The local nature of high school, American-style, is underscored as teenagers flow through the 33-year-old passages here to the next class, jostling companions and belongings, chattering about college-acceptance letters and plans for a spring-break beach trip.
The rapid growth of school technology infrastructure has led to the increased availability and use of computers in schools. Most students now have access to computers and the Internet in their classrooms, nearly all students have access somewhere in their schools, and a majority of teachers report using computers or the Internet for instructional purposes.
In a time of educational accountability and revenue shortfalls, the first question on the minds of policymakers seeking to trim already-lean school budgets often is: How does this program improve student achievement?
South Dakota officials announced this past winter that they were making the state’s much-touted online testing program voluntary for districts, and instead requiring new paper-and-pencil tests to meet the requirements of the “No Child Left Behind” Act of 2001.
Education and technology forces have converged this year to vault computer-based testing into the headlines, raising important questions about whether this new mode of assessment is more useful than traditional paper-and-pencil exams.
An informal survey of students about Oregon’s online testing system shows they find computer-based testing faster and more enjoyable than the paper-and-pencil variety, and they report feeling that they perform better on computerized assessments than on traditional tests.
As test-preparation materials leap off the printed page and onto the Web, an increasing number of states and districts are turning to online test-prep programs to help raise student scores on high-stakes assessments, Advanced Placement tests, and college-entrance exams.
Students in Carole Givens’ U.S. history class last year took a quiz at the beginning of every period. But they didn’t line up at the pencil sharpener to get ready. Instead, they fired up their laptops.
Since the 1920s, the business of school testing has largely been a province of educational publishing. The same companies that published American textbooks also distributed such well-known assessments as the Stanford Achievement Test, the California Achievement Test, and the Iowa Tests of Basic Skills.
Indiana special education student Marvin Stuller couldn’t believe the boy reading aloud on the TV set was him. His teacher had videotaped him at the beginning of 5th grade and at the midway point. The “before” and “after” scenes of the then-12-yearold with speech difficulties were dramatic: His reading level had risen, and his voice had even lowered and deepened by the later video.
Computer adaptive testing is used to test recruits to the U.S. military, for licensing nurses and computer technicians, for entrance tests to graduate school, and for a popular placement test used by community colleges—but not for academic testing in all but a handful of K-12 schools.
Andrew Trotter, September 12, 2017
•
11 min read
Sign Up for EdWeek Update
Get the latest education news delivered to your inbox daily.
Reprints, Photocopies and Licensing of Content
All content on Education Week's websites is protected by copyright. No part of this publication shall be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means, electronic or otherwise, without the written permission of the copyright holder. Readers may make up to 5 print copies of this publication at no cost for personal, non-commercial use, provided that each includes a full citation of the source. For additional print copies, or for permission for other uses of the content, visit www.edweek.org/help/reprints-photocopies-and-licensing-of-content or email reprints@educationweek.org and include information on how you would like to use the content. Want to seamlessly share more EdWeek content with your colleagues? Contact us today at pages.edweek.org/ew-for-districts-learn-more.html to learn about how group online subscriptions can complement professional learning in your district or organization.