Summative assessment
Summative assessment measures what a student has learned at the end of a unit, term, or course, and produces a grade or a pass/fail decision.
End-of-term exams, final essays, and certification tests are summative: their purpose is to judge, record, and report attainment rather than to shape the next lesson. Because the stakes are higher, summative tasks carry a heavier burden of fairness, reliability, and validity.
Summative and formative are roles a task plays, not fixed categories. The same quiz can be formative in week three and summative in week ten; what changes is whether the result guides learning or records it.
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