Announcing Our Latest Publication: A 50-Year Journey in Re-imagining Assessment for Learning

We are thrilled to announce the publication of our new chapter, “Research & Development Contributions to Assessment, Learning, Games, and Technology,” in the Handbook for Assessment in the Service of Learning, Volume III. This work, co-authored by Eva L. Baker and Gregory K. W. K. Chung, distills decades of groundbreaking research from the National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards, and Student Testing (CRESST).

For over 50 years, CRESST’s mission has been to understand and improve educational quality through evaluation. This chapter presents a compelling narrative of that journey, showcasing how a relentless focus on cognitive demands, validity, and transparency can transform assessment from endpoint into a powerful tool for learning itself.

The chapter delves into four illustrative R&D programs that defy conventional boundaries:

• Writing Assessment: Moving beyond grammar to assess deep understanding by providing students with primary sources, proving that content knowledge is foundational to communication.
• Rifle Marksmanship: Re-conceptualizing a “simple” motor skill as a complex interplay of cognitive, affective, and perceptual-motor factors, and using knowledge models to individualize training.
• AI Evaluation: Pioneering the human benchmarking of early artificial intelligence systems, laying the groundwork for how we evaluate modern AI like ChatGPT today.
• Game-Based Learning: Demonstrating how the data generated from student gameplay (telemetry) can provide rich, valid evidence of knowledge and skill, paving the way for “measurement without testing.”

A central, powerful theme emerges: if a learner’s interaction with a task is a direct manifestation of their thinking, then that behavior is a valid assessment. This principle of Assessment in the Service of Learning (AISL) is agnostic to medium, applying equally to essays, simulations, and digital games.

We invite you to explore this open-access resource to understand the past and future of assessment. This body of work provides a proven blueprint for creating assessments that are not just measures of learning, but are integral, informative parts of the learning process itself.