3 Keys to Testing and Assessment Success

In this 2023 piece, Dr. Shana Burnett explains how formative and summative assessments differ and why results should lead to a plan for instruction. The updated section below adds a plain comparison, details on the New Jersey Student Learning Assessments, and a short checklist for using results.

Testing and assessment are critical to monitoring and understanding student progress. However, what is equally essential is how educators use these results to inform instruction.  There are two major types of assessments that give educators and families information on how students are developing.  These types of assessments types can either inform or summarize how students are progressing.  Formative and summative assessments provide a meaningful understanding of how students are progressing. If educators use them correctly, assessments can support student growth, so students and educators can make improvements. 

Applying Formative and Summative Assessments

Teachers use formative assessment results to inform instructional practices in order to build up and monitor students’ ability levels. Meanwhile, educators gear summative assessment results to provide proficiency-level results generated from state assessments.  State assessments are usually administered toward the end of the school year; hence why they would be considered summative.

According to the Center for Standards, Assessment, and Accountability, 2023, “implementing formative assessment and supporting teacher and leader learning in order to guide new ways for teachers and students to engage in evidence” is what was learned. 

Having worked in education for over twenty-eight years, I have seen firsthand the importance of using assessment results when planning lessons.  Having served as a school testing coordinator (STC) afforded me opportunities to see firsthand the impact of high-stakes summative assessments and the stresses these results can cause on students, families, schools, and districts.

Ensure Communications on Testing and Assessment Plans

Testing and assessment should be a united process, and results shared with educational teams, students, and families.  When parents and students understand what performance levels on assessments epitomize, they can become partners in tracking and monitoring student progress.  According to the NJ State Department of Education, the importance of schools ensuring that “… a high-quality assessment including its alignment to standards, and how assessments should be used as part of a monitoring cycle to ensure students are on track and receiving the appropriate instruction.” 

Once students complete the assessment, results should lead to a prescription based on test outcomes. Teachers should follow up on assessment results with a treatment that will increase proficiency levels.  Assessments should be tied to curricula that measure student performance. 

Measuring student performance means understanding strengths and deficiencies.  It is imperative to understand deficiencies in assessment results. Then, the next steps would be to find solutions to address achievement gaps.  It is essential for educators to plan solutions to any deficiencies and track student performance using formative and summative assessments. 

Understanding Student Progress Through Testing and Assessment

In conclusion, once you administer assessments, it is important to recognize how results evaluate, share, and identify a plan of action based on the outcomes.  Understanding student progress becomes ideal for educators to use when informing instruction. 

Formative assessment results inform instructional practices in order to build proficiency levels.  Summative assessment results summarize how students are progressing and are usually provided by the state, such as New Jersey Student Learning Assessment (NJSLA).  According to the NJ Department of Education 2023, the assessment  administered to students in grades 3rd-8th “…. measures student proficiency with grade level skills, knowledge, and concepts that are critical to college and career readiness.”

Formative vs summative assessment: how they differ and how New Jersey uses them

The difference between formative vs summative assessment comes down to timing and purpose. A formative assessment takes place while students are still learning, so that a teacher can adjust the next lesson. A summative assessment takes place at the end of a unit, a course or a school year, and summarizes what students know at that point. As Dr. Shana Burnett explains above, both are valuable, and the value comes from what educators do with the results.

A side-by-side comparison

• When it happens. Formative assessment happens during instruction, often daily. Summative assessment happens after a block of instruction ends, and state assessments are usually given toward the end of the school year.
• Who uses the results. Teachers and students use formative results straight away to change what happens next. Schools, districts, families and the state use summative results to see how groups of students are doing.
• Typical examples. Formative examples include a short quiz, a question asked to the whole class, a draft returned with comments, or an exit ticket. Summative examples include a unit exam, a final project and a state assessment.
• Stakes. Formative work is usually low stakes or ungraded, which lets students make mistakes and learn from them. Summative work usually carries more weight.

One common mistake is to treat the two as rivals. A school that gives only summative tests learns how students did after the chance to help them has passed, and a school that gives only informal checks has little evidence to share with families or to compare across classrooms. Leaders usually need both.

New Jersey assessments in practice

New Jersey is a useful example because its state tests are summative and are meant to be read alongside other measures. The New Jersey Department of Education assessment page lists the New Jersey Student Learning Assessments, including NJSLA-Adaptive and the science assessment (NJSLA-S), among the statewide assessments. The department describes state assessments as a single measure of student performance that, combined with other measures, helps identify schools needing support and provides information for improving curriculum and instruction. The page also notes that New Jersey is required to administer the statewide assessments by the Every Student Succeeds Act and by state statute.

The NJ assessment for science, NJSLA-S, is described in the state’s 2025 technical report. It measures student proficiency in grades 5, 8 and 11 against the New Jersey Student Learning Standards for Science, which are based on the Framework for K-12 Science Education and the Next Generation Science Standards. This answers a question that families and teachers often search for, which is how NGSS assessments work in New Jersey: the science test reports results for three content areas (Earth and Space, Life, and Physical science) and for three scientific practices (Investigating, Sensemaking and Critiquing). The report also states that the first administration took place in the 2018-19 school year and that 2025 was the fifth year of administration.

The New Jersey Student Learning Assessment results, then, are an end-of-year picture. They cannot tell a teacher what to reteach on a Tuesday in October. That job belongs to formative assessment, which is why the plan Burnett describes, in which results lead to a follow-up that raises proficiency, depends on both kinds of evidence working together.

What the research says about using data

The federal What Works Clearinghouse practice guide Using Student Achievement Data to Support Instructional Decision Making, released in 2009, recommends making data part of an ongoing cycle of instructional improvement, teaching students to examine their own data and set learning goals, and building a schoolwide vision for data use. The panel rated each of the five recommendations as minimal evidence, which means the guidance reflects expert judgment more than a body of controlled studies. Leaders should treat it as a reasonable starting framework and check their own results, instead of assuming that a data cycle will raise scores by itself.

A short checklist for schools

1. Name, for each major test your school gives, whether its purpose is to guide teaching or to report results, and tell staff and families which it is.
2. Schedule time within a few weeks of state results for grade-level teams to look at where students need support, and connect those findings to the formative checks they use in class.
3. Explain performance levels to families in plain words, so that parents can follow progress as partners.
4. Keep classroom checks low stakes, and let students see what they got wrong and why.

The edCircuit assessment guide collects further reading on designing and interpreting assessments.

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