Assessing the Assessment System!

In my role as Director of Data & Assessment for Westchester Secondary Charter school I had the pleasure of supporting a research evaluation of the CAASPP/SBAC efforts underway in California.  The Independent Evaluation Report was  posted to CDE’s website today.  You can find it at:

http://www.cde.ca.gov/ta/tg/ca/caaspprptstudies.asp

As an advocate for effective software systems and a participant in the study, I added my voice to the notion that the CDE should be looking much closer at existing 3rd party assessment systems.  More than half of California's school districts have a 3rd party assessment system in place already, in ADDITION to the formative/summative resources available through CAASPP.  The report explains in very understandable language the need to understand these 3rd party systems and the need to provide more integration resources to get data moving back and forth between systems.  

I also provided the investigative team with a list of known California assessment system providers.  They incorporated that information into a survey (pictured above) which was distributed to school-site CAASPP coordinators (orange) and District CAASPP coordinators (blue).  Though not a representative sample for state-wide assessment system adoption, it was interesting to see the results.   Is the somewhat large discrepancies between what the schools are doing and what the districts are doing have any significance?

Table source:  http://www.cde.ca.gov/ta/tg/ca/caaspprptstudies.asp (Pages 45/46).

A Note from Sunny Becker, one of the authors: 

This report includes results of our two 2016 studies: the CAASPP Smarter Balanced Interim Assessment Administration Study and the Access to Designated Supports and Accommodations Study.  Many thanks to the representatives of Corona-Norco Unified, Fresno County Office of Education, Greenfield Union, Learning for Life Charter, Los Angeles Unified, Oakland Unified, Poway Unified, Salinas Union High, San Diego Unified, Tulare City, Victor Valley Union High, and Westchester Secondary Charter, who participated in one or both of these studies! 

Hooray Westchester Charter for helping to advance the assessment system conversation.  Woot-woot!