Educational Assessment: Expanded Expectations and Challenges (1992 Thorndike Award Address)

“Educational policymakers are keenly interested in educational assessment,” says Robert L. Linn in his 1992 Thorndike Award address to the American Psychological Association. Linn points to the various attractions that assessments have for policy makers who frequently think of assessment as a “kind of impartial barometer of educational quality.” But assessments are frequently used for two questionable purposes, notes Linn, first, to point out the declining quality of American education and, secondly, as an instrument of educational reform. “Such greatly expanded, and sometimes unrealistic, policy-maker expectations” he says, “together with the current press for radical changes in the nature of assessments, represent major challenges for educational measurement.” Linn concludes his remarks by saying that the measurement research community must make sure that the consequences for any new high-stakes performance assessment system are better investigated than they were for previous assessment reforms.