A Standards-driven Evaluation of Academic Performance: An 8-step Process for Nutrition Educators

Providing nutrition education instruction in schools is becoming increasingly difficult because of increased emphasis on the preparation of students for standardized testing. Higher priority core subjects often push out even the shortest of nutrition lessons. Here, Horowitz et al outline an 8-step process that can be used to document achievement of academic content standards. The process for aligning curricula with content standards, developing the instrument, and evaluating this accomplishment involves 8 sequential steps. These include aligning curriculum to one's state's content standards; examining standardized tests; selecting specific standards to evaluate; seeking permission to use test questions or having access to testing results; adapting test questions; testing each question; pilot-testing instrument, re- vise accordingly, and assess readability; and studying the impact of one's nutrition education program, and reporting the findings.