Press Release Archives

For Immediate Release: 29 January 2008

Measuring How Benchmark Assessments Affect Student Achievement

Boston, Mass. — The Regional Educational Laboratory for the Northeast and Islands (REL-NEI) has announced the publication of its inaugural study, with more reports addressing critical issues in education policy and practice scheduled for release in coming months. Operated by Education Development Center, Inc. (EDC), REL-NEI is one of 10 Regional Educational Laboratories funded by the U.S. Department of Education’s Institute for Education Sciences.

REL-NEI specializes in conducting Fast Response Research Projects that address the needs of state- and district-level educators in New England, New York, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Project staff members analyze existing education data using scientifically valid research methods, and produce reports that directly inform stakeholders’ decision-making.

In the coming months, REL-NEI will release other Fast Response Research Reports, including an analysis of the distribution of highly qualified teachers in rural, suburban, and urban areas of New York State, a survey of dropout prevention programs and policies currently in use in selected urban school districts, and a set of case studies that document how six elementary schools are working to improve the math achievement of students with special needs.

Michelle LaPointe, Fast Response Research Manager for REL-NEI, sees these reports as a valuable resource for individual departments of education that may not have the capacity to do their own research and analysis. “It gives us a chance to help states grapple with issues,” she says. “The process of doing the report can be as helpful [to states] as the report itself.”

The first released study, titled “Measuring How Benchmark Assessments Affect Student Achievement,” examined the impact of a pilot benchmarking program in mathematics for middle school students in Massachusetts over the course of one year. The research team did not identify any differences in achievement between students enrolled in the schools that use benchmarking and students in the control schools after one year of program implementation.

In a benchmarking program, students take online district-created interim assessments aligned with state standards throughout the academic year. The results of these interim assessments are made available to teachers immediately—unlike tests that are given annually — and can be used to assess student perform on particular standards and inform classroom instruction related to those standards.

Study co-author Susan Henderson of Learning Innovations at WestEd, a partner to EDC, reports that with just a single year of data after implementing benchmark assessment practices, it is not yet possible to say whether the practice is effective or not. “With educational initiatives, it usually takes several years to see a change in achievement,” she says. Henderson describes the team’s work as foundational, because it is one of the first rigorous examinations of benchmark assessment practices, and one of the few conducted by an impartial third party. The study also raises a number of questions about benchmarking that can be examined in future studies about the subject.

For example, Henderson wonders what the data about benchmarking could reveal about how content standards shape instruction. “If teachers were focusing on instruction on these [particular standards], you would expect students to increase their achievement in these relevant standards.” Noting limitations in the amount of data that was available to them in the current study, she says, “We looked at overall MCAS scores by grade level, rather than look at particular standards or content strands.”

In the short-term, Henderson and her colleagues hope to follow-up the study by adding an additional year of data now that 2007 MCAS results are available. This would provide a snapshot of student performance after two years of implementation of the benchmark process. Other possible topics for future research include a look at the impact of benchmarking on specific sub-groups of students and an examination of how benchmark assessment results were used in different schools.

The staff of REL-NEI seeks to help educators at the state and district levels make evidence-based decisions that help reduce performance gaps among student groups and boost student achievement. A full text version of the study is available online.

For more information about this report, contact agaddis@edc.org.

The Regional Educational Laboratory Northeast and Islands (REL-NEI) is run by Education Development Center, Inc. (EDC), the American Institutes for Research (AIR), and WestEd’s Learning Innovations program. REL-NEI is one of 10 Regional Educational Laboratories funded by the Institute of Education Sciences at the U.S. Department of Education. REL-NEI provides rigorous research that is relevant to national education priorities, responsive to local needs, and usable for policy and practice. Visit www.relnei.org.

This project has been funded at least in part with federal funds from the U.S. Department of Education under Contract Number ED-06-CO-0025. The content of this publication does not necessarily reflect the views or policies of the U.S. Department of Education nor does mention of trade names, commercial products, or organizations imply endorsement by the U.S. Government.

Education Development Center, Inc.(EDC) is a global nonprofit organization that develops, delivers, and evaluates innovative programs to address some of the world’s most urgent challenges in education, health, and economic development. Celebrating its 50th year, EDC manages more than 300 projects in 35 countries. Visit www.edc.org.