Short-Cycle Interim Assessments and the
Top 10 Safeguards for Teachers during Evaluations

  1. Start with the students. It sounds simple, doesn’t it? But improving student achievement is the primary purpose for short-cycle interim assessment. Its use in evaluation is a consequence of its use throughout the school and school year — not a substitute for it.
  2. Mandate a testing cycle. Select an assessment system that allows you to set regular testing windows in which all students are required to be assessed.
  3. Test efficiently. Select a short-cycle interim assessment system that is time-effective and makes multiple uses of data, to avoid impinging on learning time and make best use of educator human resources.
  4. Provide ample professional development on data use. Training should be job-embedded, continuous, progressive, and should reach all members of the instructional team – from administrators to classroom teachers to resource personnel.
  5. Look at the data regularly at all levels. The instructional teams should have regular collegial planning sessions. Teachers should review data regularly as part of their instructional team.
  6. Identify promising practices and role models based on student growth. Regular use of data provides many opportunities for coaching and mentoring.
  7. Monitor fidelity of implementation. Use a short-cycle interim assessment system that monitors student participation, appropriate progress between administrations, and other factors can provide indicators of possible abuses.
  8. Use multiple measures. Short-cycle interim assessment data should be a supplement to, not a replacement for, analysis of state test data. Also, consider using the wealth of possible comparison standards to look at growth in several different ways.
  9. Be inclusive and transparent. Just as state test data on schools ultimately find their way to a public website, short-cycle interim assessment data can provide feedback to various constituencies. Feedback during the year to teachers goes without saying, but students and parents should also be kept aware of progress. A secure web-based system facilitates this kind of data sharing.
  10. Evaluate the system. Many factors play a part in student growth including key administrative decisions around school schedule, choice of curriculum, professional development, and leadership in data teams. A rising tide raises all boats.