ALN: Rethinking Summative Assessment & Performance Assessment

Assessment Learning Network with Karin Hess

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Date

Wednesday, January 27, 2027

Time

9:00 am - 11:30 am

Location

Virtual
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Resources

Flyer ALN 2026-27 Series

What counts as evidence of learning, and how do we know when students are competent?

This virtual session focuses on the role of summative assessment within a competency-based system, with a particular emphasis on performance assessment. Participants will explore how authentic, application-based tasks can provide defensible evidence of student learning aligned to competencies. 

Participants will unpack the characteristics of high-quality performance assessments, including alignment, rigor, and opportunities for revision, while connecting to Components of an Equitable Assessment System (CEAS) such as authentic and student-driven assessment. 

Framing Questions

  • What types of classroom evidence best demonstrate that students can apply, transfer, and use their learning in meaningful ways?
  • How can performance assessments create opportunities for students to demonstrate deeper understanding, transfer, and authentic application of learning? 
  • What design features help ensure that performance assessments are rigorous, equitable, and supportive of student ownership and agency? 

Presenter: Karin Hess

Karin Hess, author of the Hess Cognitive Rigor Matrices, is recognized internationally as a leader in developing practical approaches using depth of knowledge/DOK, cognitive rigor, and learning progressions as the foundation for formative, interim, and performance-based assessment. Dr. Hess has authored and co-authored more than a dozen books or book chapters, and numerous articles related to brain-based learning and competency-based systems. Her twenty-six years working in schools includes fifteen years as a classroom teacher, and as an elementary and middle school principal and district curriculum and Title I director. Her work includes contributing to Maine’s early thinking about how to design and assess graduation exhibitions and supporting the development of New Hampshire’s K-12 model competencies in ELA, math, and science, and the New Hampshire Learning Initiative in guiding the design of performance-based assessments and the BEST work study habit rubrics (collaboration, communication, self-direction, and creative thinking).

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