ABSTRACT
Inclusion and assessment are complicated and complex concepts that present challenges for educationalists and for systems of education. In 2015, the annual Global Monitoring Report, which tracks the progress towards education for all the world's children, noted that: ambitious approaches to inclusion are commonly grounded in a rights-based approach that aims to empower learners, celebrate diversity and combat discrimination. Yet governments throughout the world have agreed to the goal while simultaneously embracing 'standards-based reforms' to improve national competitiveness and efficiency of their school systems. When summative assessment information is used in this way, it can distort the opportunity to learning and diminish the potential of assessment to support forms of teaching that enhance learning. Alternatively, formative assessment practices and the information they generate differ to the summative assessment data obtained by the use of standardised tests. The complex world of inclusive education requires at least two kinds of data be collected: data about students and data about inclusive education systems.
