| Duration |
Eight weeks (July 1–Aug. 23, 2013) (Internship can be somewhat flexible, but requires prior clearance from the College Board before the internship begins.)
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| Positions |
3 |
| Location |
College Board in Newtown, PA |
| Compensation |
$8,320 |
| Travel |
Interns are responsible for their own travel to and from the College Board. |
| Housing: |
$1,200 per month housing stipend. Interns are encouraged to secure their own housing, or may opt to stay at the Homewood Suites (within walking distance from the College Board). If choosing to stay at Homewood Suites interns will need to pay approximately an additional $1,200 a month. However, Homewood Suites provides all amenities associated with long-term residency including Internet, breakfast and dinner.
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| Requirements |
Students must be eligible to be legally employed in the United States (citizens, green card holders, or international student with F1 visas; for international students please see below).
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| Projects |
Interns will work with two College Board mentors on a specific project in the area of psychometrics.
Possible topics include:
A. Enhancing IRT Parameter Estimates
This study is an investigation into improving item parameter estimation during the early stages of development of an item pool. A pre-calibrated item pool is necessary for an IRT based computer-adaptive test to function. However, during initial stages, there are only a limited number of anchor items in each new test administration. Given the limited number of anchor items any individual examinee takes, is there a way to improve item parameter estimation and linking? The study will initially involve a literature review for methods to improve item parameter estimation and linking. The next phase is a simulation study to evaluate the effectiveness of the methodology.
B. Relation of High School Course Type to First Year and Subject Specific College GPA
The focus of this research is to evaluate the relationship between advanced English high school courses and college outcomes (e.g., FYGPA, English GPA), with a focus on the benefit of Advanced Placement® participation. Multilevel modeling would be used to account for the nested structure of the data (i.e., students nested within schools), and to incorporate several student-level and school-level covariates in the model to provide a stringent test of these relationships.
C. Exploring Teacher and School Effects in Students' AP Performance
AP Potential is a model-based tool utilizing PSAT/NMSQT (PN) scores to identify students who have potential to succeed in AP courses. The proposed study aims to investigate the effect of teacher and school characteristics in explaining students' performance on AP exams over and above PN scores. A mix of high-volume and low-volume AP examinations such as Calculus AB, English Language, US History, Biology (or Chemistry) will be sampled from the national data. Teacher and school effects will be analyzed with student-level PN scores, and other academic performance indicators such as HSGPA. A variety of multilevel models that take into account nesting of student AP performance with and without teacher-level and school-level variables will be evaluated.
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| Application |
Please send a letter of introduction (including previous experience and areas of interest), unofficial university transcript and curriculum vitae as a single PDF file to r&dinternship@collegeboard.org.
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| Deadline |
Applications are due Feb. 1, 2013, at 5 p.m. EST. |
| Decisions |
Selection decisions will be e-mailed to potential interns on March 15th, 2013.
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| Description |
This eight-week internship is designed to provide interns with an insight into College Board research and development operations in psychometrics. Interns will have the opportunity to work closely with psychometricians and gain hands-on working experience with College Board data and projects.
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| For International Students |
International students who are studying at an accredited university under F1 visas are eligible to apply for the summer internship under Curricular Practical Training (CPT) stipulations. Please note that only two internship positions can be offered. International students should not apply for CPT unless accepted as a summer intern.
Upon acceptance to the summer internship, we urge students to contact their respective international advisers at their host university as soon as possible to apply for a practical training certificate, which permits F1 visa holders to receive compensation from the College Board for the work they will be completing over the summer. The process to clear a student for CPT may take six weeks or longer. Therefore we urge students to initiate the process as soon as possible. Additionally, all international students must have a social security number in order to receive compensation.
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