High Stakes Assessment In Social Studies

Introduction
Problem of Practice
Social studies classrooms at Williams Middle School, a suburban middle school in the south that contains the International Baccalaureate Middle Year Programme (IBMYP), rely on traditional means of instruction and assessment, including lecture, reading comprehension questions, and multiple choice tests, in order to prepare students for the South Carolina Palmetto Assessment of State Standards (SC PASS), a high stakes assessment completed at the end of the course. Despite high test scores on the SC PASS, students in the Williams Middle School IBMYP display a disinterest in the world history curriculum that is taught in the seventh-grade social studies classroom. Students achieve high scores on assignments and