Thoughts On Assessment

April 8, 2015

An Open Letter to the Division Directors of Testing
and Other Interested Parties in Virginia:

Honestly, I believe now is the most opportune time, in all years of the SOL’s existence, for those concerned with curriculum and assessment in Virginia to move the SOL program dramatically forward. Together, the Virginia Legislature and the Board the Education have created a unique opportunity in the Local Alternative Assessment program. Virginia’s School Divisions can use the opportunity to begin fashioning a broader, richer, more instructionally integrated SOL system. We can be a nationwide leader.

During this first year, each division can and is using its own creativity to produce a more comprehensive and complete local SOL assessment program. Such local programs can be an innovative mixture of multiple-choice, technically enhanced, computer administered test items, coupled with performance, portfolio, project-based, and instructionally-embedded assessments. Such a mix can blur the unnecessary distinction between formative and summative assessment and provide both depth and breadth.

Probably we all agree that the VDOE’s creation, development, and administration of the SOL assessments has been an exemplary program for many years. All Virginians can be proud of our SOL tests. We showed this when Virginia declined to adopt the CCSS with accompanying assessments (SBAC and PARCC). The SOLs’ original intended use was to aid the instruction of students. Because the tests have needed to carry high-stakes functions for students, teachers, schools, and divisions, the assessment team at the VDOE has had to be very careful and conservative in introducing new features into the state’s testing program. This has been their responsibility and they have been very responsible.

Yet, the multiple high-stakes usages of the tests have meant that the negative features of the NCLB have been appended to the SOL program. Now the winds of change are on the horizon and we can begin to ride them in Virginia.

In developing the Local Alternative Assessment program, divisions can be experimental and quick moving. This is already happening. Divisions have the freedom to try out new approaches. They can move forward with the ones that work well, refine those that could work better, and discard those that prove not to really work. Division and school personnel, teachers, and even students can be involved in the development process. Different mixes of approaches can be tried in different divisions — one single approach need not fit all.

Some of the best of the local efforts might eventually be moved into the state-administered SOL assessment program as tried and validated components. On the other hand, it may be that some parts of the current SOL assessment program might be turned over to the divisions to administer and report. Many possibilities.

Most people’s initial reaction to the Local Alternative Assessment program probably was that it was just another task shifted from the state to the local divisions — just one more thing that the division staffs had to deal with. Looking deeper into the situation, a far different picture emerges. School divisions now have a unique opportunity to move Virginia forward. We at ROSworks/Tests for Higher Standards urge you to work with your people, with other school divisions, with your assessment system vendors, and to consult with the VDOE staff to craft what could and can be the Next Generation of Assessments, right here in Virginia. We can look into what PARCC and SBAC are doing too, adopt some of their best features, and avoid what doesn’t work.

My staff and I will be calling around in the next few weeks to discover how we might use some of our deep assessment expertise to help you going forward.

David E. W. Mott
ROSworks/Tests for Higher Standards

PS
I have been deeply involved with the SOL program since 1981, when it was introduced by then Superintendent, Dr. S. John Davis — over 34 years! I have been involved both when I was inside the VDOE and later outside in all aspects of the SOL program, as a curriculum developer, testing administrator, author, psychometrician, and assessment system vendor.