Parent-based evidence of formative, summative assessment alignment in outcome-based education: a descriptive study from Pakistan

Purpose While outcome-based education (OBE) principles are widely cited in reform discourse, evidence on how assessment practices align with intended cognitive outcomes at the school level remains limited in Pakistan and similar examination-driven contexts. Existing work often relies on achievement scores or policy analysis, with fewer studies using stakeholder perception data to interrogate alignment between teaching, assessment and learning outputs. This study addresses this gap by analyzing parent-based School Performance Questionnaire evidence as proxy indicators of cognitive outcome support and assessment alignment within an OBE lens. Design/methodology/approach A quantitative, cross-sectional descriptive survey design was employed to examine parents' perceptions of teaching, assessment and cognitive learning outputs in an OBE-oriented school context. In the present study, parental ratings are treated as proxy indicators of perceived alignment between instructional and assessment practices and intended cognitive outcomes. This study is intentionally diagnostic rather than explanatory, aiming to identify systemic alignment patterns between teaching, assessment and learning outputs rather than to establish causal relationships. Findings The analysis focuses on indicators related to instructional processes, assessment practices and cognitive learning outputs, interpreted descriptively within an OBE orientation. In line with reporting conventions for survey-based studies, findings are presented using percentage distributions and comparative visual representations. While references to relevant empirical literature are included to contextualize patterns, theoretical interpretation is reserved for the Discussion section (Creswell and Creswell, 2023). Interpretive claims regarding alignment are therefore advanced in the Discussion section rather than inferred directly from descriptive findings. Accordingly, references to cognitive levels in the findings reflect perceived instructional and assessment emphases, not verified cognitive performance at specific taxonomy levels. Research limitations/implications This study's reliance on aggregated survey data limited the depth of analysis possible. Individual-level data would enable examination of relationships between variables and identification of subgroups experiencing different patterns. The cross-sectional design captures perceptions at one point but cannot track change or establish causality. Parent perceptions, while valuable, represent indirect indicators of learning processes rather than direct measures of student cognition. The single-school focus, while appropriate for this study's purpose, limits generalizability. Frontier Children's Academy operates in a specific context urban, private, middle-class, that differs from rural schools, government schools or schools serving different socioeconomic populations. The patterns we identified may look quite different in other settings. The value of the case lies not in institutional representativeness but in its capacity to illuminate system-level tensions between summative assessment dominance and formative learning support. Practical implications By empirically documenting this assessment asymmetry using parent-based evidence, the study extends constructive alignment theory into a stakeholder-informed school evaluation context. This study contributes to OBE scholarship in several ways. Methodologically, it demonstrates how systematically collected parent perceptions can illuminate alignment issues that internal school data might miss. Parents observe learning behaviors homework independence, reliance on external support, responses to feedback that reveal whether school practices translate into intended outcomes. Theoretically, the study applies constructive alignment and Bloom's taxonomy to a practical school setting, showing how these frameworks can diagnose specific implementation gaps rather than simply affirm general principles. The assessment asymmetry we identified strong summative structures alongside weaker formative routines represents a common pattern in examination-oriented contexts that deserves more explicit research attention. Originality/value The current study is based on original data sourced from parents of students at Frontier Children Academy and other daughter schools in Peshawar, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.