ABSTRACT
School systems spend nearly the entire year evaluating the performance of students. The powers that be in education are starting to realize the value in performance-based assessment. That is why a new state testing system, the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC), will incorporate a performance aspect to it. The direction of education naturally takes us toward performance-based assessment. An alternative method of evaluating students is “performance assessment,” which appraises students on items such as portfolios, projects, and writing samples. Performance-based assessment gives students these tools to develop their Swiss Army knives. Public speaking is an invaluable skill for any person to have. The ability to problem solve is a skill students will use for the rest of their lives. Problem solving can be used on a much larger scale.
