The initial framework for this study was extremely broad, as was the list of operational assessment programs we might investigate. Fortunately, the members of our advisory committee helped us narrow our focus and select an interesting set of assessment case studies. For this help we are grateful to Charles Hopkins, Oklahoma Department of Education; Harry O'Neil, University of Southern California; Dean Petersen, Glendale Union High School District; Stanley Rabinowitz, WestEd; Catherine B. Smith, Michigan Department of Education; and Jonathan Troper, Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards, and Student Testing, UCLA. We wish to thank the program administrators, teachers, participants, and researchers who responded to our interview questions as part of the case studies of the Career-Technical Assessment Program, the Kentucky Instructional Results Information System, the Laborers-Associated General Contractors environmental training and certification programs, the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards certification program, the Oklahoma Department of Vocational-Technical Education competency-based testing program, and the Vocational/Industrial Clubs of America national competition. In addition, our thanks go to many other staff from testing and assessment projects who helped us gather information in our initial investigations of operational alternative assessments. Finally, credit is due to David Adamson and Jeri O'Donnell for their efforts to improve the clarity of this report and to Judy Wood and Donna White for their help with document preparation.