Objective evaluation of achievement is generally absent from academic programs designed to develop skill in written composition (Braddockr 1963;Meckel, 1963;Diederich, 1964;Marksheffell, 1964;Steinberg, 1965). This lack is particularly true in short-term programs. In fact, a pilot evaluation of the more than 100 English Institutes of the summer of 1965 did not employ any evaluative instruments other than site observations and a questionnaire designed to sample participants' and instructors' attitudes toward their work in written composition (Gray, 1966).Against this background, an attempt was made to employ an objective measure to evaluate the composition component of the English Institute conducted during the summer of 1965 at the University of Georgia for 49 elementary school teachers. Since global ratings have been reported as reliable estimates of achievement (ETS, 1963;Findley, 1963; Burton, 1963;O'Donnell, 1964;McColly and Remstad, 1965), and since STEP Essay Tests are widely used (Gunderson, 1965) and employ such a rating, the criterion measures were difference scores from preand post-test measures on the STEP Essay Tests (Level 1) for college freshmen and sophomores.