‘Nation’s Report Card’: Two Decades of Growth Wiped Out by Two Years of Pandemic

Posted on October 6, 2022October 2, 2022 by coreeducation

Recently in The 74, Kevin Mahnken looked at long-term scores from NAEP that show unprecedented score declines for nine-year-olds in math and generational literacy loss. Two decades of growth for American students in reading and math were wiped away by just two years of pandemic-disrupted learning, according to national test scores. Dismal releases from the Read more about ‘Nation’s Report Card’: Two Decades of Growth Wiped Out by Two Years of Pandemic[…]

Harvard Economist Offers Gloomy Forecast on Reversing Pandemic Learning Loss

Posted on July 28, 2022July 26, 2022 by coreeducation

Along with collaborators from Dartmouth, the CALDER Center at the American Institutes for Research, and the nonprofit testing group NWEA, Harvard economist Tom Kane released a paper this May incorporating pre- and post-pandemic testing data from over 2 million students in 49 states. Its conclusion: Remote instruction was a “primary driver of widening achievement gaps” Read more about Harvard Economist Offers Gloomy Forecast on Reversing Pandemic Learning Loss[…]

Big Data on Campus

Posted on March 9, 2022March 7, 2022 by coreeducation

Recently, EducationNext released research on the predictive analytics that colleges and universities are using to identify at-risk students who may benefit from additional support. Excerpts from the piece appear below: Colleges and universities are facing mounting pressure to raise completion rates and have embraced predictive analytics to identify which students are at risk of failing Read more about Big Data on Campus[…]

Widescale Study Finds More Students Started the School Year Behind

Posted on January 11, 2022January 1, 2022 by coreeducation

Fewer elementary and middle school students started the 2021 school year on grade level for reading and mathematics, according to a new report released by Curriculum Associates. The report, Understanding Student Learning: Insights from Fall 2021, analyzes data gathered from the edtech company’s i-Ready Assessment tool on reading and mathematics learning from three million Grades Read more about Widescale Study Finds More Students Started the School Year Behind[…]

Predicting Students’ Academic Trajectory from Third Grade Test Scores

Posted on March 2, 2021February 27, 2021 by coreeducation

Dan Goldhaber, Malcolm Wolff, and Timothy Daly recently published a CALDER working paper titled, “Assessing the Accuracy of Elementary School Test Scores as Predictors of Students’ High School Outcomes.” They employ datasets from Massachusetts, North Carolina, and Washington to track sixteen cohorts of students from third grade through high school, enabling them to investigate how Read more about Predicting Students’ Academic Trajectory from Third Grade Test Scores[…]

Frameworks for Evaluating Cognitive Complexity in Assessments

Posted on October 17, 2019October 11, 2019 by coreeducation

Achieve is excited to release three new frameworks – one each for mathematics, reading, and science – for the educator community working on high-quality student assessments. The frameworks, which were developed by content experts and practitioners, can be used to evaluate the cognitive complexity of assessment items (the tasks students must complete on a test) Read more about Frameworks for Evaluating Cognitive Complexity in Assessments[…]

Assessment HQ launches State Assessment Site

Posted on August 28, 2019August 26, 2019 by coreeducation

The nonprofit Collaborative for Student Success has launched Assessment HQ, a unique online platform that takes the guesswork and risk of misinformation out of understanding state annual assessments by providing transparency on student proficiency and state testing decisions. Assessment HQ highlights state-reported student performance results in mathematics and English language arts (ELA) by student demographics Read more about Assessment HQ launches State Assessment Site[…]

Alignment Matters: A Framework for Advancing Student Learning and Promoting Equity

Posted on June 20, 2019March 3, 2020 by coreeducation

What do high performing schools have in common? Among other things, they have rigorous academic standards, rich curriculum, and high-quality assessments. They also have well-trained educators who have regular access to accurate and useful data. And they have a culture of equity that undergirds their work. All of these reinforce one another to drive student Read more about Alignment Matters: A Framework for Advancing Student Learning and Promoting Equity[…]

The Research Base for Formative Assessment

Posted on August 1, 2018July 30, 2018 by coreeducation

Mary Ryerse and Susan Brookhart, writing for Getting Smart, recently analyzed the research base for formative assessment. Excerpts from their piece appear below: The original research base on formative assessment is most typically traced back to the 1998 publication Assessment and Classroom Learning (Black & Wiliam, 1998), the first widely cited review of literature on Read more about The Research Base for Formative Assessment[…]

What Predicts College Completion? High School GPA Beats SAT Score

Posted on July 12, 2018March 3, 2020 by coreeducation

Preston Cooper, writing for Forbes, has reviewed a new article by Matthew Chingos of the Urban Institute that finds high school GPA to be a better predictor of college completion than SAT score. For excerpts from the article, see below: For obvious reasons, students who exhibit better academic preparation in high school are more likely Read more about What Predicts College Completion? High School GPA Beats SAT Score[…]

Ten Principles of Building High-Quality Systems of Assessment

Posted on March 7, 2018March 1, 2018 by coreeducation

How do state and district leaders cut through the clutter to make decisions on assessments for student success? Finally, there is unprecedented support on how to answer this question with the release of Ten Principles for Building a High-Quality System of Assessments, a collaborative effort led by Jobs for the Future (JFF), a national nonprofit Read more about Ten Principles of Building High-Quality Systems of Assessment[…]

February Issue Brief: Performance Assessment

Posted on February 27, 2018February 23, 2018 by coreeducation

Educators seeking to measure student attainment of 21st century skills and deeper learning are increasingly looking to performance assessment as a way to assess student performance meaningfully. ESSA’s innovative testing pilot and new test-optional college admissions policies are removing roadblocks that once stood in the way of widescale adoption of performance assessment. In this month’s Read more about February Issue Brief: Performance Assessment[…]

New Case Studies: Policy Implementation Hinges on Educator Support

Posted on February 21, 2018February 16, 2018 by coreeducation

Many states will be transitioning to new ESSA-aligned accountability systems over the next few years, and the way those accountability systems are presented to teachers could have a dramatic impact on how they are perceived in states. A new PIE Network resource offers lessons learned from successful implementation efforts, and a useful reminder of what Read more about New Case Studies: Policy Implementation Hinges on Educator Support[…]

10 Evidence-Based Policies and Practices for Assessment

Posted on December 20, 2017December 15, 2017 by coreeducation

The Meadows Center at the University of Texas at Austin has released a piece outlining 10 evidence-based policies and practices for high-quality assessment in schools, along with the research supporting them. These policies/practices include the following: School leadership ensures that teachers have a shared understanding of the curriculum and standards across the grades. Schools use Read more about 10 Evidence-Based Policies and Practices for Assessment[…]

School Districts where Students Learn Most

Posted on December 19, 2017December 15, 2017 by coreeducation

New data from researchers at Stanford, based on some 300 million elementary-school test scores across more than 11,000 school districts, reveals the school districts where children are showing the most growth. The results do not follow conventional wisdom. Districts with high growth are scattered across the country, in contrast with sharp geographic divisions on proficiency Read more about School Districts where Students Learn Most[…]

Performance Assessment: Fostering the Learning of Teachers and Students

Posted on August 14, 2017July 29, 2017 by coreeducation

The Annenberg Institute’s new issue of VUE, Performance Assessment: Fostering the Learning of Teachers and Students proposes an alternative to standardized testing, based on a performance assessment approach, which is personalized and rigorous, and improves teaching and learning – thereby benefiting both students and teachers. Against a backdrop of the opportunities provided by the Every Read more about Performance Assessment: Fostering the Learning of Teachers and Students[…]