NAPLAN could be made obsolete as it becomes more outdated, according to the secretary of the NSW Department of Education Mark Scott. 

The recent Gonski report has sparked reforms in the Australian education system, including the support for more sophisticated assessment methods to replace NAPLAN. 

“We all know that these smaller tests, these regular ongoing assessments that take place by teachers in classrooms to monitor progress, that this is the way that good assessment happened,” Mr Scott said. “My feeling is that when we prioritise and develop these tools and roll them out, then NAPLAN will look a little tired, a little simple, a little dated, and so we need to get on with the new reform process.”

“I think it will become obsolete because the kinds of information that the new assessment schemes will give us will be richer and deeper and more meaningful for teachers, for parents and for education systems,” he added. 

Gonski-style diagnostic assessments, which would include frequent testing and feedback to and from students to better track student’s goals, may be prioritised to make NAPLAN irrelevant. 

NSW Education Minister Rob Stokes has also recently criticised NAPLAN and said that the test was being used dishonestly as a school rating system. He said the assessment was not being used to track the student’s process, but only to rate students. 

“You now have an industry that’s grown up alongside it, where teachers are being encouraged to teach to the test rather than the curriculum,” Mr Stokes said.