Common Assessments a Test for Schools' Technology

Even small details like electrical-circuit capacity could undermine effort

Washington

It’s a daunting job for two big groups of states to design multilayered assessment systems by 2014, and a panel of experts has made it even more daunting, composing a long list of concerns about what it will take to make the venture a success.

On its list, the panel included high-level, long-range items such as integrating the tests into systems of instruction, and nitty-gritty, immediate worries such as making sure the tests’ computer demands don’t blow schools’ electrical circuits.

The to-do list was sketched out during a six-hour hearing convened April 15 by the U.S. Department of Education. It was the first in a series aimed at advising the two state collaboratives as they design tests for the new common standards in mathematics and English/language arts that have been adopted by all but six states, using $360 million in federal Race to the Top money. Forty-five states are participating...