The co-chairs of the Fairness and Equity in Assessment Task Force have developed a glossary of terms, which expanded as the work evolved.
Accommodations - Accommodations are changes to the assessment environment that remove barriers and provide equitable opportunities for engagement for all. (University of Florida Disability Resource Center)
Assessment - Any process used to evaluate or measure an individual, group of individuals, or program. (UF Fairness and Equity in Assessment Task Force, 2021)
Assessor - The person responsible for observing an individual’s performance or assessment artifact and making a decision on its quality.
Bias - Aspects of the assessment which systematically results in an over- or under-estimate of performance that is not attributable to the construct being measured. For example, construct-irrelevant components of test scores that differentially affect the performance of different groups of test takers and consequently the reliability/precision and validity of interpretations and uses of results. (Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing, 2014)
Construct - The trait, concept, or characteristic that the assessment is designed to measure. (Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing, 2014)
Cultural Humility – A lifelong commitment to learning and refining the skills of responsiveness, engaging in self-reflection, and challenging one’s own stereotypes and assumptions about other cultures (Tervalon and Murray-Garcia, 1998; Sacred Heart University, n.d.).
Culturally Responsive Assessment – The practice of assessment that is intentionally mindful of the student populations the institution serves, uses language that is appropriate for all students when developing learning outcomes, acknowledges students’ differences in the planning phases of an assessment effort, utilizes assessment tools that are appropriate for different students, and yield results intended to be used to improve learning for all students (Montenegro & Jankowski, 2017; Solano-Flores, 2019).
Disaggregated Data – The data produced by the analysis of subcomponents or subpopulation characteristics of interest from a larger data set. (National Cooperative Education Statistics System, USDOE https://nces.ed.gov/pubs2017/NFES2017017.pdf)
External assessments - Assessments developed by an individual or organization external to UF. (UF Fairness and Equity in Assessment Task Force, 2021)
Fairness and Equity in Assessment - Fairness and equity in assessment ensure that no person is disadvantaged based on individual characteristics so that all have unobstructed opportunities to demonstrate their standing on the construct or criterion being measured, and that full access to assessments and the results of assessments are guaranteed. (Huggins-Manley, Miller, & Mutahi, 2021)
Formative assessments - An assessment that provides feedback to adjust processes with the goal of improving individual's achievement of intended outcomes. (Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing, 2014)
High-stakes assessments - An assessment used to provide results that have important, direct consequences for individuals, programs, or institutions involved in the assessment. (Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing, 2014)
Internal assessments - Assessments developed by an individual or organization internal to UF (Fairness and Equity in Assessment Taskforce, 2021).
Norming - The process of constructing norms or the typical performance of a group on the assessment (Frey, 2018).
Rating - A classification of the individual based on scoring the assessment on a set of standards, often based on a rubric (Oxford Lexico, n.d.).
Reliability - Reliability refers to the consistency of the scores across instances of the assessment procedure (Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing, 2014).
Results - The qualitative and/or quantitative information obtained from the assessment process.
Rubric - A scoring guide used to evaluate the quality of constructed responses or products resulting in a rating (University of Texas, Austin Faculty Innovation Center, 2017).
Score - Any specific number resulting from the assessment of an individual, such as raw score, a scale score, an estimate or latent variable, a production count, an absence record, a course grade, or a rating (Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing, 2014).
Summative assessments - The assessment of knowledge and/or skills typically carried out at the completion of a program (Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing, 2014).
Validity - Validity refers to the degree to which evidence and theory support the interpretations of assessment results for the proposed uses of the assessments. Validity is a property of the inferences we make based on the results of an assessment and is determined by the evidence we have that can substantiate the claims we make about what our assessment results tell us (Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing, 2014).
References
American Educational Research Association (AERA), American Psychological Association (APA), & National Council on Measurement in Education (NCME). (2014). Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing. Washington, DC: AERA.
Apple, D. K. & Baehr, M. (2003). Assessment Methodology. Faculty Development Series, Pacific Crest. https://www.webpages.uidaho.edu/ele/scholars/practices/Assessment/Resources/Assessment_Methodology.pdf
Cumming, T., and Miller, M. D. (2017). Enhancing Assessment in Higher Education: Putting Psychometrics to Work. Stylus.
Fuchs, K. (June 18, 2020). Another step toward positive change against racism. https://statements.ufl.edu/statements/2020/june/another-step-toward-positive-change-against-racism.html
Frey, B. (2018). The SAGE encyclopedia of educational research, measurement, and evaluation (Vols. 1-4). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, Inc. doi: 10.4135/9781506326139
Huggins-Manley, A. C.; Miller, M. D; Mutahi, T. (2021). Definition of fairness and equity in assessment at the University of Florida. https://assessment.aa.ufl.edu/fairness-and-equity-in-assessment-task-force/
Montenegro, E., and Jankowski, N. A. (2017). Equity and Assessment: Moving Towards Culturally Responsive Assessment (Occasional Paper No. 29). Urbana, IL: University of Illinois and Indiana University, National Institute for Learning Outcomes Assessment (NILOA).
National Cooperative Education Statistics System (2016). Forum guide to collecting and using disaggregated data on racial/ethnic subgroups. https://nces.ed.gov/pubs2017/NFES2017017.pdf
Oxford Lexico English Dictionary. (n.d.). Definition of Rating. https://www.lexico.com/en/definition/rating?locale=en
Sacred Heart University. (n.d.). Cultural humility vs. cultural competence: A lifelong journey. https://onlineprograms.sacredheart.edu/resources/article/cultural-humility-cultural-competence/
Solano-Flores, G. (2019, June 7). Examining cultural responsiveness in large-scale assessment: The matrix of evidence for validity argumentation. Frontiers in Education. https://doi.org/10.3389/feduc.2019.00043
Tervalon, M., & Murray-Garcia, J. (1998). Cultural humility versus cultural competence: A critical distinction in defining physician training outcomes in multicultural education. Journal of Health Care for the Poor and Underserved, 9(2), 117-125. https://doi.org/10.1353/hpu.2010.0233
University of Florida (April 1, 2016). 7.003 Academic Personnel Employment Plan: Academic Appointments, Types of Appointments, Appointment Status Modifiers, Academic-Administrative Classification Titles, and Faculty Award Titles. https://regulations.ufl.edu/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/7003.2016final4-8-16.pdf
University of Florida. (n.d.). Disability Resource Center. https://disability.ufl.edu/students/accommodations/
University of Florida Fairness and Equity in Assessment Task Force (2021). Glossary. https://assessment.aa.ufl.edu/fairness-and-equity-in-assessment-task-force/glossary/
University of Florida (2022). Mission statement. https://catalog.ufl.edu/UGRD/administration/#missionstatementtext
University of Texas, Austin Faculty Innovation Center (2017). Definition of rubric. https://facultyinnovate.utexas.edu/sites/default/files/build-rubric.pdf#:~:text=rubric%20is%20a%20scoring%20guide%20used%20to%20evaluate,performance%20criteria%3B%202%29%20rating%20scale%3B%20and%203%29%20indicators