Validity and Fairness of Assessment-based Information in Educational Evaluations: How Can “User-Centeredness” and “Stakeholder-Orientation” Help?

This expert lecture will focus on issues of Validity as it relates to Fair Assessment Uses in educational program and policy evaluations, with an emphasis on improving the validity and fairness of inferences drawn from test-based data in high stakes, evaluative contexts. The main objective will be to discuss, with active audience involvement, the basic principles and advantages of “user-centered design” as applied to assessment design and use, and the benefits it affords in educational evaluation contexts by engaging human users from start to finish. The session will offer a user-centered assessment design framework for conducting program/policy evaluations grounded in a realist view of science and informed by a socio-ecological perspective. With illustrative high stakes cases, it will highlight how to avoid adverse consequences for specific users and optimize evaluation uses with positive social consequences for relevant stakeholders. The content of the session will draw on a recently-published book.
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