This conference was organised as a contribution to the European Unions objective of increasing the quality and effectiveness of education and training systems. The event aimed to stimulate debate among researchers using particular methodologies to assess the quality of education and training provision.
The creation of reliable accountability systems in education depends greatly on the availability of longitudinal data, on reliable measures of student achievement, and on the analysis of the hierarchical structure of educational systems. Multilevel modelling and Rasch analysis are the two statistical methodologies that provide the greatest insight with respect to this objective. These topics and methodologies were the main focus of discussion at the workshop.