Reenvisioning Assessments

May 21, 2007 12:00 PM

LFA Summit participants repeatedly voiced concerns that the current testing regime subverts the kind of learning that will prepare students for the new century. A new Education Week commentary by Summit speakers Charles Fadel and Margaret Honey lays out the need for much more sophisticated assessments.

Fadel and Honey insist that now is not the time to dither on the issue of testing. They note that countries like Singapore, whose schools' stratospheric performance fuels so many fears among critics of U.S. schools, are busily reforming their education systems to foster 21st-century skills such as "strong analytical, communication, and interpersonal skills," tolerance for ambiguity and lifelong learning. Though celebrated in some quarters as a prod to America's economic competitiveness, No Child Left Behind may well be dragging us in the opposite direction.

Fadel and Honey argue that 21st-century assessments should:
• Be largely performance-based.
• Make students’ thinking visible.
• Generate data that can be acted upon.
• Build capacity in both teachers and students.
• Be part of a comprehensive and well-aligned continuum.

The authors seem to take a page from LFA leaders' book when they write, "With the reauthorization of the federal No Child Left Behind Act under way, the time is right to engage the nation’s policymakers in thinking about what 21st-century assessment should be."

Two months ago, Summit participants made clear that the parents, practitioners and policymakers in LFA's networks can help help push this kind of thinking.