding Example of Application of Educational Measurement Technology to a Specific Problem

  • 1984 Trudy W. Banta
  • 1987 Jerry Jenkins
  • 1990 R. Darrell Bock and Bob Mislevy
  • 1993 Martha Stocking and Len Swanson
  • 1996 Wim van der Linden
  • 1999 National Council of Architectural Registration Boards
  • 2002 No recipient
  • 2005 Sarah Hartz and Louis Roussos
  • 2008 Hua-Hua Chang and Zhiliang Ying
  • 2011 Sun-Joo Cho, Allan Cohen, Seock-Ho Kim, and Brian Bottge
  • 2014 Sun-Joo Cho, Jennifer Gilbert, and Amanda Goodwin

Outstanding Technical or Scientific Contribution to the Field of Educational Measurement

  • 1985 Kikumi L. Tatsuoka
  • 1988 Robert Mislevy, Albert Beaton, Eugene Johnson, and Kathleen M. Sheehan
  • 1991 Fumiko Samejima
  • 1994 William F. Stout
  • 1997 Susan Embretson, Michael J. Kolen and Robert L. Brennan
  • 2000 Robert Mislevy, Linda Steinberg and Robert Almond
  • 2003 Jim Ramsey
  • 2006 Howard Wainer, Eric Bradlow, and Xiaohui Wang
  • 2009 Shelby Haberman, Sandip Sinharay, and Gautam Puham
  • 2012 Derek Briggs
  • 2015 Sandip Sinharay, Shelby Haberman, and Kyong Hee Chon

Committee Members

This committee is responsible for all steps associated with the selection and recognition of the recipient of the Annual NCME Award. The focus of this award rotates annually among the following three themes: a) Technical or Scientific Contributions to the Field of Educational Measurement, b) Outstanding Example of Application of Educational Measurement Technology to a Specific Problem, and c) Outstanding Dissemination of Educational Measurement Concepts to the Public.

  • Sandra Sweeney, Chair
  • Tabitha Bellamy-McKinley
  • Shenghai Dai
  • Lisa Keller
  • Junhui Liu
  • Yanyan Tan
  • Donwei Wang, Student Member