As teachers, we typically use three general approaches to assess student progress.  These include: diagnostic assessment—assessing prior knowledge, attitudes, and abilities, formative assessments–everyday methods that we use to help students improve their learning and understanding of science, as well as a way for teachers to inform and improve their teaching abilities, and summative assessment—the assessment of learning and that students have shown for a particular period of time.

Why is it that summative assessment is one that dominates the reform movement in the US, and the method that is used to evaluate not only students, but now, teachers, administrators and schools?

Why aren’t diagnostic and formative assessments given a prominent position in the reform of schooling, especially when the research in these two areas has tended to be supportive of helping students learn science?

We have been  convinced the bubble multiple choice tests can be used to measure and assess student achievement in all areas of schooling.  These high-stakes tests, which typically take two – three hours in each content area, are used to determine not only the achievement of individual students, but average scores are used to determine the effectiveness of individual teachers, as well the effectiveness of administrators and their schools.

High-stakes testing is driving the current model of reform in the USA.  This is causing a narrowing of student learning as seen in the Common Core State Standards movement in mathematics and language arts.  Instead of seeing education as a way to open students to the outer reaches of learning, we currently are turning inward and embracing a common set of standards that ends up narrowing education.

You might be wondering what can be done about this.  The action to challenge the current perception that learning can be measured on high-stakes testing is a difficult one.  You and I will have to speak out and raise questions about the emphasis on high-stakes testing as a force that now dominates educational reform.

Our questions need to be based on research, not simply on personal opinion.  They need also to grounded in experience that you bring to the table in the exploration of educational reform.

For example, just recently the National Research Council (NRC) announced the release of the newest reform document in science education, A Framework for K-12 Science Education.  The Framework will be used by Achieve, Inc., to develop a new set of science standards, which will be the basis for a new generation of high-stakes tests.  Yet, the same organization (NRC) published a report, What is the influence of the National Science Education Standards.  In that report, serious questions were raised about the impact of science standards on student achievement.

One research contributor to this report indicated that there is little evidence that the science standards have affected the achievement gap between African-American or Hispanic and European American students.  In this paper, the researcher indicated that we would be better off focusing on resources that are made available to students, rather than emphasizing standards.