Life and learning today is all about the questions – not the answers. Ernő Rubik, inventor of the Rubik’s Cube, created something more than a puzzle – he created a question waiting to be...
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Imagine you go to your radiologist for an X-ray. She is highly qualified to do this task. The radiologist sends the film to the doctor to interpret the results. The doctor, however, only received a...
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Dr. Jack Bierwirth is a retired superintendent who spent the last 15 years of his career at the helm of Herricks Union Free School District in New York. Jack shared his views on defining the purpose...
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My favorite athlete in this summer’s Olympic Games was Galen Rupp, who won the marathon in the American Olympic trials and went on to become the second American runner in 40 years to earn a medal...
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The school supply shelves look pretty depleted – in fact, the Halloween costumes are already out! For many, that means it’s the first week of school, and for others, you have been back in school...
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At NWEA, we work with over 7,800 schools and districts across the country and in 140 countries around the world, reaching more than 8 million students, so there’s a pretty good chance that students...
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Earlier this month the U.S. Department of Education announced the next step in President Obama’s Testing Action Plan — an $8.6 million grant competition for states “to innovate and improve the...
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Earlier this year, I wrote a blog on the importance of data comparability in today’s assessment environment. With the passage of the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), many states are likely to be...
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One of the most common criticisms of high-stakes accountability tests is that they force schools and teachers to narrow their curricula and “teach to the test,” thereby undermining a teacher’s...
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Over the past 5 years, NWEA has sponsored three national studies focused on what various stakeholders, including superintendents, principals, teachers, students and parents think about assessment. As...
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At this time of change in U.S. education policy, it is important to recognize that some parents, teachers, principals and superintendents in low-income and urban districts view assessments quite...
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In a post not too long ago, I highlighted three reasons to prioritize formative assessment in the classroom. Formative assessment may be a buzz word in education these days, but it’s more than...
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