Assessment Module Overview

Relevant Definitions

Please review Assessment Function.

Assessment Code

PEMS tracks any number of assessments and relates each assessment to programs, subjects, curriculum selection, grade level and grade span. The assessment are defined in the assessment code table, and they may be linked to any combination of the above records.  The assessment code is a plan to asses a student for an indicator, it is not the actual student result.

 

Assessment Type

The assessment Type field has the three options for the different types of assessments that PEMS supports. 

• Level Equivalent - assessment determines what grade level the student is actually performing at in the subject
• Percentile Rank - assessment determines the ranking against a larger population of students at the same grade level
• Competency - assessment is recording a student has completed a required competency for the grade span
  

Assessment Code and the Subject

Each assessment code record may only link to one subject, assessments codes may not be defined for multiple subject areas in one code.  When students take one exam that tests the student on multiple subjects, the school must create an assessment code record for each of the subjects the single test addresses.  When the test results are records, the user must create multiple assessment result records for such a test.  In General, tests that cover multiple subject areas provide individual scores for each of the tested areas.  Because an assessment code record only allows one score, multiple assessment code records are needed to record all available data.

The school does have the option to define subjects as very high level, in doing this one one assessment code record may be created for the high-level subject. 

Marks Matrix

The marks matrix table allows the userthe administrator to interpretsinterpret the raw scores of each assessment in a consistent manner.  Multiple marks matrix records are created for each assessment code record.record are used to specify a range of scores.  Each mark matrix record specifies a low mark and high mark. If the raw score stored in the assessment result record falls inside the range of a specific marks matrix record, then the parent assessment result recordsrecord will read the 'normalized' score from the mark matrix record and update the assessment result record.

Level Equivalent

For Assessment codes with type = level equivalent, the normalized score will be the level equivalent field from the matching marks matrix record.   Recall the definition of Level Equivalent:

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Percentile Rank

For assessment codes with type = percentile rank, the normalized score will be the percentile rank score from the matching marks matrix record. recall the definition for percentile rank:

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Competencies

The marks matrix table is not used for competency based assessments since these assessments are either passed or not passed, they are not comparative in nature.

Assessment Results

Each time the student completes an assessment, the user makes an assessment result record.  Which assessments the school administers  are defined by the set of assessment code records; the assessment result records contain the students' score.  The assessment also tracks when the student took the assessment, so that the students progress can be tracked over time.  Based on the date of the assessment result, the record is linked to the student term.  

In PEMS the assessment code and marks matrix tables are organized in the assessment module, but the Assessment Results table is organized in the student's module as the student modules localizes all records that report on student progress.

Assessment Results Calculations

An assessment result has limited value if the administrator can not see a trend over time in how the student is performing.  Therefore, the difference in academic performance between a previous assessment result must be calculated, but the difference in time must also be calculated in order to obtain a trend. The following terminology is used when making these calculations.

• AP = Academic Performance
  • DAP = different in Academic Performance values between two assessment result records that are associated to the same assessment code record.
• DT = Difference in time frame
  • DTterm = difference in time frame, measured in units of school terms
  • DTGrade = difference in time frame, measured in units of grade levels
  • DTSpan = difference in time frame, measured in number of terms in the grade span
• DAPDT = the difference in Academic Performance / difference in a time frame
  • DAPDTerm = difference of Academic Performance / difference in time frame, measured in units of school terms
  • DAPDTGrade = difference of Academic Performance / difference in time frame, measured in units of grade level
  • DAPDTSpan = difference of Academic Performance / difference in time frame, measured in units of grade span

A student may take an assessment at anytime in the academic school year.  When calculating  time frame differences, PEMS selects the most relevant historical assessment record.  

• For the term time frame, PEMS selects the earliest assessment result within the term.
• For the Grade time frame, PEMS selects the earliest assessment result in the grade level.
• For the Grade Span time frame, PEMS selects he earliest assessment result in the grade span.

Assessment Antecedent

However, a school may use end of term, end year, or end of grade span assessments to set the baseline for the next phase of learning rather than assessments taken at the start of the term.  In this case, the school prefers to use the assessment results taken just prior to the start of the term to determine academic performance. 

Academic Results are based on calendar dates, so PEMS lets the user can set an "earliness" time frame that finds results prior to the start of the time frame (term, grade level, span), called the assessment antecedent.

The assessment antecedent is configured per term label. For example, the fall term may calculate a time frame difference from the end of the last school term, or may choose to spend the first week setting the academic baseline. Assessment antecedent is entered in number of weeks.

Note: Create the field called "assessment antecedent" in the term label table, decimal field.

Calculations Workflow

When ever a new assessment result record is entered, each result is associated to an assessment code, the assessment allocations are made.  PEMS searches for prior assessment result records, and calculates the time difference academic performance difference between assessment result records.  Then PEMS calculates the ratios.  Once entered, these values are not recalculated.