Making Assessment Relevant to Students, Teachers, and Schools

This chapter develops a model for an assessment and accountability system that reverses the trend of systems built upon a foundation of accountability with sanctions for not meeting expected standards being the primary motivating feature for students, teachers, and schools to devise ways to avoid sanctions. The model developed in this chapter relies instead upon providing students, teachers, and schools with the necessary tools to achieve success as measured by student achievement and student growth based on multiple measures so that accountability is not a punitive measure, but a measure that assures that the tools are being used appropriately to assure success.