Educational Alignment: Past, Present, and Potential Future (Part 1)
To ensure that accurate inferences of student learning are made, the alignment of learning standards, instruction, and assessments is critical. Educational systems benefit from alignment studies that examine these relationships. However, recent research suggests that traditional alignment study methods focus on the alignment between test items and standards, without consideration of the other components that make up an assessment system.
Bowzer and Dyke examine the methodologies developed for alignment studies for various populations of students and the influence of policy on the components explored in alignment studies. In this paper, they walk through the history of alignment study methods, referencing the advancements that have been made and the challenges that have yet to be addressed, which will be explored further in Part 2.