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Carolyn Phenicie, cphenicie@edtrust.org

EdTrust proposes through-year assessment systems that help teachers adjust instruction and support students

WASHINGTON – Federally mandated statewide assessments are an essential tool for determining whether schools are serving all students well — particularly Black and Latino students, multilingual learners, and those with disabilities — and allowing policymakers to more equitably allocate resources where they’re needed. Though important, existing assessments are not currently designed to provide educators with timely information and provide only one opportunity for students to show what they know and can do.

One promising alternative is through-year assessments, an innovative new system that tests students in smaller doses more frequently throughout the year, EdTrust argues in a new report. Through-year assessments can provide more timely results — often within a day or two — that will allow educators to adjust instruction and identify students for additional supports during the year and can eliminate the need for costly and duplicative interim assessments given by many districts on top of the federally required summative assessments.

EdTrust’s report, “Five Things Every Equity Advocate Should Know About Through-Year Assessments” is the last in a series of reports on how assessments can provide data that will enable equitable learning opportunities and improve outcomes for all students, including papers on racially and culturally inclusive assessments and actionable reporting of individual results for students and their families.

“Policymakers must consider ways to make assessments more inclusive of all students’ experiences, and the results more useful to families and educators. One way they can do so is by adopting a system of through-year assessments, which in pilot states have shown a way forward for more actionable and timely data that allows educators to more quickly meet the needs of students,” said Shayna Levitan, policy analyst at EdTrust and co-author of the report.

As advocates are making the case for through-year assessments, they should keep in mind the following considerations:

• Through-year assessments can help promote more equitable opportunities for students.
• Popular interim assessments can inspire through-year assessment design but have many limitations.
• Through-year assessments offer several opportunities to address the concerns of families, educators, and administrators about traditional statewide summative assessments.
• Research suggests that certain components of a through-year assessment can promote student learning, but further study is needed to evaluate the model’s effectiveness.
• Not all through-year assessments are created equal: States must make thoughtful choices to ensure a through-year assessment can produce more meaningful data.

EdTrust’s accompanying technical resource, “Designing Equitable Through-Year Assessments” lays out several conditions for designing equitable through-year assessments and provides recommendations on three crucial design decisions. EdTrust has also released new resources to summarize this report series for state advocates and federal policymakers.

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About EdTrust

EdTrust is committed to advancing policies and practices to dismantle the racial and economic barriers embedded in the American education system. Through our research and advocacy, EdTrust improves equity in education from preschool through college, engages diverse communities dedicated to education equity and justice, and increases political and public will to build an education system where students will thrive.