Assessment Registration Domain - Best Practices

Definitions and Key Concepts

Assessment encompasses a broad range of tests, methods, and tools that educators utilize to evaluate, measure, and document students' academic readiness, learning progress, skill acquisition, or educational needs. The Assessment domain in Ed-Fi UDM specifies the details for capturing metadata about an assessment, including students' scores and results. The Assessment Registration domain introduced in this version focuses on the administration of assessments and the registration of students for assessments created by vendors.

Assessment Administration is to refer a wide range of activities involved in procuring, organizing, delivering, and scoring assessments for a student population. It includes

• identifying the target student group,
• setting the assessment window dates,
• selecting participating schools for delivery and proctoring,
• ensuring the availability, functionality and security of technologies used for assessment delivery,
• managing student registration logistics and communication with the assessment vendor,
• accommodating special needs of students,
• handling the logistics of scoring and returning assessment results to educational organizations.

Education organizations involved in the assessment administration may have different roles as assigning, participating, testing, and reporting.

An Assessment Battery Part is a module or collection of assessment tests or questions designed for student delivery that can be administered at different times, scored separately or differently, taken by various groups of students, or require distinct logistics or accommodations.

Assessment Accommodations entail altering the design or delivery of assessments to cater to the needs of students with disabilities or English learners (EL) who cannot effectively take standard assessments. These accommodations can differ depending on the assessment part, such as using a translator for ELA or a calculator for Mathematics. Some special education students may need additional modifications to participate in assessments.

Use cases Ed-Fi has discussed with the community members revealed that a typical process of assessment registration in the field has following steps

• Education organizations collaborate with the assessment vendor to determine the time frame and guidelines for administering an assessment.
• The specifics of assessment participation and delivery are outlined.
• Students are registered for the administration of the assessment.
• The assessment vendor receives the registration list of students along with selected student information.

Assessment Registration Use Case

The Assessment Registration domain facilitates the use case of supporting the communication between education organizations and assessment vendors associated with the administration of an assessment. While the details of the use case may vary, the general flow of the use case is depicted below. By providing a real-time API, Ed-Fi enables the automation of, what was previously, a largely-manual and time-consuming process. The image below depicts a high-level use case of assessment registration.

The following table depicts a typical assessment registration protocol associated with the administration of a state assessment with the details the entities and associations that will be used in the process.

Process Step #	Acting Agent	Reads or Writes	Entity or Association Used
0. (Previously) Students are enrolled in a school	LEA's SIS	Writes	Student StudentSchoolAssociation StudentEducationOrganizationAssociation StudentEducationOrganizationAssessmentAccommodation
1. SEA works with assessment vendor to establish a test window for the assessment and the participating schools	SEA	Writes	Assessment AssessmentBatteryPart (if needed) AssessmentAdministration AssessmentAdministrationParticipation
2. (Optionally) If students will be registered by the LEA SIS, the SIS reads the assessment administration data	LEA's SIS	Reads	Assessment AssessmentBatteryPart (if needed) AssessmentAdministration AssessmentAdministrationParticipation
3. Students are registered for the assessment administration either by the SEA or the individual LEAs; updates will be made until just before the assessment window.	SEA or LEA’s SIS	Writes	StudentAssessmentRegistration StudentAssessmentRegistrationBattery PartAssociation (if needed)
4. As the test window approaches, the assessment vendor retrieves the information about the students registered for the assessment; updates will be retrieved until just before the test window	Assessment Vendor	Reads	Assessment AssessmentBatteryPart AssessmentAdministration AssessmentAdministrationParticipation StudentAssessmentRegistration StudentAssessmentRegistrationBattery PartAssociation Student StudentSchoolAssociation StudentEducationOrganizationAssociation StudentEducationOrganizationAssessment Accommodation
5. After the students take the assessment, the assessment vendor writes the assessment metadata and assessment results.	Assessment Vendor	Writes	Assessment ObjectiveAssessment AssessmentItem StudentAssessment

Prerequisites for Writing Assessment Registration Domain Entities

The Assessment Registration domain has dependencies on other data that should be entered into the Ed-Fi API prior to writing the domain entities and associations, as follows:

• Yearly API setup. The best practice convention instantiates a separate API for each school year. This means that assessment registration entities and associations must be written into the appropriate API for the school year.
• EducationOrganizations, minimally Schools, LocalEducationAgency(s) and StateEducationAgency(s), need to be created for the scope of the API.
• The assessment registration domain is dependent on certain attributes of entities and associations in the Student Identification and Demographics domain and the Enrollment domain, as follows:
  • Student
    • StudentUniqueId (key)
    • Name.FirstName
    • Name.LastNameSurname
    • BirthData.BirthDate
  • StudentSchoolAssociation
    • Student reference (key)
    • School reference (key)
    • EntryDate
    • EntryGradeLevel
    • ExitWithdrawDate
    • PrimarySchool
  • StudentEducationOrganization
    • Student reference (key)
    • EducationOrganization reference (key)
    • Address
    • ElectronicMail
    • Race
    • Sex
    • StudentIdentificationCode
• The Assessment Registration domain is dependent on certain attributes of entities and associations in the Assessment domain as follows
  • Assessment
    • AssessmentIdentifier (key)
    • Namespace (key)
    • AssessmentTitle
    • AcademicSubject
    • AssessedGradeLevel
  • ObjectiveAssessment
    • IdentificationCode (key)
    • Assessment reference (key)
• Descriptor values need to be loaded. The Assessment Registration domain has dependency on several sets of descriptors, as follows
  • GradeLevel descriptor referenced in StudentAssessmentRegistration.AssessmentGradeLevel
  • Accommodation descriptor, referenced in the following:
    • StudentEducationOrganizationAssessmentAccommodation.GeneralAccommodation
    • StudentAssessmentRegistration.AssessmentAccommodation
    • StudentAssessmentRegistrationBatteryPartAssociation.Accommodation
  • PlatformType descriptor referenced in StudentAssessmentRegistration.PlatformType
• Since the AssessmentRegistration is designed to support an interoperability protocol between education organizations and the assessment vendor, it is important that the assessment vendor is provided the necessary access as follows:
  • Namespace based access (using Assessment.Namespace) is used to assign create/read/write/delete access via the assessment vendor’s claim set to manage the various endpoints for assessment metadata and the students’ results.
  • The Assessment Registration requires assessment vendors to read student data from the entities Student, StudentSchoolAssociation, StudentEducationOrganizationAssociation, and StudentEducationOrganizationAssessmentAccommodation. The necessary access is accomplished by providing read access to these endpoints via relationship-based authorization by assigning the EducationOrganization spanning the scope of the students to the assessment vendor's claim. This is typically the AssessmentAdministration.AssigningEducationOrganization

Using the Assessment Registration Domain

Education Organizations for Assessment Administration

The Assessment Registration domain is designed to provide flexibility for a variety of assessment use cases where there is a need to communicate the information about registered students and their characteristics that will be taking the assessment to the assessment vendor.

The domain can be used for assessments administered by a StateEducationalAgency, an EducationServiceCenter, a LocalEducationAgency, or a School.

Much of the flexibility is provided by identifying the different roles of EducationOrganizations as follows:

Education Organization	Specified in Entity	Definition of Role
AssigningEducationOrganization	AssessmentAdministration	The organization that contracts and administers the assessment.
ParticipatingEducationOrganization	AssessmentAdministration Participation	Lower-level organizations that will be participating in the assessment, For example for with an SEA as the “assigning” organization, the LEAs would be “participating” in this administration of the assessment.
TestingEducationOrganization	StudentAssessmentRegistration	The organization where the student will be taking the assessment, often a school. This school may be different from the school the student is enrolled in.
ReportingEducationOrganization	StudentAssessmentRegistration	The organization where the results of the assessment will be reported, typically the School (or its LEA) where the student is enrolled.

Use of Battery Parts

Assessments are often organized into modules that are separately scored, often by subject area. The different modules are indicated as ObjectiveAssessments as part of the Assessment Domain.

The use of the AssessmentBatteryPart entity denotes the organization of parts for delivery to students, specifically where:

• Different students may take different battery parts of the assessment.
• Students may require different accommodation(s) for different batter parts. Some things to note on usage:
• An assessment may or may not have AssessmentBatteryParts
• AssessmentBatteryPart may or may not be aligned with the ObjectiveAssessments. AssessmentBatteryPart.ObjectiveAssessment is used to map the relationship, if it exists.
• AssessmentBatteryParts may or may not be scored separately.

Specifying and Communicating Student Accommodations

The accommodations actually provided to a student for an assessment is reported after the fact in the StudentAssessment.Accommodation. The determination of what accommodations a student should receive are addressed in the Assessment Registration domain.

The Assessment Registration use case requires that the education organization provides information to the assessment vendor as to what accommodation(s) to provide or organize through the proctor. To address this flexibly, there are three (optional) mechanisms defined, as shown in the table below. Any or all of these options may be used as needed.

Attribute	When to Write	Definition
StudentEducationOrganizationAssessmentAccommodation. GeneralAccommodation	At student school registration or when determined by a program (e.g., special education or language instruction).	Indicates what assessment accommodations the student should generally receive for all assessments
StudentAssessmentRegistration.AssessmentAccommodation	Upon student registration for the assessment.	Indicates the accommodations the student should receive for this particular assessment.
StudentAssessmentRegistrationBatteryPartAssociation. Accommodation	Upon student registration for the assessment. Used on when the accommodations may differ by battery part.	Indicates the accommodations the student should receive for each battery part.

Assessment Registration Best Practices

The following best practices are organized by entity and association in the Assessment Registration domain.

AssessmentAdministration

The AssessmentAdministration entity captures the anticipated administration of an assessment under the purview of an EducationOrganization. The following table summarizes the best practice use of the AssessmentAdministration attributes.

Required	Must Have	Recommended	As Needed
AssigningEducationOrganization (key) Assessment (key) AdministrationIdentifier (key)	AssessmentAdministration Period		AssessmentBatteryPart

Keys in reading the table and following ones:

• Required attributes in Ed-Fi are hard constraints, meaning that a record or API payload will be rejected if the attribute is not present. These necessarily include key values.
• Must Have attributes are those whose intended use of the entity requires them to be used, even if, upon creation, they may not be present.
• Recommended attributes are those whose best practices encourage their use.
• As Needed attributes are those that should be used when appropriate, based upon policy.

Best practices for the use of AssessmentAdministration and its attributes

info

• An Assessment may have zero or more AssessmentAdministrations for a school year.
• Different AssessmentAdministrations for the same Assessment typically do not have overlapping AssessmentAdministration.Periods – but may in circumstances where there are different AssessmentAdministrationParticipation. ParticipatingEducationOrganizations or where different student populations are targeted.
• The AssessmentAdministration.AssigningEducationOrganization should reflect that organization that has responsibility for the entire scope of the assessment registration including management of the assessment vendor.
• If, at the time of defining an assessment administration with the assessment vendor, the assessment meta data (specifically the Assessment entity) has not been written, create the Assessment for reference by the AssessmentAdministration.
• If the assessment administration will involve the selective delivery of assessment battery parts, create the AssessmentBatteryParts for reference by the AssessmentAdministration.

AssessmentAdministrationParticipation

The AssessmentAdministrationParticipation entity indicates the planned participation of an EducationOrganization in the administration of an assessment. The following table summarizes the best practice use of the AssessmentAdministrationParticipation attributes.

Required	Must Have	Recommended	As Needed
AssessmentAdministration (key) ParticipatingEducationOrganization (key)		AdministrationContact

Best practices for the use of AssessmentAdministrationParticipation and its attributes

info

• Use the AssessmentRegistrationParticipation entity to communicate the participating education organizations and their contacts to the assessment vendor, if required.
• The AssessmentRegistrationParticipation.ParticipatingEducationOrganization is typically a sub-organization of the AssessmentAdministration.AssigningEducationOrganization, for example a LocalEducationAgency as a participating sub-organization of the StateEducationAgency.

StudentAssessmentRegistration

The StudentAssessmentRegistration entity reflects the registration that indicates the student is expected to participate in a particular assessment administration. The following table summarizes the best practice use of the StudentAssessmentRegistration attributes.

Required	Must Have	Recommended	As Needed
AssessmentAdministration (key) StudentEducationOrganization Association (key) StudentSchoolAssociation	TestingEducationOrganization ReportingEducationOrganization	AssessmentAccommodation PlatformType AssessmentGradeLevel	StudentEducationOrganizationAssessmentAccommodation AssessmentCustomization

Best practices for the use of StudentAssessmentRegistration and its attributes

info

• A StudentAssessmentRegistration is not required for the results of the Assessment to be reported in StudentAssessment.
• Every student reflected in the StudentAssessmentRegistration should have a corresponding StudentAssessment, even if the student was not tested.
• The StudentAssessmentRegistration.ReportingEducationOrganization is typically the School, or its LEA, where the student is enrolled.
• Use the StudentAssessmentRegistration.AssessmentAccommodation to communicate to the assessment vendor the accommodations required for the student for the entire assessment.
• Use the StudentAssessmentRegistration.AssessmentCustomization to communicate to the assessment vendor additional data about the student and/or details of the student’s registration that is not available from other entities in the API.

AssessmentBatteryPart

The AssessmentBatteryPart entity denotes parts that are organized for administering an assessment which, together, provide a comprehensive assessment of the students. The following table summarizes the best practice use of the AssessmentBatteryPart attributes.

Required	Must Have	Recommended	As Needed
Assessment (key) AssessmentBatteryPart (key)		ObjectiveAssessment

Best practices for the use of AssessmentBatteryPart and its attributes

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• Use the AssessmentBatteryPart when
  1. students are selectively delivered different assessment battery parts, or
  2. students may receive different accommodations for different assessment battery parts.
• An Assessment may have zero or more AssessmentBatteryParts.
• If AssessmentBatteryParts are defined, reference the ObjectiveAssessments that they are mapped to when aligned.

StudentAssessmentRegistrationBatteryPartAssociation

The StudentAssessmentRegistrationBatteryPartAssociation indicates the battery part(s) of the assessment that the student is to be tested for this administration of the assessment. The following table summarizes the best practice use of the StudentAssessmentRegistrationBatteryPartAssociation attributes.

Required	Must Have	Recommended	As Needed
StudentAssessmentRegistration (key) AssessmentBatteryPart (key)		Accommodation

info

• Use the StudentAssessmentRegistrationBatteryPartAssociation when
  1. the student is selectively delivered certain assessment battery parts;
  2. the student should receive different accommodations for different assessment battery parts.

StudentEducationOrganizationAssessmentAccommodation

The StudentEducationOrganizationAssessmentAccommodation entity specifies the accommodation(s) required or expected for administering assessments as determined by the education organization. This is typically written by the SIS (or alternatively supporting applications for ELL or special education) to indicate what assessment accommodations the student should generally receive for assessments. The following table summarizes the best practice use of the StudentEducationOrganizationAssessmentAccommodation attributes.

Required	Must Have	Recommended	As Needed
EducationOrganization (key) Student (key)	GeneralAccommodation

info

• Use the StudentEducationOrganizationAssessmentAccommodation to record the general accommodations that the student should be afforded for all assessments.
• The StudentEducationOrganizationAssessmentAccommodation.EducationOrganization is typically the same as the corresponding StudentEducationOrganizationAssociation.EducationOrganization that is written during enrollment