Accountability and Assessment

Measuring How Benchmarks Assessments Affect Student Achievement: An Interview with the Researchers (44 min.)

These short audio files are edited from an hour-long interview with REL-NEI researchers Sue Henderson and Anthony Petrosino. They discuss the design, findings, limitations, and implications of their project, “Measuring How Benchmarks Assessments Affect Student Achievement.”

Chapter 1: Origins of the Report
Henderson and Petrosino describe the origins of their report, how they define “benchmark testing,” and the reasoning that lies behind these mini-summative tests. (2:55)

Chapter 2: Design of the Study
Henderson and Petrosino describe the design of the study and the software used for the benchmarks testing. (1:04)

Chapter 3: What Prompted the Study
Henderson and Petrosino describe what prompted the study, the expense involved in schools undertaking a benchmark-testing program, and the operational definition for “middle school.” (3:49)

Chapter 4: How the Schools Were Matched
The researchers discuss the attributes of the schools chosen for the study, how the schools using benchmark-testing programs were “matched” with those that were not, and the challenge of keeping enough schools in the study for the research to be considered robust. (5:50)

Chapter 5: Study Design & Some Findings
The researchers describe the “interrupted time series design” they used for their study and begin to talk about their findings. (3:45)

Chapter 6: Findings & Limitations of the Study
Interviewer Josephine Louie asks the researchers what surprised them in their research for the benchmarks project, and Henderson and Petrosino discuss the limitations of their study. (2:25)

Chapter 7: Ideas for Further Research
The researchers discuss further the limitations of their study and future research they would like to undertake to find out more about the impact of benchmark testing. (5:05)

Chapter 8: Challenges of the Study
The researchers discuss the challenges of the study—for example, the unknown variables of school leadership—and the dangers inherent in over-simplifying the findings. (4:20)

Chapter 9: Recommendations for Policymakers
Henderson and Petrosino discuss what they would tell policymakers about this research study and make recommendations across the board about using research to assess policy. (4:10)

Chapter 10: Implications of Study for Further Research
The researchers discuss their hunches about benchmark assessments after looking at a second year of data, as well as the responses from the state officials who asked for it. Limitations on data collection methods for this type of study also are explored. (6:25)

Chapter 11: More Research Needed
Henderson and Petrosino discuss the need for multiyear research to better assess benchmark testing and use examples of Google Earth and prescriptive medicine as metaphors for the strands of assessment needed for more conclusive results. (4:30)