Barry Topol, John Olson, and Ed Roeber
Assessment Solutions Group for the Stanford Center for Opportunity Policy Education
April 2010
This paper, one of eight in a series on performance assessments spearheaded by Stanford Professor Linda Darling-Hammond, addresses the notion that instructionally-sensitive tests are too expensive. Using fancy cost-modeling software, analysts found that high-quality assessments (HQAs), such as those with short answer questions and expository writing samples, can compete economically with traditional multiple choice tests. A typical mid-sized state, defined as one that assesses about 900,000 students annually, now pays about $20 per student over the course of four years of “traditional” multiple choice math and English language arts assessment. But if that same state were to implement all of the cost-saving measures laid out in this paper, however, those states could bring that number to as low as $10 per student over four years for a high-quality test. The greatest money-saving move would be participation in assessment consortia (such as the ones being encouraged by the Education Department’s “Race to the Test” competition) and using teachers to score tests rather than the test company or independent paid assessors. Other tactics include more advanced technology, such as online testing, and remote and/or computerized scoring, though these had a much smaller impact on the bottom line. It’s probably no coincidence that Darling-Hammond herself is involved in a testing consortium, or that this paper finds participation in such a consortium to be the largest cost-saving measure. Still, it’s heartening that the ever-blunt instrument of standardized tests can become more nuanced and accurate without costing taxpayers an arm and a leg. Read the paper here, and the others in its series here.
