Assessment Crisis: The Absence of Assessment FOR Learning
The issue in this article is the fact that the United States has failed to balance the use of standardized tests and classroom assessments in the service of school improvement in meaningful ways. This has resulted in a deep and intensifying crisis in assessment. Based on student s’ achievement in the United States, there has to be a greater focus placed on the improvement of classroom assessment. As of June 2002, there is only emphasis placed on assessment Of learning and not assessment For learning.
This article discusses the United States belief that the path to school improvement is paved through more enhanced, more common, and more powerful standardized testing. The evolution of the vision of excellence in assessment and how it has led to the view that school improvement needs communication of higher achievement standards, change of expectations into assessments and the expectation of accountability by educators for student achievement. It’s flaw-based on the societal views of what role assessment should take in the schools. The article also addresses the question of whether or not the teachers are equipped to face the challenges of assessment when graduating from the teaching programs, and finally the benefits students, educators, and parents receive when a balance between assessment of and for learning is reached.
The school administrators in federal, state, and local education agencies are too quick to jump on board and focus on how to make their test scores go up rather than focusing in on how to engage their students in the learning process and teaching their students how to want to learn and how to feel able to learn. The author Richard J. Stiggins is not opposed to high-stakes testing, just as long as the tests are of sound quality. He believes that the emphasis should not be placed so much on the high scores of these tests but rather should be more focused...