Since the onset of COVID-19, countless countries have suggested that large scale assessments don't make sense during these times. Some education specialists have even encouraged governments to step down and cancel evaluation and assessment programs to focus on strategies for children to work efficiently from home so that learning gaps don't increase. However, the former shouldn't be ruled out in order to achieve the latter. Here in Colombia, Icfes, has made huge efforts to maintain large scale assessments, such as administering two out of three nation wide assessments in a computer based format; a leap we wouldn't have taken if it weren't for the pandemic. Not only did we work side by side with the ministry to guarantee that the country understood the public and social value that evaluation and assessment has as cornerstone for making policy and institutional decisions, but we offered Evaluar para Avanzar, a program designed for teachers. We provided evaluation tools, such as, (a) test booklets for third grade students up to 11th grade students, (b) teachers’ guides for interpreting student results, (c) student reports for teachers and (d) instructional videos for teachers so that they could identify their student’s strengths and weaknesses and design teaching and learning strategies. Furthermore, the solution isn't to cancel large scale assessments, because the unavailability of student results both in high school and undergraduate programs is worse for the educational system than counting with student's performance results even if they fall. It's best to have evidence on how the pandemic has impacted learning and what better way to report it than through large scale assessments. Of course, this standpoint can be interpreted as if assessment had a punitive aspect, but on the contrary what we have done is work together with the entire education community providing evaluation tools to support teachers and foster teaching strategies for them to work with students. From Icfes we would like to share these experiences and hear yours too.
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