Center for School Change Releases Assessment Criteria Guidelines

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Center for School Change
Assessment of Student Achievement Criteria

On November 9, 1999, the Center for School Change at the University of Minnesota's Humphrey Institute released the set of guidelines below for the assessment of student achievement. The guidelines are the first part of a federally funded project seeking to understand what goes into an effective assessment system and how schools can share their best practices in this area. The project aims to identify and analyze closely 20 public schools whose student assessment programs meet these guidelines.

Vital Criteria

1. Clear Goals
A school should have some clear, explicit learning goals, outcomes or standards, etc., as well as a curriculum designed to help students reach these goals. The assessment system should measure the extent to which the school is reaching its goals with students.

2. Outcomes Understood
Teachers, parents, students and community members understand and support the expected outcomes and standards. Students and parents can see examples of what the standards require and can work with teachers toward improving personal performance.

3. Multiple Measures
Assessment uses multiple methods--not just standardized, norm, or criterion-referenced tests.

4. Assessment as Part of an Integrated Approach to School Improvement
Assessment must be part of an integrated system of instruction, professional development, and refinement of a school's operations. Assessment should not be used only for ranking or sorting. Schools should use the results of assessment to modify instruction and help plan in-service.

5. Language Proficiency
Assessment takes into account a student's language proficiency. If some of the school's students come from homes where English is not spoken, or if the student comes from some other linguistic background, the assessment practices take this into account. The assessment system actually measures what students know, regardless of their disability or linguistic background.

6. All Students are Assessed
The school reports, in some ways, on the academic growth of all students.

Valuable Criteria

Assessment uses an outside person or persons to help judge student work.

Assessment measures attitudes of people who graduated from the program.

The school has a committee of parents, educators and in secondary schools, students, who help plan, carry out and monitor the student assessment system.

From the Center for School Change, Humphrey Institute, University of Minnesota, (612) 624-7077