August 5–6, 2025  •  Kellogg Conference Center  •  East Lansing, Michigan 

Register

Register individually, register an entire team (3+ people), or register as an addition to an existing team — click the button below to register:

9.5 SCECH credits available

For early registration, a 10% discount will automatically be applied during checkout through May 31, 2025. 
After that date, registration will remain open at regular pricing.

please note: If registering an entire team, please wait to register an entire team until you have ALL team members' names and emails.

At BBAF 2025, we are placing students at the center of our assessment systems, practices, and policies. Inspiring and innovative trailblazers will explore actions and practices rooted in research and real-life experience to implement and support equitable student-centered assessment systems for all learners.

Join us for the fifth annual Building a Better Assessment Future conference where we will be Blazing a Trail to Student Success! This educator-designed conference aims to inspire and empower educational leaders to engage in and adopt assessment literate practices. Participants will explore ways to lead innovative changes by advancing student-centered assessment and grading approaches, while also leveraging improvement science to sustain our efforts as we blaze a trail to work in service of all students. 

KEYNOTE PRESENTERS:

Implementing meaningful assessment and grading reforms, such as standards-based grading, serves as a powerful catalyst for enhancing student learning and success. However, this change can also be contentious among stakeholders. News and social media often depict contrarians appearing at parent-teacher conferences, and even school board meetings, demanding a return to traditional grading practices. As education leaders initiate and maintain student-centered grading, they must understand common obstacles and apply key strategies to address inevitable opposition effectively. 

In this engaging keynote, Matt Townsley will explore five leadership actions for advancing student-centered grading practices. Whether your school is initiating systemic reforms to assessment and grading or is already well underway, you will benefit from Matt’s practical approach to synthesizing research and sharing real-world examples from schools. Learn more about Matt from his website. 

The science of improvement has one goal: to get better faster. It is one thing to know what to do; it is a different thing to get individuals to adopt or adapt practices that counter what they have always done. The field of assessment has made great strides, and we know how to design and employ assessments that both provide feedback to students and information to educators. Yet, the shift from knowledge to practice requires more than simply telling educators there is a new and better way.  

Improvement science takes the pragmatic question of what works and makes it more specific, by asking what works, for whom, and under what circumstances. The context specificity of improvement allows practitioners to be innovators as they test the merit of different practices for their efficacy. Informed by its own pragmatic assessment, called practical measures, improvement science offers a user-friendly methodology for trying, changing, adopting, adapting, and implementing new practices within the field. By providing educators with a framework to taste and see, improvement empowers while changing practice. Let improvement be part of the strategy to change the way we do assessment; we can blaze the trail to equitable education—one PDSA cycle at a time. Learn more about Brandi from her website.

Over the past two decades, the focus on academic standards has transformed assessment systems, moving us beyond outdated and harmful grading practices. The assessment work in countless schools has been both groundbreaking and exciting! Yet, as we have elevated standards to center stage, we must ask: is there room left for teaching and assessing the transferable skills students need most to thrive in life? 
 
In this session, we will examine the balance between measuring content standards and cultivating transferable skills that lay outside them. Specifically, we will explore the pivotal role of metacognition—how students reflect on and regulate their thinking. To what extent do we explicitly teach and assess metacognitive skills, and what might change if we prioritized them more? We will consider how opening multiple pathways for students to demonstrate their learning can ignite engagement, strengthen self-efficacy, and deepen metacognition. We will explore a common misunderstanding of the terms formative and summative that serves as a barrier to providing multiple pathways. Together, we will envision assessment as more than a tool to prepare students as experts in content—but as a tool to nurture them as experts in learning. Learn more about Lee Ann from her website.

Hotels 

Once you've registered, the confirmation email will include hotel reservation details with a code for our room blocks to reserve at our special discounted rate. 

Parking 

Parking is available on-site in Ramp 4/Lot 66. Individual parking charges are $2.00 per hour and payable using the Spot On App (additional fees may apply) or on-site kiosk. Parking is included for Kellogg Hotel guests.

Registration 

Registration is from 7:30 – 8:15 a.m. in front of Big Ten A Room. Please arrive by 7:30 a.m. to sign in, get a name badge, and enjoy some coffee and light breakfast before the conference begins at 8:30 a.m.

Lunch will be provided both days with an optional hot breakfast available to everyone on Day 2 at 7:15 a.m. 
Coffee and tea will be available throughout the conference in the main room (Big Ten Room A).