Conducting a Lifecycle Audit of the National Assessment of Educational Progress

The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) program is a series of periodic assessments administered nationally to samples of students and designed to measure different content areas. This article describes a multi-year study that focused on the breadth of the development, administration, maintenance, and renewal of the assessments in the program. The methodology targeted data collection through documentation and onsite interviews with key personnel relative to evaluation criteria developed from the Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing (AERA, APA, & NCME, 1999). We present summary results of this study and discuss one of the overarching recommendations that can inform practice for all testing programs.