This from Terry Holliday at
Dr. H's Blog:
As states
moved to implement new, more rigorous college/career-readiness standards
in English/language arts and mathematics, they faced a challenge: how
would they assess student progress on the new standards? Writing high
quality assessment items that truly measure student mastery of the
standards would be no small task. It would be both time consuming and
expensive.
In Kentucky,
due to the mandates of Senate Bill 1 (2009) to implement new standards
and aligned assessments in 2011-12, the Kentucky Department of Education
contracted with vendors to provide end-of-the year tests for students
in grades 3-8, and an on-demand writing test and end-of-course exams in
Algebra II, English II, Biology and U.S. History at the high school
level. The majority of the tests were traditional, multiple choice,
fill-in-the-bubble tests that were really more narrowly focused than the
standards demanded, but were nonetheless valid and reliable.
Meanwhile, in 2010 through the Race to the Top Assessment Program,
the U.S. Department of Education (USED) awarded $330 million to two
assessment consortia to develop a new generation of tests designed to
provide ongoing feedback to teachers during the course of the school
year, measure annual student growth, and more accurately gauge students’
understanding and application of the standards. Through the consortia,
states would benefit from having their dollars used in highly leveraged
ways to support goals that would not otherwise be achieved without an
infusion of federal funding.
Based on their applications, the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC)
planned to test students' ability to read complex text, complete
research projects, excel at classroom speaking and listening
assignments, and work with digital media.
The SMARTER Balanced Assessment Consortium (SBAC)
would test students using computer adaptive technology that would ask
students tailored questions based on their previous answers.
The
consortia would develop periodic assessments throughout the school year
to inform students, parents and teachers about whether students were on
track.
The
requirements of the grant provided that the consortia “…make all
assessment content (i.e., assessments and assessment items) developed
with funds from this competition freely available to the States,
technology platform provides and other that request it for the purposes
of administering assessments, provided they comply with the consortium
or state requirements for test and item security.”
This
provision was designed to ensure that content developed with public
funds was widely available – including to states that were not part of
grantee consortia. Initially, Kentucky was a participating state in each
consortium, meaning we were monitoring but not leading the work.
Eventually, due to capacity issues and a potential conflict of interest
if either or both of the consortia would bid on Kentucky’s testing
contract, the state withdrew from each.
Now, in an
effort to save millions of dollars, the Kentucky Department of Education
is seeking access to consortia-developed assessment items at the end of
the 2014-15 school year so that we may enhance Kentucky's assessment
item pool for the 2015-16 state assessments. Of course, before any new
items are added to state K-PREP tests, they would move through the
normal state review process.
It is my
understanding, however, that several states have already contacted the
consortia to request access to assessment items and have been denied
access or told they would have to pay for access to assessment items.
Both of these conditions seem to violate the program requirements of the
publicly funded grant.
So, the
question is, who owns the assessment items and the consortia-developed
assessments? Are they yours (the consortia’s), mine (the states’) or
ours (the federal government’s)?
I have
written Secretary of Education Arne Duncan to ask for clarification.
Kentucky and several other states anxiously await his response. Stay
tuned.
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