Educational Leadership - November 2009

Stephen Chappuis, Jan Chappuis,
and Rick Stiggins

Long before No Child Left Behind (NCLB), high-stakes tests were common in schools. Cut scores on tests have dictated promotion from one grade level to the next, and teachers have used them to assign passing or failing grades. High school students continue to take course placement exams, subject-area finals, exit exams, and college entrance tests. Making decisions that affect individuals and groups of students on the basis of a single measure is part of our past and current practice.

In the past, few educators, policymakers, or parents would have considered questioning the accuracy of these tests. Most assumed that a low score or grade was probably justly assigned and that a decision made about a student as a result was as defensible as the evidence on which it was based.

But NCLB has exposed students to an unprecedented overflow of testing. In response to the accountability movement, schools have added new levels of testing that include benchmark, interim, and common assessments. Using data from these assessments, schools now make decisions about individual students, groups of students, instructional programs, resource allocation, and more. We’re betting that the instructional hours sacrificed to testing will return dividends in the form of better instructional decisions and improved high-stakes test scores.

Given the rise in testing, especially in light of a heightened focus on using multiple measures, it’s increasingly important to address two essential components of reliable assessments: quality and balance.

Keys to Quality

Although it may seem as though having more assessments will mean we are more accurately estimating student achievement, the use of multiple measures does not, by itself, translate into high-quality evidence. Using misinformation to triangulate on student needs defeats the purpose of bringing in more results to inform our decisions.

Five keys to assessment quality provide the larger picture into which our multiple measures must fit (Stiggins, Arter, Chappuis, & Chappuis, 2006). Only assessments that satisfy these standards—whether teachers’ classroom assessments, department or grade-level common assessments, or benchmark or interim tests—will be capable of informing sound decisions.

Clear Purpose

The assessor must begin with a clear picture of why he or she is conducting the assessment. Who will use the results to inform what decisions? The assessor might use the assessment formatively—as practice or to inform students about their own progress—or summatively—to feed results into the grade book.

The use of multiple measures
does not, by itself, translate
into high-quality evidence.

In the case of summative tests, the reason for assessing is to document individual or group achievement or mastery of standards and measure achievement status at a point in time. The purpose is to inform others—policymakers, program planners, supervisors, teachers, parents, and the students themselves—about the overall level of students’ performance.

Clear Learning Targets

The assessor needs to have a clear picture of what achievement he or she intends to measure. If we don’t begin with clear statements of the intended learning—clear and understandable to everyone, including students—we won’t end up with sound assessments.

For this key to quality, it’s important to know the learning targets represented in the written curriculum. The four categories of learning targets are