Researchers draw on the American Instructional Resources Survey and interviews with 45 English language arts and math teachers to examine the prevalence of different types of benchmark assessments and explore educators' perceptions about the extent to which benchmark assessments align with other components of their schools' instructional systems.

The Role of Benchmark Assessments in Coherent Instructional Systems

Findings from the 2022 American Instructional Resources Survey

Ashley Woo, Melissa Kay Diliberti

ResearchPublished Aug 23, 2023

Researchers draw on the American Instructional Resources Survey (AIRS) and interviews with 45 English language arts (ELA) and math teachers to examine the prevalence of different types of benchmark assessments and explore educators' perceptions about the extent to which benchmark assessments align with other components of their schools' instructional systems.

As school systems emerge from the chaos wrought by the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic and opportunities for gathering student assessment data resume, education leaders and policymakers have an opportunity to take stock of the state of their assessment systems and reflect on whether assessments — and benchmark assessments specifically — are appropriately aligned with other aspects of schools' instructional systems, such as state standards, summative assessments, and curriculum materials.

Key Takeaways

  • Nearly all kindergarten through grade 12 public schools (99 percent) reported administration of at least one benchmark assessment to at least some of their students in the 2021–2022 school year.
  • In schools serving any grades kindergarten through grade 8, published benchmark assessments were somewhat more common than locally created assessments. In high schools, it was the opposite.
  • The share of schools administering published assessments has grown slightly over the past four school years. Schools' use of locally created assessments also has grown over time, although there were large shifts in the shares of schools administering these assessments between the 2019–2020 and 2020–2021 school years.
  • During the 2021–2022 school year, more than 80 percent of principals perceived that their schools' benchmark assessments were aligned with their state standards and state summative assessments.
  • About two-thirds of ELA and math teachers felt that their benchmark assessments aligned with the content of their curriculum materials, although ELA teachers were less likely than math teachers to perceive alignment.
  • Teachers who used self-created benchmark assessments, served students performing at or above grade level, and spent more professional learning time on analysis or use of student assessments were more likely to perceive alignment between their benchmark assessments and curriculum materials.
  • Teachers' perceptions about the alignment between their benchmark assessments and curricula were linked to how easy or difficult it was for them to identify tasks or activities within their curriculum materials to address students' unmet learning needs.

Recommendations

  • State and local leaders should strive to create coherent instructional systems by intentionally adopting benchmark assessments that are aligned with other aspects of their instructional systems.
  • State and local leaders also can play a role in supporting the development of coherent instructional systems by holistically examining how instructional system components work together and designing or encouraging the uptake of curricula and assessments that are intentionally linked.
  • To support the role of benchmark assessments as an instructional tool, state and local leaders should provide teachers with the professional learning and resources to facilitate connections between their curriculum materials and their benchmark assessments and to make student data more actionable.

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Woo, Ashley and Melissa Kay Diliberti, The Role of Benchmark Assessments in Coherent Instructional Systems: Findings from the 2022 American Instructional Resources Survey. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2023. https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RRA134-19.html.
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The research described in this report was funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Foundation, and the Walton Family Foundation and conducted by RAND Education and Labor.

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