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
Text Dependent Analysis: The Need for a Shift in Instruction and Curriculum
Text dependent analysis is much more than an item type on a state test. The Center is working with states and districts to understand the curriculum and instructional implications of instructing students to respond to this college and career item type.
Authors:
Jeri Thompson
Date:
2018-07-17
Accountability Identification is only the Beginning: Monitoring and Evaluating Accountability Results and Implementation
Senior Associates Juan D’Brot and Leslie Keng describe a framework to help states systematically evaluate identification decisions. In the paper, the authors present example claims, guiding questions, and assumptions to help SEAs clarify the intended purpose, use, and process associated with accountability system activities. Within the framework, assumptions are used to help practitioners and designers identify sources of information, methods, or analyses that can be used to collect information to defend each claim to support accountability validity arguments.
Authors:
Juan D'Brot
Leslie Keng
Files:
Date:
2018-07-01
An Introduction to Accountability Implementation: A Preface to the Operations, Performance Standards, and Evaluation Resources
In this paper, Senior Associates Juan D’Brot and Leslie Keng describe highlight critical areas where states are poised to examine practice and collect evidence to support the development of an overall validity argument for their accountability systems. This paper serves as an overview for a series of resources the authors developed as part of the State Plan Implementation Meeting convened by the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) in April, 2018. The three areas include These areas include operations and quality control, setting performance expectations for schools, and establishing plans for monitoring and evaluating their accountability systems.
Authors:
Juan D'Brot
Leslie Keng
Files:
Date:
2018-07-01
Innovative Assessment and Accountability Systems that Support Continuous Improvement under ESSA: Practical Considerations and Early Research
The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) addresses concerns about the effects of high-stakes achievement tests by authorizing a pilot program that allows up to seven states to apply for a waiver from federal assessment and accountability regulations. These innovative assessment and accountability systems are important because they have the potential to re-align state assessment systems in such a way that there is coherence between the underlying theory of learning, goals and purposes for the assessment system, and design of the assessment system. However, there has been little focused work on specifying the practical considerations related to the design and implementation of innovative systems as well as the relationship between key elements of such systems, student achievement outcomes, and continuous improvement.
Authors:
Carla Evans
Andresse St. Rose
Paul Leather
Files:
Date:
2018-06-29
Alabama’s State Assessment System: Recommendations from the Assessment Task Force
Juan D’Brot and Scott Marion led an Assessment Task Force for the Alabama State Department of Education to help create this framework for Alabama’s next statewide assessment system.
Authors:
Juan D'Brot
Scott Marion
Date:
2018-05-01