Rate My Professor Gary Skaggs

Gary E. Skaggs is a professor emeritus of educational research and evaluation in the School of Education at Virginia Tech, where he served for over 22 years until receiving emeritus status in 2022. He earned a B.S. in Psychology from Virginia Tech in 1974, an M.S. in School Psychology from Radford University in 1975, and a Ph.D. in Measurement, Statistics, and Evaluation from the University of Maryland, College Park, in 1984. Before joining Virginia Tech as an associate professor in 2001, Skaggs was President of West Mesa Associates, Inc. from 1991 to 2001, Test Development Analyst at Fairfax County Public Schools from 1984 to 1991, and held various instructional and research positions at the University of Maryland.

At Virginia Tech's Educational Research and Evaluation Program, Skaggs advanced to full professor in 2019, taught undergraduate and graduate courses in psychometrics, educational statistics, and measurement, directed master's and Ph.D. students, and served on more than 50 graduate committees. His research centers on psychometrics, including standard setting, test equating, differential item functioning, and applications to cognitive diagnostic models in large-scale educational testing. As principal or co-principal investigator, he secured grants from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (2008–2011), National Science Foundation (2011–2013), and U.S. Department of Justice (2015–2019). Skaggs authored the textbook Test Development and Validation (Sage Publishing, 2022) and more than 50 peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters, including "Diagnostic profiles: A standard setting method for use with a cognitive diagnostic model" (Journal of Educational Measurement, 2016), "Estimating an observed score distribution from a cognitive diagnostic model" (Applied Psychological Measurement, 2017), and "Using diagnostic profiles to describe borderline performance in standard setting" (Educational Measurement: Issues and Practice, 2020). He received the Bradley Hanson Award for Contributions to Educational Measurement from the National Council on Measurement in Education in 2005 and the Jerome Niles Dean’s Faculty Research Award from Virginia Tech in 2009. Skaggs served on editorial boards for Applied Measurement in Education (2005–2022) and Educational Measurement: Issues and Practice (2006–2009) and held leadership roles in professional organizations.