State Activism in Education Reform: Applying the Rasch Model to Measure Trends and Examine Policy Coherence

Given state activism in education reform during the 1980s, the central questions are whether the reform movement changed over time and how each state responded differently to education policy issues. This study not only attempts to examine empirical regularities in state education policy-making using the Rasch measurement method, but also to explain interstate variation in reform activism. Measuring 50 states and calibrating 43 policies show a change in the picture of state leadership and a generalized pattern of policy-making among the states. It sheds light on the possibility of applying item response theory to policy analysis.