Reimagining College/Career Readiness: Performance Assessments That Measure and Support Student Learning for 21st-Century Success

• In Event: Performance-Based Assessment: Something Old, Something New

Abstract

In the last decade, there has been a growing concern about the adequacy of existing assessment systems to measure and promote the kind of knowledge and skills that matter for college and career success. Most standardized assessments (e.g., high school exit exams) are limited in their ability to measure the deep learning or complex thinking skills needed for success in higher education and the 21st century workforce. The new Common Core State Standards in English Language Arts and mathematics are explicit in their intent to better align with college and career expectations. In addition, the federal Race to the Top competition, which is funding efforts to develop common assessments aligned with the Common Core State Standards, provides evidence that policymakers are ready to explore the viability of assessment systems that incorporate both standardized and performance-based components.

There are a number of different perspectives about what comprises college and career readiness (what are the constructs to be measured?), and different approaches to designing performance assessments that both assess and support student learning. The Stanford Center for Assessment, Learning and Equity (SCALE) has worked over the last decade to develop, pilot, and implement innovative performance assessment instruments that specifically aim to measure college and career readiness. These assessments range from rich, complex, inter-disciplinary tasks that are completed over time (e.g., Envision Schools College Success Portfolio—Stanford University), to more standardized discipline-specific performance assessment tasks that are embedded within the curriculum (e.g., NYC Formative College-Readiness Performance Assessment System) and the Ohio Performance Assessment Pilot Project.

Each of these SCALE projects seeks to both measure and promote students’ development of critical thinking, analytic reasoning, problem solving, and communication skills. However, each of these assessment systems has a distinctive approach to defining the constructs to be measured and performance assessment design, as well as different technical and psychometric challenges that impact teaching and learning.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the different task design principles and constructs measured across different performance assessment tasks, discuss their affordances and challenges both psychometrically and practically, hear about lessons learned from field trials or implementation of each of these task types (shorter tasks (90 minutes) and richer performance tasks(two weeks) ), and suggest a research agenda to build a knowledge base for future development work. This paper will also explore how these different types of performance assessments might fit within a comprehensive common assessment system that may be used for school improvement and teacher accountability.

Author

• Raymond Lee Pecheone, Stanford University