This Alert reviews the current trends in portfolio assessment and examines the issues that guide its use as a tool for evaluating student learning. Portfolios were introduced initially as a way for artists, graphic designers, and other such professionals to show evidence of their work, illustrating their skill at applying knowledge to practice. With education's increasing focus on performance standards and student-centered classrooms, the portfolio has become more than a repository of work samples. The appeal of portfolio assessment is its response to integrated curriculum. For example, the portfolio contents may include examples, reviews, and other demonstrations of students' vocational skills as well as academic achievements evidenced through multiple types of assessment, e.g., performance, process, and product assessments.
Portfolios offer the additional benefit of involving students in the assessment process.
Portfolio assessment is not teacher driven as is common in conventional assessments. In keeping with the trend toward student-centered classrooms, portfolio assessment is a shared responsibility. It requires the involvement of students, parents, and employers, as well as teachers, in establishing the assessment standards, criteria, and content of the portfolio. It affords students the opportunity to manage and monitor their learning, document their progress and achievements over time, articulate their achievement levels, and, more important, experience success. Portfolio assessment offers teachers a way of motivating students, which is being recognized as a critical function of assessment.