According to a survey released today, parents, teachers, and district administrators in the U.S. consider formative and interim tests far more valuable than summative assessments–and parents do not find much value in state results that arrive more than a month after tests were administered.
“What the data show is that parents, teachers, and administrators think that summative tests do not give them the information they consider most valuable, and yet the pendulum has swung so far in that direction that there is a risk to other kinds of tests that actually help children learn,” said Matt Chapman, the president and chief executive officer of Northwest Evaluation Association, the nonprofit research and test-development organization that commissioned the study.
The survey is especially timely as key assessment policy is being shaped at the state and national levels. Said Chapman, “It’s an incredibly important time to have that conversation.”