Curricular alignment and integration
An important aspect of student assessment is to create assessment tasks that are tightly aligned to the curriculum. When this occurs, teachers are teaching things that will be assessed and the assessments are created in a way that students are tested on important and relevant information. All assessment tasks are verified as information that is taught in the curriculum. This does not mean that teachers should teach to the questions of the test, but rather to the objectives of the test - which closely match the objectives of the curriculum.

One method used to keep an appropriate curricular alignment is the heavy reliance on instructors in the field to generate and validate assessment items. In this way the Networking Academy program relies heavily on a strong community of partnering instructors.

Frequent and varied assessment opportunities
In order to provide students, instructors, and administrators, frequent opportunities for self-monitoring and feedback, the ideal assessment system provides frequent and varied opportunities for assessment. This is addressed in the Networking Academy program by the recent addition of capability for pre-test, practice, and post-test (or summative) tests. As more assessment items become available, new versions of the curriculum will be written with multiple versions of these multiple types of tests. This allows numerous opportunities for feedback. For many tests, such as practice tests, instructors are given many options regarding the timing, length, presentation, and level of feedback the students may see on these exams. For other exams in which standardized use is important, the available options may be more restrictive.

In addition to formal testing with scoring and gradebooks, students can also receive feedback on their skill and knowledge acquisition through chapter quizzes embedded in the curriculum as well as hands-on skill-focused exams given by instructors.

Immediate and detailed feedback
Because the Networking Academy tests are computer generated and scored, they provide instant feedback to students. No one has to wait for instructors or outside agencies to score and return the tests -- results are available immediately after taking the test. For all tests, students are given overall numeric results immediately, and teachers can see a detailed report listing the answer each student gave for each question through an interactive gradebook. In some cases (e.g. practice exams) instructors may let students see the test items, and review them in class.

In some curricula, students may also receive reports that characterize their performance on the test in terms of different levels of proficiency such as Novice, Partially Proficient, Proficient, or Advanced. These are called Proficiency Reports. The reports allow students to translate the numerical value of the percent correct into some meaning regarding the curriculum. In addition it supports the use of assessment data for program evaluation insofar as it allows the documentation of how many students moved from Novice to other categories during the course.

In some versions of curricula, students can also be allowed to obtain a report that lists all the curricular areas associated with test questions to which the student gave a wrong answer. This system is called "Personalized Feedback". The Personalized Feedback report provides a single source of content links that helps the student quickly navigate through the curriculum for test review or further study. Because these reports include direct links to an on-line version of the curriculum, the Global Learning Network infrastructure automatically determines, and links to, the most efficient source location on the network to give students such personalized linking to the curriculum.

Use of rich media for assessment presentation
Because the Academy assessment system uses computer networks for delivery, the assessment items used can be constructed from highly graphical and highly interactive media. Item formats used throughout the assessment system include drag-and-drop items, point and click, fill in the blank (with a wide variety of scoring procedures), standard versions of multiple choice items with graphics and animations, as well as complex simulation of computer tasks. In each case, the student's interaction with the assessment items is followed by scoring of the item and the inclusion of that result in the student and instructor gradebook.

Starting in the summer of 2002, these rich media items will also be viewable in the instructor gradebook along with a brief description of the scoring rules used. In this way, the Networking Academy program can take advantage of the rich media presentation of new media, while supporting the need for detailed result reporting.

Use of complex statistical models to monitor and maintain the assessment system
The last 30 years has included rapid growth in the use of complex statistical models to understand and improve student assessment. Unfortunately, these models are primarily used for the construction of summative high-stakes tests used for program accountability, rather than for immediate feedback to students and instructors. However, the Cisco Networking Academy Program employs the use of large databases and statistical models to monitor and maintain tests that instructors use in the classroom. In this way, the program is a leader in applying best practices in test design and maintenance to help students and teachers in the classroom.