Shares some lessons learned from performance-based assessment in the health professions, using four performance-based assessment methods as examples: (1) written clinical simulations (patient-management problems); (2) computer-based clinical simulations; (3) oral examinations; and (4) standardized patients (live simulations). (SLD)

Investigates the validity and reliability of performance assessments using data from over 300 fifth and sixth graders. Results demonstrate the gap between the reality of measurement through performance assessments and the political rhetoric that would institute these assessments in a national examination system in the immediate future. (SLD)