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Fairness and validity are fundamental qualities of educational assessment and occupational testing.

Fariness might be regarded as a broad concept, with broad philosophical and sociological implications outside the measurement concerns.

It has been formally defined in some measurement circles as equitable treatment of all test-takers during the testing process, absence of measurement bias, equitable access to the constructs being measured, and justifiable validity of test score interpretation for the intended purpose(s)

Fairness in testing is of increasing concern in the area of measurement.

Read Fairness in educational assessment

See ETS Quality and Fariness in Testing

 

APA Code of Fair Testing Practices in Education

CLEAR Principles of Fairness for Credentialing Boards

Please read

 Xi, X. (2010). How do we go about investigating test fairness? Language Testing, 27 (2), 147–170.

Artice is here-How do we go about investigating test fairness

About the Author- Xiamong XI-A conversation with-ETS

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Validity - Meanings

Eva Baker's Take on Validity and its Evolving Meanings

See The Chimera of Validity

Baker, E. L. (2013). The chimera of validity. Teachers College Record, 115(9), 1-26.

Also Read-





Stephen Sireci-PowerPoint on Packing and Unpacking Sources of Validity

New Understandings

Kane, M. T. (2013). Validating the interpretations and uses of test scores. Journal of Educational Measurement, 50(1), 1-73.

 

Article is here-Validating the Interpretations and Uses of Test Scores by Michael Kane-ETS

 

Abstract

Validation requires two kinds of arguments, an interpretive argument and a validity argument. The interpretive argument specifies the proposed interpretation and use of test scores in terms of a sequence of inferences and assumptions leading from observed test performances to claims about attributes of the test taker, and typically, to decisions about the test taker. The validity argument validates the proposed interpretation and use by evaluating the plausibility of the inferences and assumptions in the interpretive argument. That is, in validating a proposed interpretation or use, we first lay out the claims being made, and then we evaluate these claims. An evaluation of a test use necessarily requires an evaluation of the consequences of the use. If the consequences are, on the whole, positive, the use is justified. If the consequences are judged to be more negative than positive, the use is unjustified. Evaluating the consequences of a decision rule tends to be difficult and potentially contentious, but if we want to evaluate test uses, it is necessary. Fairness plays a major role in the evaluation of both the interpretations and uses of test scores. In the context of interpretations, fairness can be defined in terms of the consistency of score meanings and implications (e.g., predictions of various criteria) across groups. For test uses, fairness can be defined in terms of the appropriateness of the decisions based on test scores, and therefore depends mainly on the consequences of these decisions.

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You should explore the treatment of validity and fariness in the two latest versions of the testing standards and handbook

NCME

APA

NCME Open Forum on the Revision - 2011 (includes video)

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Application

Apply your enhanced understandings of fairness and validity to the  Secondary School Entrance Examinations--

See

De Lisle, J. (2012). Secondary school entrance examinations in the Caribbean: Legacy, policy, and evidence within an era of seamless education. Caribbean Curriculum, 19, 109-143.

 

Article is here

 

De Lisle, J., Smith, P., Keller, C., & Jules, V. (2012). Differential outcomes in high-stakes eleven plus testing: the role of gender, geography, and assessment design in Trinidad and Tobago. Assessment in Education: Principles, Policy & Practice, 19(1), 45-64.

UWI students have access to this. If not email me.

 

There are several new textbooks and seminars on validity

 

See ETS