assessment, accountability, and other important stuff
“The day the child realizes that all adults are imperfect, he becomes an adolescent; the day he forgives them, he becomes an adult; the day he forgives himself, he becomes wise. Alden Nowlan”
We appear to be adolescents – still learning how to deal with imperfection.
It’s gut check time for educational measurement and assessment. So much is going to be asked of us over the next 5-10 years and we need to respond. First, however, we must accept that where PK-12 education leads, we must follow.
There are a few things I miss since stepping away from working full-time, but so many more that I don’t miss at all. And then there are my neckties.
The SAT finds itself in the news again due to
A. Unforced errors
B. Unfortunate events
C. Unintended consequences
D. All of the above
I thought that box of old class notes in my basement was a testament to all I had learned. But sifting through it got me thinking about learning loss. Could it be that understanding learning loss is even more complicated than understanding how students learn in the first place?
Describe your vision for the future of assessment. Now try to do it without jargon or buzzwords; with enough detail that someone might be able to implement it, but not so much that it’s obsolete before it happens. A lesson from the past on picturing the future.
There’s only so many wings you can pile on your plate at the Super Bowl party. There’s only so much trash you can squeeze into each $2 trash bag from the transfer station after the party. There’s only so much you can fit into a school year. We need to make choices.
When the results of NAEP testing underway now are released next year, at least as important as actual student performance will be the way that those results are framed. My initial plea for something other than the recovery of learning lost to the pandemic.
Of the many, many things that I learned from Rich Hill, first at Advanced Systems and later at the Center for Assessment, the most important may have been this: Take a break for lunch.
We have reached the point where MLK Day may be the least controversial of all of the federal holidays. I wouldn’t have predicted that back in 1981, and I’ll take it as a positive sign. Even if there is still much more work to be done.
