Test-Based Educational Accountability in the Era of No Child Left Behind. CSE Report 651.

The ever-increasing reliance on student performance on tests as a way of holding schools and educators accountable is discussed. Comparisons are made between state accountability requirements and the accountability requirements of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act of 2001. The resulting mixed messages being given by the two systems are discussed. Features of NCLB accountability and state accountability systems that contribute to the identification of a school as meeting goals according to NCLB but failing to do so according to the state accountability system, or vise versa, are discussed. These include the multiple hurdles of NCLB, the comparison of performance against a fixed target rather than changes in achievement, and the definition of performance goals. Some suggestions are provided for improving the NCLB accountability system. The assessment of student achievement has long been an integral part of education. Test results for individual students have been used for myriad purposes, such as monitoring progress, assigning grades, placement, college admissions, and in grade-to-grade promotion, and high school graduation decisions. The use of student test results to judge programs and schools, with a few exceptions (see, for example, Resnick, 1982), has a shorter, but still substantial, history. Both states and the federal government have moved away from resource and process measures as a means of judging the quality of schools to an ever-increasing reliance on student test results to hold schools accountable. The characteristics of the school accountability systems evolved over the last 40 years and the systems vary a good deal from one state to another, as do the state and federal accountability systems.