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For Immediate Release
The SIF Association® and 1EdTech Consortium Further Assessment Interoperability
Washington, DC and Lake Mary, FL, 8 February 2012--- 1EdTech Consortium and the SIF Association are proud to further the partnership established to support the US Department of Education’s Race to the Top Assessment Program as the two consortia collaborate to develop state of the art online assessment capabilities for students across the country.
A groundbreaking meeting held during the SIF Association Annual Meeting brought together leaders in the education and assessment community to establish consensus around an Assessment Interoperability Framework (AIF). “The AIF not only supports the Race to the Top Assessment Consortia, but also focuses on the entire assessment lifecycle,” stated Wayne Ostler, VP Technology Solutions. “Enabling comprehensive interoperability for all forms of assessment proves crucial in strengthening learning in the classroom.”
Dr. Rob Abel, CEO of 1EdTech, explains, “Leveraging existing standards to improve interoperability reduces redundancy, lessens confusion in the marketplace and supports existing implementations. The SIF Association and 1EdTech working together enable interoperable content and data in both formative and summative assessment for districts and states.”
1EdTech GLC and the SIF Association have created a small working group to quickly deliver on agreed upon actions during the next six to nine months. The following activities will occur:
- Define fully the AIF and determine scope and standards recommendations,
- Create and refine use cases,
- Identify collaborative efforts, develop a strategy and identify teams to complete the work,
- Identify changes to existing standards to support the AIF and provide, recommendations to the existing working groups of 1EdTech and the SIF Association,
- Develop new standards, as applicable, to support the AIF,
- Create a set of documentation that describes how a solution should be implemented and
- Develop a working prototype that demonstrations key interoperable components
“The SIF Association and 1EdTech working together to solve real interoperability challenges for assessment is paramount. Enabling better solutions for assessment content and data for the education community will occur quickly with the broad collaboration between the SIF Association, 1EdTech and the assessment community at large,” explains Dr. Larry Fruth II, Executive Director/CEO of the SIF Association. “We are at a crucial time in assessment, education and interoperability.”
1EdTech and the SIF Association will provide further information regarding the Assessment Interoperability Framework in the coming months as the work progresses.
About the SIF Association
The SIF Association is a unique, non-profit collaboration composed of over 3,200 schools, districts, states, US and International Ministries of Education, software vendors and consultants who collectively define the rules and regulations for educational software data interoperability. The SIF Implementation Specification enables diverse applications to interact and share data efficiently, reliably, and securely regardless of the platform hosting those applications. The SIF Association has united these education technology end users and providers in an unprecedented effort to give teachers more time to do what they do best: teach. For further information, visit http://www.sifassociation.org.
About 1EdTech Consortium
1EdTech Learning is a nonprofit member organization that strives to enable the growth and impact of learning technology in higher education, K-12, and corporate education worldwide. 1EdTech GLC members are leading corporations, higher education institutions, school districts and government organizations worldwide that are enabling the future of education by collaborating on interoperability standards and major adoption projects for the digital support of education and learning. 1EdTech GLC also sponsors Learning Impact: a global awards program and conference that recognizes the impact of innovative technology on educational access, affordability, and quality. For more information visit www.imsglobal.org.
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