By Dale Chu Just because spring testing is on hold doesn’t mean innovation in assessment has come to a halt. Last week, Massachusetts got the green light from the U.S. Department of Education to develop new science assessments for grades 5 and 8 under ESSA as...
By Dale Chu The convergence of the suspension of spring testing with a bipartisan backlash to standardized tests has raised questions as to what the future holds for annual state assessments. Into the breach stepped FutureEd earlier this week with a timely analysis titled, “The Big...
By Dale Chu For all the talk about federal testing waivers and the anticipated COVID-19 learning loss, there’s been far less discussion on what happens next to help students hit the ground running in the fall. As if the stakes weren’t already high enough, NWEA released...
By Dale Chu With all of the coronavirus related news vis-à-vis testing, I’ve neglected to mention the exciting updates we’ve made to Assessment HQ’s Explore State Data tool. Here are some of the notable ones, which reflect state data released at the end of last year: - 33...
By Dale Chu All 50 states including the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and the Bureau of Indian Education have sought or received an initial waiver from the U.S. Department of Education to suspend spring testing. Given the extensive disruption in learning, pressing the pause button...
By Dale Chu Over the last week, we’ve been monitoring state movement on spring testing with our COVID-19 end-of-year assessment tracker. Given the trend, it’s become clear that by the end of the week all states are going to have a testing waiver and will not...
By Dale Chu Here’s the latest: Since this morning, several states have announced waiver approval from the U.S. Department of Education and a few have updated their plans to suspend or cancel assessments. We have verified through publicly available sources that 10 additional states have had their...
By Dale Chu I hope you’re buckled up for more action on state testing this week. Since our last update on Friday, six states—Alabama, Arkansas, Hawaii, Minnesota, Oregon, and Wyoming—have taken steps to cancel testing or obtain a waiver. Two states, Hawaii and Wyoming, have publically...
By Dale Chu As expected, new developments on state testing are happening fast and furiously. Since this morning, Alabama, D.C., Kentucky, North Carolina, and South Dakota have expressed their intent to pursue a waiver. In addition, North Dakota has canceled spring testing, and Rhode Island is...
By Dale Chu Since yesterday’s post, three more states have made moves. With today’s announcement by U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos of broad waivers from federal testing requirements, it seems more and more likely that state assessments will be significantly delayed if not outright canceled in...