Innovative assessment and accountability demonstration authority

The term “innovative assessment system” means a system of assessments that may include— The Secretary may provide a State educational agency, or a consortium of State educational agencies, in accordance with paragraph (3), with the authority to establish an innovative assessment system (referred to in this section as “demonstration authority”). In accordance with the requirements described in subsection (e), each State educational agency, or consortium of State educational agencies, that submits an application under this section shall propose in its application the period of time over which the State educational agency or consortium desires to exercise the demonstration authority, except that such period shall not exceed 5 years. During the first 3 years that the Secretary provides State educational agencies and consortia with demonstration authority (referred to in this section as the “initial demonstration period”) the Secretary shall provide such demonstration authority to— Not later than 180 days after the end of the initial demonstration period, and prior to providing additional State educational agencies with demonstration authority, the Director of the Institute of Education Sciences, in consultation with the Secretary, shall publish a report detailing the initial progress of innovative assessment systems carried out through demonstration authority under this section. The progress report under paragraph (1) shall be based on the annual information submitted by participating States described in subsection (e)(2)(B)(ix) and examine the extent to which— with respect to each innovative assessment system— each State with demonstration authority has demonstrated that— Upon completion of the progress report, the Secretary shall provide a response to the findings of the progress report, including a description of how the findings of the report will be used— The Secretary shall make the progress report under this subsection and the response described in paragraph (3) publicly available on the website of the Department. The Secretary shall not require States that have demonstration authority to submit any information for the purposes of the progress report that is in addition to the information the State is already required to provide under subsection (e)(2)(B)(x). Upon completion and publication of the report described in subsection (c), the Secretary may grant demonstration authority to additional State educational agencies or consortia that submit an application under subsection (e). Such State educational agencies or consortia of State educational agencies shall be subject to all of the same terms, conditions, and requirements of this section. A State educational agency, or consortium of State educational agencies, that desires to participate in the program of demonstration authority under this section shall submit an application to the Secretary at such time and in such manner as the Secretary may reasonably require. Such application shall include a description of the innovative assessment system, the experience the applicant has in implementing any components of the innovative assessment system, and the timeline over which the State or consortium proposes to exercise the demonstration authority. In addition, the application shall include each of the following: A demonstration that the innovative assessment system will— be developed in collaboration with— allow the State educational agency to validly and reliably aggregate data from the innovative assessment system for purposes of— A description of how the State educational agency will— report data from the innovative assessment system annually to the Secretary, including— A description of the State educational agency’s plan to— If the innovative assessment system will initially be administered in a subset of local educational agencies— a description of how the State will— The Secretary shall— implement a peer-review process to inform— determinations about whether an innovative assessment system— ensure that the peer-review team consists of practitioners and experts who are knowledgeable about the innovative assessment system being proposed for all participating students, including— if the Secretary disapproves an application under paragraph (4), offer the State an opportunity to— The Secretary may extend an authorization of demonstration authority under this section for an additional 2 years if the State educational agency demonstrates with evidence that the State educational agency’s innovative assessment system is continuing to meet the requirements of subsection (c), including by demonstrating a plan for, and the capacity to, transition to statewide use of the innovative assessment system by the end of the 2-year extension period. A State may, during the State’s approved demonstration authority period or 2-year extension, include results from the innovative assessment systems developed under this section in accountability determinations for each student in the participating local educational agencies instead of, or in addition to, results from the assessment system under section 6311(b)(2) of this title if the State demonstrates that the State has met the requirements under subsection (c). The State shall continue to meet all other requirements of section 6311(c) of this title. The Secretary shall withdraw the authorization for demonstration authority provided to a State educational agency under this section and such State shall return to use of the statewide assessment system under section 6311(b)(2) of this title for all local educational agencies in the State if, at any time during a State’s approved demonstration authority period or 2-year extension, the State educational agency cannot present to the Secretary evidence that the innovative assessment system developed under this section— If, after a State’s approved demonstration authority period or 2-year extension, the State educational agency has met all the requirements of this section, including having scaled the innovative assessment system up to statewide use, and demonstrated that such system is of high quality, as described in subparagraph (B), the State shall be permitted to operate the innovative assessment system approved under the program of demonstration authority under this section for the purposes of subsections (b)(2) and (c) of section 6311 of this title. Such system shall be considered of high quality if the Secretary, through the peer-review process described in section 6311(a)(4) of this title, determines that— the State has demonstrated that the same innovative assessment system was used to measure— For the purposes of the evaluation described in paragraph (1), the baseline year shall be considered the first year that each local educational agency in the State used the innovative assessment system. A State may request, and the Secretary shall review such request and may grant, a delay of the withdrawal of authority under subsection (i) for the purpose of providing the State with the time necessary to implement the innovative assessment system statewide, if, at the conclusion of the State’s approved demonstration authority period and 2-year extension— A State may use funds available under section 6361 of this title to carry out this section. A consortium of States may apply to participate in the program of demonstration authority under this section, and the Secretary may provide each State member of such consortium with such authority if each such State member meets all of the requirements of this section. Such consortium shall be subject to the limitation described in subsection (b)(3)(B) during the initial 3 years of the demonstration authority. Following the publication of the progress report described in subsection (c), the Director of the Institute of Education Sciences, in consultation with the Secretary, shall collect and disseminate the best practices on the development and implementation of innovative assessment systems that meet the requirements of this section, including best practices regarding the development of— summative assessments that— The Secretary shall make the information described in paragraph (1) available on the website of the Department and shall publish an update to the information not less often than once every 3 years.