Opinion ID: 805464
Heading Depth: 6
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Reasonable Competence

Text: The trial evidence was sufficient to establish that the generic sub-tests were the product of reasonably competent test design. In Guardians I, we stated that the reasonable competence of an employment examination’s design can be called into doubt if (1) the examination was not created by professional test preparers, or (2) no sample study was performed to ensure that the questions were comprehensible and unambiguous. See 630 F.2d at 96. Here, the trial record shows that the generic sub-tests were written by professional test preparers. Steinberg testified that she relied on the Civil Service Department’s units responsible for drafting cross-occupational test questions to write the generic sub-tests. Paul Kaiser, the Department’s director of testing services who supervised the creation of the Lower Level Fire Promotion test series, detailed the process by which the Department drafts cross-occupational test questions and calibrates them according to specific job responsibilities and the promotion level at issue. Kaiser explained that, in doing so, the Department routinely consults with experts and people in the field at issue. 30 Buffalo offered no evidence that the Civil Service Department conducted a sample study to determine that the generic sub-test questions were comprehensible and unambiguous. But it did submit evidence that, in creating these sub-tests, the Civil Service Department employed cross-occupational questions from previous employment examinations, which had been screened for objections from past test administrators and takers. Whatever the advantages of a prospective sample study, we conclude that the Civil Service Department’s consideration of such feedback to check the quality of crossoccupational questions, in combination with evidence that professional test preparers drafted them, was sufficient to support the district court’s finding that the generic sub-tests were the product of reasonably competent test design.