K-12 Assessment

FairTest works with organizations and the public to ensure that K-12 assessment provides better information to students, parents and teachers without over burdening schools. Our resources help keep administrators, educators, and families informed about trends in testing, tools for limiting testing, ways testing may be overused, and more effective methods of assessment.

The statement of our vision for K-12 policy reform can be found in our posting Assessment for Equity and Excellence.

K-12 Assessment

Federal Policy Reform

Federal education policy is governed by the Every Student Succeeds Act, which modified the failed accountability system of No Child Left Behind. FairTest works with stakeholders to fight for improvements and changes in federal assessment law and policy that relieve students, teachers and schools of the burdens of excessive and educationally harmful testing and support excellence and equity in education.

FairTest provides information, expertise and support networks to ensure that state and local accountability measures are not harmful, are educationally beneficial and further goals of equity. We provide information and support for parents and students choosing to opt-out of mandated standardized testing and for organizations that work to reform the abuses of testing systems.

FairTest supports and promotes the development and implementation of authentic, performance-based assessments as an educationally superior way of evaluating student understanding and achievement. Performance assessments drive deeper learning and are tied to tasks directly connected to student experience and classroom practice. FairTest works to create the policy conditions that best sustain these systems of assessment.

Resources