Performance-Based Assessment and Educational Equity.

Darling-Hammond L. (1994)

Two assumptions dominate the current policy debate about assessment:

• first, that changes in the assessment policy can be used as a lever for reforming schools,
• second, that the new “authentic” forms of assessment are inherently superior to traditional standardized, multiple-choice tests. These assumptions have largely been unchallenged despite the fact that there is little empirical evidence to indicate that they are valid. Contributors to a recent symposium in the Harvard Educational Review point out that it is doubtful that merely changing the form of assessments will improve schools or reduce educational inequities in the United States. These educators point out that there is no quick fix through assessment reform — that we can not test, examine or assess our way out of our educational problems.