MAY 05, 2014Accord on process for defining Common Core cut scores
(Wash.) A big step in ensuring that new computer-based tests aligned to the Common Core State Standards will properly measure student achievement won passage last week by governing states of the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium.
Field testing of the new assessments has been ongoing this spring in the 21 governing member states of Smarter Balanced. Individual student scores are generally not being used for accountability purposes – instead education officials are using the process to gauge the fitness of the assessment system itself. That will all change next year when testing begins for real and scores will be used to judge student performance and growth as well as the effectiveness of teachers and their schools.
To be able to make those judgments, however, architects of the new assessment system will need to establish “cut scores” – the points on the scale that would indicate whether a student has achieved proficiency.
At a meeting last week, member states agreed to the process that will be used to define the cut scores, or what they called achievement levels, with that final step set to be undertaken at workshops that will be held in October.
“I like to tell people that what our governing states have done is decide on the recipe that they will follow later on when they actually adopt the levels of achievement,” said Jacqueline King, director of Higher Education Collaboration at the consortium. “It is actually a very big deal what the states have done.”
As proposed, the Smarter Balanced test system will have four performance levels to reflect how well students performed or achieved the goal of being college and career ready. Under the system, levels three and four will be considered passing; while levels one and two would be considered deficient.
With the conclusion of the field testing in June, consortium officials will begin the task of analyzing how well more than 20,000 test items and related performance tasks actually fulfilled their goals Accord on process for defining Common Core cut scores :: SI&A Cabinet Report :: The Essential Resource for Superintendents and the Cabinet:
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