Dive Brief:
- A Council of Great City Schools study shows students in grades 3-11 spend 20+ hours each year on testing, with 40% of districts not seeing results until the following year, leading District Administration to report that "resistance and frustration over standardized assessments and learning standards may have reached critical mass."
- A survey by District Administration found that 39% of respondents believe the amount of students opting out of standardized testing will grow in 2016, with 41% saying that political pressure against Common Core will increase.
- A majority of education thought leaders support a shift from test-based accountability to “broader forms of assessment, such as portfolio review and performance-based tests,” according to District Administration.
Dive Insight:
The growing preference for formative assessments as opposed to summative is a growing trend, yet some testing experts are already airing concerns over how exactly formative assessment will be executed under the new Every Student Succeeds Act. Guidelines for the ESSA have yet to be released, but the new law suggests that states and districts combine interim assessment results into one score for evaluation. That’s raised hackles for critics, who claim that any interim results used for accountability might not be accurate since interim tests aren’t designed to give summative results.