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Education Dive
DeVos: States should 'rethink' assessment, consider competency, mastery-based assessments
Naaz Modan
Sept. 3, 2020
Dive Brief:
In a letter this week telling chief state school officers they will be
expected to administer summative assessments for the 2020-21 school
year, U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos encouraged state leaders
to consider competency and mastery-based assessments.
"Now may be the perfect time for you to rethink assessment in your
state," DeVos said, adding testing this year may look different.
She also said the department would be "open to discussions" about
flexibilities for using assessment results as part of states' school
accountability metrics.
Dive Insight:
DeVos said while waiving assessments last spring was "the right call,"
failing to assess students this year "will have lasting effects for
years to come," noting the exams are necessary to gauge student
performance.
Pushes to overhaul standardized and high-stakes testing that were
growing prior to the COVID-19 pandemic have been renewed in light of
recent school closures. However, with expected but unclear learning
losses following closures and the summer break, educators, parents,
researchers and legislators have also expressed the need to gather
relevant and useful data to inform instruction for the school year.
Many are planning to use diagnostic and interim assessments, for
example. But, leaders and grassroots advocates in some places were
still hoping to waive statewide summative tests this school year in
favor of more instruction time. Testing experts have also said
summative assessments, in their current form, take place too late in
the year and are not tied closely to curriculum, which make it unlikely
for the tests to support instruction.
In Georgia's request for a 2020-21 assessment waiver, Gov. Brian P.
Kemp and State School Superintendent Richard Woods said their request
was part of a larger push against high-stakes testing.
But testing experts don't believe there will be a massive shift away
from statewide summative testing anytime soon. They do, however,
suggest states and districts work together to create a comprehensive
assessment system that aligns the purposes and uses of statewide
summative and interim testing. Nebraska, for example, is working to
overlap tests so students in grades 3-8 only take three interim
assessments from which summative information is collected, eliminating
a fourth summative exam.
That method, said Jeremy Heneger, director of statewide assessment at
the Nebraska Department of Education, would stress growth rather than
proficiency and emphasize instructional feedback. Both of those have
been the focus of educators as students learn from home in different
environments and at varying paces.
Some states have gone one step further than emphasizing growth, saying
results should also be disentangled from stakes like accountability
measures. Carolyn Phenicie, spokesperson for the Council of Chief State
School Officers, said accountability waivers are "an evolving
situation."
In a request for comment, the state chiefs organization reiterated its
view that high-quality annual assessments to measure learning and
identify gaps are "more important than ever." A number of other
organizations have also released guidance on assessment best practices
for the school year. For example, one of NWEA's suggestions is that
states make adjustments and investments in secure hybrid learning and
remotely proctored assessments in the long term.
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