Vermont has joined the Dynamic Learning Maps Alternate Assessment Consortium.
It joins the DLM Consortium’s 13 other states: Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, New Jersey, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Utah, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, and Wisconsin.
“We are happy to join the other DLM states in the development of authentic assessment tools to inform teaching and learning in Vermont," said Armando Vilaseca, Vermont education commissioner. “Collaboration amongst states will increase professional development opportunities for our educators. I am a believer that collaboration, the sharing of best practices and resources, will strengthen our education system.”
DLM is a multi-state initiative led by the Center for Educational Testing and Evaluation (CETE) at the University of Kansas.
The DLM Consortium is developing the Dynamic Learning Maps Alternate Assessment, a computer-based assessment for the 1% of the K-12 public school student population with significant cognitive disabilities for whom, even with accommodations, general state assessments are not appropriate. Therefore, these students take an alternate assessment.
The DLM assessment system is being designed to support student learning by having assessment tasks model good instruction. Assessment is embedded in teachers’ instruction given throughout the school year in ways that allow the Dynamic Learning Map to help teachers teach better. It will be implemented in the DLM Consortium states during the 2014–2015 school year.
“We welcome Vermont to the DLM Consortium during this exciting time in the history of educational testing,” said Neal Kingston, DLM project director and CETE director. “I fully expect that the addition of Vermont to the Consortium will help ensure we develop a high-quality assessment system that will support student learning and teacher instruction.”
DLM is funded through a five-year-grant awarded in late 2010 by the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Special Education Programs. Its $22 million grant award was the largest in KU history at that time. The DLM Consortium is one of two multistate consortia to receive federal grants to create a next-generation alternate assessment linked to Common Core State Standards in math and English language arts for the 1% population.
DLM is led by CETE, a nationally recognized center specializing in large-scale assessment and online test delivery systems. For more than 30 years, CETE has developed cutting-edge testing programs and technology tools, including the Kansas Assessment Program, Dynamic Learning Maps, Kansas Writing Instruction and Education Tool, and Adaptive Reading Motivation Measures.