National education R&D non-profit program working to transform assessment launches a new, interactive digital experience that emphasizes the need for learner-centered assessment of the future. Forecast guides readers through a research and development-based vision for modernizing assessment, putting PreK-12 learners and educators at the center.
AERDF is one of the few organizations purpose-built to match the pace of AI and global disruption, ensuring education can anticipate change rather than react to it. That is why Assessment for Good (AFG), one of our flagship R&D programs, is advocating for new approaches to assessment that supports instruction and learning in a fundamentally different way. Currently, educators have to navigate information from a variety of sources, but it often comes too late and is too varied to support the 1500 decisions a day that they have to make. AFG is creating research-informed assessment solutions that focus on delivering accurate, meaningful data to teachers and students immediately, do not interrupt the learning process, and foster a more student-centered experience. Today, the program released a new publication, “Futures of Assessment.”
“Our nation’s schools need evidence-based assessment solutions that better support the dynamic ways that students learn and also significantly propel learning outcomes,” said Dr. Temple Lovelace, Executive Director of AFG. “ Assessment for Good calls for a new approach to assessment that reflects the learning of the future – that promotes greater flexibility, discovery, and connection.”
While most assessment innovation has been tied to subject mastery, educators are often missing information about a student’s foundational skills that are important to any learning process, across multiple academic areas. Visibility into both content area learning and the skills that power that learning are crucial. Our new publication, “Futures of Assessment” asks, “How might assessment be improved to help educators and students create and pursue learning opportunities that can maximize student potential?”
To examine this question, AFG and the Strategic Foresight team at KnowledgeWorks embarked on a year-long data-driven approach to create the “Futures of Assessment” forecast which depicts a range of possible futures that can be imagined in less than 10 years. This publication introduces four worlds where new cultures of assessment are created, especially at the intersection of artificial intelligence and the call for reimagining school success. As AI use continues to rise and new models for quality education emerge, education must contend with how to customize support, increase student agency, unlock powerful learning opportunities, and embed community connections across the PreK-16 continuum.
“The Futures of Assessment” invites readers to think beyond the “now,” and explore radically different assessment approaches so that we can support the learning process differently. Key recommendations include:
- Seamless Assessment: Measure key competencies earlier and without disrupting the learning process
- Accessible Assessment: Communicate assessment data in an understandable, actionable way with the learner, their educator, and their family — at the speed of teaching and learning
- Comprehensive Assessment: Move beyond subject matter mastery to get a complete picture of the learner and the skills that power their learning
- Dynamic Assessment: Provide solutions that support a formative, self-directed approach to assessment and learning
Over 60 educators and practitioners from across the nation contributed to this forecast that explores a preferred future of teaching and learning while also thinking deeply about change beyond the status quo.
“What will assessment look like when we put learners first?” said Dr. Lovelace at a 2024 Futures of Assessment convening with Knowledgeworks. “Assessment can be used as a tool that leads to greater learning, connection, and discovery – and we can build that future together.”
The “Futures of Assessment” forecast features concepts developed by this group of how we can do that at the intersection of two critical uncertainties: AI and school success. Our goal is to explore the power of assessment and find actionable ways to modernize it to serve today’s learners.”
Assessment For Good’s “Futures of Assessment” publication includes:
- An invitation to imagine the future, forecasting new approaches that center learning and introduce new types of data that will be key in maximizing student growth
- Eleven concepts of asset-based assessment informed by national leaders, to be used as a platform for future innovation
- Four distinct future worlds, introduced through the eyes of four learners, that explore multiple plausible futures where assessment becomes discretionary, compassionate, joyful, or automated and how teaching and learning is impacted.
- Twenty-four highlights that grapple with two “critical uncertainties” AI and school success — both of which feel uncertain, yet will be highly impactful for how assessment will be designed and used over the next 10 years.
“We are inviting the field to join us in creating a new vision for assessment to inspire education leaders, researchers and decision-makers to take direct actions that will lead us to a preferred future where assessment can support all learners to reach their maximum potential” said Dr. Lovelace. “Assessment For Good’s call to action is to build a better, more innovative process for assessment that places learners and educators at the center.”
For more information, visit the new “Futures of Assessment” website here: https://futureofassessment.org/.
About AERDF
The Advanced Education Research & Development Fund (AERDF, sounds like air-diff) is a national nonprofit that unlocks scientific breakthroughs, new inventions, and cutting-edge research to solve for the most pressing teaching and learning challenges in PreK–12 education.
Through our Advanced Inclusive Research and Development (R&D) model, we unite educators, caregivers, learners, scientists, and technologists to discover research-backed solutions that push the limits of what’s believed to be possible in education.
We build the infrastructure, partnerships, and momentum needed to move discoveries from idea to impact, so every student can thrive in a rapidly changing world.
For media inquiries, please contact:
Yasmene Mumby, Communications Director, ymumby@aerdf.org
