Systems for State Science Assessment (2006) / Chapter Skim
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1 Introduction
1 Introduction
Pages 11-20
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to all public schools and districts in states that receive federal Title I funds.1 NCLB has two primary goals: improving student achievement overall and narrowing the achievement gap between students of different backgrounds. These goals are to be achieved by means of strong accountability measures for schools and districts and the imposition of sanctions on those that cannot demonstrate that their students are making adequate yearly progress in meeting challenging standards of academic achievement.
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From page 12... ...
Although NCLB requires states and districts that receive Title I funds to participate in the biennial state-level assessments in reading and mathematics conducted under the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) , no such requirement for science is in place as this report goes to press.
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STUDY CONTEXT The Committee's Charge Recognizing the challenges that states face in meeting NCLB requirements for the design and development of science assessments,4 the National Science Foundation (NSF) asked the National Research Council (NRC)
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ACADEMIC ASSESSMENTS (A) IN GENERAL -- Each State plan shall demonstrate that the State educa tional agency, in consultation with local educational agencies, has im plemented a set of high-quality, yearly student academic assessments that include, at a minimum, academic assessments in mathematics, reading or language arts, and science that will be used as the primary means of determining the yearly performance of the State and of each local educational agency and school in the State in enabling all children to meet the State's challenging student academic achievement stan dards, except that no State shall be required to meet the requirements of this part relating to science assessments until the beginning of the 20072008 school year.
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that allow parents, teachers, and principals to understand and address the specific academic needs of students, and include information regarding achievement on ac ademic assessments aligned with State academic achievement standards, and that are provided to parents, teachers, and princi pals, as soon as is practicably possible after the assessment is given, in an understandable and uniform format, and to the extent practicable, in a language that parents can understand; (xiii) enable results to be disaggregated within each State, local educa tional agency, and school by gender, by each major racial and eth nic group, by English proficiency status, by migrant status, by stu dents with disabilities as compared to nondisabled students, and by economically disadvantaged students as compared to students who are not economically disadvantaged, except that, in the case of a local educational agency or a school, such disaggregation shall not be required in a case in which the number of students in a category is insufficient to yield statistically reliable information or the results would reveal personally identifiable information about an individual student; (xiv)
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High-quality assessment is critical to science education because it is both the way in which states exemplify the goals for science education embodied in the standards and a major source of the information that states use in making important decisions about education. Based on our review of relevant research and extensive practical experience with the design of assessment programs, the committee decided to take a systems approach in thinking about the nature and role of science assessment in education.
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We looked for evidence in the scientific and professional literature on science assessment and on science education and in policy reports on the implementation and effects of NCLB. We reviewed the body of work that has been done on science assessment by scientific disciplinary societies, such as the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the National Science Teachers Association, the American Chemical Society, the American Physics Society, and others.
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The models developed by these teams are summarized in Chapter 5. The committee held a workshop at which representatives of education and policy organizations discussed the challenges related to science assessment facing legislatures, governors, chief state school officers, school administrators, school boards, teachers, and others.
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However, taken together, the existing research literature and the innovative work that has been done in some states provide key means of meeting the challenges of developing NCLB science assessments that are technically sound and support high-quality science education. In carrying out our charge, the committee did not make recommendations about the science content that should be included in state science standards or represented in assessment, because we view standards as a state responsibility.
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While the report underscores the importance of considering the assessment system as a whole, states might begin by targeting their areas of greatest need and using some of the ideas contained in the report to do so. For each of the major topics addressed, the committee presents a set of questions that states can use to review elements of their systems for science education and assessment and consider aspects they may want to change.
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