Enacting a Justice-Oriented System of Assessment

H-PEA Online Post-Conference Workshop
Sept. 20, 2024 8:30-10:00 am

Presenter: Jennifer Randall 
Dunn Family Chair of Psychometrics and Test Development
President of the Center for Measurement Justice University of Michigan

Description: A justice-oriented approach to assessment design and development: (a) acknowledges the historical structures of oppression (such as racism, sexism, and colonialism) deeply embedded within our current assessment processes; (b) actively seeks to understand their ongoing consequences on marginalized populations; and (c) intentionally seeks to disrupt these negative processes and outcomes by centering the needs of these populations. Justice-oriented approaches to assessment do not seek to serve the “greater good” of the many and powerful to the exclusion of the few and minoritized, but rather assertively prioritizes the most marginalized populations.

A commitment to justice goes further than a commitment to equity, as equity-driven approaches to assessment seek merely to provide scaffolds that compensate for historical and contemporary barriers. Justice-oriented approaches, on the other hand, actively seek to remove those barriers and also make amends for the damage those barriers have already created.

In this workshop we will discuss what assessment justice looks like in action (and what it does not) and begin brainstorming behaviors and procedures that each person can begin to enact in their daily practices immediately to move us closer to a justice-oriented system of assessment.