Education officials have long hoped that the statewide academic assessments most students take each year could be used not only for accountability but also to guide instruction. Congress established the Innovative Assessment Demonstration Authority (IADA) program in 2015 to help address this goal, offering up to seven states temporary flexibility…

This appendix volume supplements "Evaluating the Federal Innovative Assessment Demonstration Authority: Early Implementation and Progress of State Efforts to Develop New Statewide Academic Assessments. Evaluation Report. NCEE 2023-004" analyzing the early progress of the first five assessment systems participating in the Innovative…

Education officials have long hoped that the statewide academic assessments most students take each year could be used not only for accountability but also to guide instruction. Congress established the Innovative Assessment Demonstration Authority (IADA) program in 2015 to help address this goal, offering up to seven states flexibility from…

Teachers are now experiencing the age of quantitative test-driven assessment, in which there is little weight accorded to teacher-based judgement about student progress. In the Australian context, the NAPLaN test has become a driving force in school and teacher accountability. The language of NAPLaN is one of bands and numerical scores and…

This paper is part of a series investigating the implementation of competency education. The purpose of the paper is to explore how districts and schools can redesign grading systems to best help students to excel in academics and to gain the skills that are needed to be successful in college, the community, and the workplace. In order to make the…

From the 1980s to the present, educational accountability in the United States has grown dramatically. Such accountability in U.S. school districts, although driven primarily by external demands, has internal manifestations as well. The chapter traces the historical development of internal evaluation in American school districts, then highlights…

Why and under which conditions do international student assessment programmes like PISA have success? How can the results of these assessments be useful for advocates of different, even contradictory, policies? What might explain different patterns of using assessment as a tool for school governance? Drawing on historical and comparative research,…

The importance of student assessment, particularly for summative purposes, has increased greatly over the past thirty years. At the same time, emphasis on including all students in assessment programs has also increased. Assessment programs, whether they are large-scale, district-based, or teacher developed, have traditionally attempted to assess…

The 2006-2007 school year was the eighth annual reporting period since disaggregating the performance of students with disabilities on state and district-wide assessments was required by the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). It is the fifth reporting period since the enactment of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), and the…

Describes a program to certify state and district judges of high school debate tournaments. Covers constructing the written test, evaluating the ballot test, implementing certification, and assessing the program. (PD)

The need for an independent mechanism that regulates, or audits, the testing enterprise is discussed along with a critique of current mechanisms for challenging a high-stakes test or its use and the need for independent auditing of the commercial test industry. Models for an auditing mechanism are reviewed. (SLD)

Almost every state has in place a state assessment and accountability system. These systems vary greatly in their characteristics but share a common global purpose of improving teaching and learning. Some of the variations in the state systems are discussed and illustrated with examples from selected states. Issues that are critical to the value…

Many of us have an intuitive understanding of physics that works surprisingly well to guide everyday action, but we would not attempt to send a rocket to the moon with it. Unfortunately, the authors argue, our policy makers are not as cautious when it comes to basing our school accountability system on intuitive test theory. Intuitive physics…

Utah's Alternate Assessment (UAA) is one of six components of the Utah Performance Assessment System for Students (U-PASS). UAA is designed to assess the achievement of students in grades 1 through 12 with significant cognitive disabilities. It was developed to fulfill two main purposes: (1) To address federal legislative mandates that all…

Under the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), all public school districts, campuses, and the state are evaluated annually for Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP). The Texas AYP plan meets the requirements of the NCLB, maintains the integrity of the Texas assessment program, and provides a mechanism for evaluating district and campus AYP in 2003. Following…