Derek Briggs's research agenda focuses upon building sound methodological approaches for the valid measurement and evaluation of growth in student achievement. His daily agenda is to challenge conventional wisdom and methodological chicanery as they manifest themselves in educational research, policy and practice. Examples of his research interests related to educational assessment include (1) the use (and misuse) of developmental score scales to model growth in student learning, (2) creating psychometric models that facilitate diagnostic inferences about hypothesized student learning progressions. Examples of research interests in applied statistics include the critical analysis of the statistical models used to make causal inferences about the effects of teachers, schools and other educational interventions on the growth of student achievement.
