Educational assessment is important. But in the twenty-first century it is easy to feel that schooling and other phases of education are shaped entirely by certain assessments, and that assessment is only about exam results. The idea that test grades can accurately describe the aims and outcomes of education is unfair and reductive. Yet it is a…

The synergy, or lack thereof, between large-scale and classroom assessment has been fiercely debated in both academic and policy spheres for decades around the world. This paper seeks to explicate how different countries are utilizing large-scale testing and test results at the classroom level. Through country profiles, this paper analyzes…

In this commentary, the authors have set out some areas where they see overlaps between the original position paper and the current discussion around theory and practice in language assessment, the key consideration of washback, and the need for a greater awareness of, and engagement with, the assessment literacy of policy-makers and other key…

This is the final installment of a 3-part series of articles proposing substantial changes in assessment practices, urging school psychologists to write reports that are responsive to the needs of primary consumers--parents and educators, in particular. According to the author, the prevailing practice of writing long, complex reports with a focus…

The ubiquitous use of standardized test results to make varied judgments about educators, students, and schools within the public school system raises concerns of validity. If the test results have not been validated for making multiple determinations, then the decisions made about educators, students, schools, and school districts based on the…

Assessment of human abilities and behaviors is enormously enhanced by the use of standardized assessment measures that yield norm-referenced scores. As school psychologists, they rely on quantitative findings to anchor their judgments about a child's developmental and educational functioning and to enhance our capacity to draw diagnostic…

As school psychologists know, and as a recent survey confirms, school psychologists devote considerably more time to conducting mandated assessments for special education than to any other professional activity (Curtis, Castillo, & Gelley, 2012). A major part of this activity involves documenting assessment findings in the form of a written…

"Assessing Learning in the Primary Classroom" is an accessible introduction to the concepts critical to a professional understanding of this vital aspect of a teacher's role. It comprehensively considers the principles underpinning effective assessment, the different forms it can take and the different purposes it serves, both within and beyond…

A high school principal and faculty celebrated after hearing that their students in each of the quartiles had improved in both reading and mathematics on the state accountability assessment. Because of the percent of increases in achievement levels on the test, the Florida Department of Education awarded the school an A for 2011. Shortly…

Asian American students, who comprise almost 5% of public school students in the U.S., are a very diverse group. In the aggregate, Asian Americans often have the highest achievement on state tests among major racial/ethnic subgroups. But this overall high performance can sometimes lead educators and policymakers to overlook the needs of…

The rank-ordering method for standard maintaining was designed for the purpose of mapping a known cut-score (e.g. a grade boundary mark) on one test to an equivalent point on the test score scale of another test, using holistic expert judgements about the quality of exemplars of examinees' work (scripts). It is a novel application of an old…

The Texas Assessment of Academic Skills (TAAS) test was the major source of data for the Texas educational accountability system from 1994 through 2002. Contrary to critics who claim that TAAS data are invalid and unreliable measures of student performance, structural equation analyses of TAAS reading data based on the 1994 Texas third grade…

A representative sample of 122,000 eighth-graders participated in the 2011 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment, which is designed to measure students' knowledge and abilities in the areas of physical science, life science, and Earth and space sciences. This report covers the overall results, achievement level…

A representative sample of 122,000 eighth-graders participated in the 2011 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment, which is designed to measure students' knowledge and abilities in the areas of physical science, life science, and Earth and space sciences. This report covers the overall results, achievement level…

A representative sample of 122,000 eighth-graders participated in the 2011 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment, which is designed to measure students' knowledge and abilities in the areas of physical science, life science, and Earth and space sciences. This report covers the overall results, achievement level…