Developing and Scoring Assessment Center Exercises.

The Assessment Development Laboratory for the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards is developing a certification process with the three components of school site documentation, a content knowledge examination, and assessment center exercises. Activities involved in the development of the exercises and their scoring are described. The assessment center method is a process that includes: (1) standardized assessments based on multiple scores of candidate evidence; (2) multiple trained assessors; (3) judgments about evidence based, in part, on simulation exercises; and (4) judgments pooled by assessors or by statistical integration. A major consideration in developing the exercises was the representation of the exercises to teaching. Six dimensions of teacher tasks were identified, and each exercise was designed to elicit evidence on at least three dimensions. Exercises were also designed to elicit pedagogical reasoning and action. Resource needs for assessment administration were a further consideration. Four exercises are currently being developed, centering on cooperative group discussion, instructional analysis, planning instruction, and evaluating student learning. Small pilot tests (smoke tests) have been administered in the development process. A detailed analysis of each exercise illustrates the development process. (SLD)