Rethinking assessment of student learning in statistics courses

Although much attention has been paid to issues around student assessment, for most introductory statistics courses few changes have taken place in the ways students are assessed. The assessment literature describes three foundational elements-cognition, observation, and interpretation-that comprise an "assessment triangle" underlying all assessments. However, most instructors focus primarily on the second component: tasks that are used to produce grades. This article focuses on three sections written by leading statistics educators who describe some innovative and even provocative approaches to rethinking student assessment in statistics classes. © 2011 American Statistical Association.