Center for Assessment team members write and present extensively on topics relating to assessment and accountability. As part of our mission and in order to increase and improve assessment and accountability practices nationally, we make our guides, presentations, papers, reports and other resources widely available.
Library
The Operational Best Practices for Accountability
The Operational Best Practices for Accountability are intended to provide states with guidance and criteria for the design, development, implementation, evaluation, and potential revision of accountability systems under ESSA. These criteria describe practices that are applicable across contexts while providing concrete benefits to users. These practices also establish a common set of operational criteria that include guidance from other areas of measurement in education and can be approached by states either in part or in whole.
Authors:
Juan D'Brot
Files:
Date:
2022-02-28
Technical Advisory Committees: Technical Guidance in Challenging Times
In this policy brief, Senior Associate, Juan D’Brot, provides clear recommendations for state leaders about how to learn as much as possible from their technical advisors.
Assessment Framework Development Processes
By describing what is to be assessed and how to assess it, assessment frameworks play a pivotal role in testing programs. This technical memo discusses how large-scale assessment sponsors initiate, conduct, or commission to develop, review, or update assessment frameworks. We enumerate the elements of assessment processes, classifying all the decisions relevant to shaping framework processes. We conclude that a sound principle of best practice in this area is for test sponsors to know the framework process elements/components and their associated options. Moreover, they should be deliberate in their specification of requirements for contractors or other external parties.
Authors:
Will Lorié
Brian Gong
Files:
Date:
2021-12-21
Measuring Student Success Skills: A Review of the Literature on Creativity
There is a growing interest in conceptualizing, defining, and assessing what are often called 21st century skills or deeper learning competencies. The purpose of this literature review is to explore the conceptualizations, definitions, and understandings in
the research literature related to creativity. Key initial questions include: What does it mean to be creative? How is creativity related to other success skill concepts? And how do creative skills develop over time? This foundational information will then be used to examine (a) instructional approaches to promote creativity, (b) benefits of creativity on valued student outcomes such as student learning, and (c) ways teachers can collect evidence of students’ creativity using student artifacts and other appropriate measures.
Authors:
W. Chris Brandt
Date:
2021-11-01
Symposia: Application of Needs-Based Models to Support Sociocultural Approaches to Improving Educators’ Assessment Literacy
The purpose of this symposium was to explore a needs-based assessment model approach to identify, support, and sustain the development of K-12 educators’ assessment literacy capacities in ways that are situated and differential. To do so, we explored the assumptions underlying traditional models of professional learning and knowledge-based supports/resources provided to educators around assessment literacy. We then examined how those assumptions are potentially at odds with a sociocultural understanding of assessment literacy, as well as best practices around adult learning and professional development. We used different needs-based assessment models to explore the importance of matching assessment literacy professional learning design to the specific and contextual needs of participants. The symposium ended with discussant remarks and questions.
Authors:
Carla Evans
Erika Landl
Jeri Thompson
Charlie DePascale
Date:
2021-10-22