New assessments - are they better?

Posted in Standards and EvaluationEducation PolicySchools on Sep 03, 2010 - 08:44 AM

Secretary Duncan and the U.S. Department of Education announced the awarding of $330 million yesterday to two consortia of states under the Race to the Top Assessment program for their proposals to create a new generation of assessments. This is on top of the $4 billion announced in the past months to the state-wide Race to the Top competition. The Department of Education framed the contest as one that would create assessments that help "prepare students for college and the workplace, that more validly measure student knowledge and skills, that better reflect good instructional practices, and that support a culture of continuous improvement in education." The plan is for the assessments these programs devise to be in place in states around the country by 2014-15.

Interestingly, both proposals specify that their assessments will include a focus on higher-order thinking skills and performance assessments, bringing the possibility of moving beyond multiple choice assessments. In Secretary Duncan's own words during his announcement of the winners yesterday:

"For the first time, many teachers will have the state assessments they have longed for‐‐ tests of critical thinking skills and complex student learning that are not just fill‐in-the‐bubble tests of basic skills but support good teaching in the classroom."

The very beginning of the SMARTER Balanced Assessment Consortium's proposal states that their vision:

"is rooted in a concern for the valid, reliable, and fair assessment of the deep disciplinary understanding and higher-order thinking skills that are increasingly demanded by a knowledge-based global economy."

This is good news. Still, the proposals do give me pause. They both include multiple assessments throughout the year, bringing up the question as to how much time teachers and students will have to spend giving and preparing for these assessments. If there is a predominance on critical thinking and performance assessments such as those advanced by the New York Performance Standards Consortium (the word "consortium" here is a coincidence, they did not apply for this grant), then they could be beneficial. Yet the nature of these programs looks to be more of a standardized model that all states can use, reducing the chance that districts, schools, teachers, and students will be able to be involved in relevant, meaningful learning opportunities and assessments.

Also, both assessment programs further the "college and career readiness" verbiage that President Obama, Secretary Duncan, and others have put forward - language that to me is only a piece of the full picture of learning and the goals of education, serving to push aside or skip over the notions of individual and personal growth, the primacy of motivation in learning, social and emotional development, the nurturing of creativity and innovation, and the building of a more just, democratic, and sustainable society.

All in all, though, perhaps this is a step in the right direction. Check out the proposals and see what you think:

SMARTER Balanced Assessment Consortium

Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers

Tags for this entry:
achievement, standardized tests, critical thinking and analysis, performance

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