Viewpoints

Beyond Testing:
Assessment for Teaching and Learning

The Issue

President Bush's signing of the No Child Left Behind Act in January 2002 reemphasized the federal government's emerging role in ensuring achievement for all students, with high-stakes testing at its core. This legislation has created challenges for local education leaders, schools, and teachers who are mandated to move forward with the implementation of a system of accountability, standards, and assessment in the schools.

Annual testing can be more than an indicator of success or failure, however. It can be a tool in an entire assessment system that serves as a catalyst for educational change. Devising ways to use the raw data provided by test scores to benchmark student progress, measuring progress against established standards, and using that assessment to guide the decisions about instructional programming are just a few of the challenges that lie before the nation's educators.