The idea of an indicator of student achievement at the national level first emerged in 1963 when the Commissioner of Education decided to collect information on the state of the nation's schools. By 1969 NAEP was designed as a voluntary, cooperative program to answer questions such as: Are students learning more today than they did in the past? Is greater progress being made in some areas than others?

In the 1980's NAEP was reviewed and revised to ensure that it reflected changes in instructional practices, such as greater use of open-ended responses.

In 1988, the Augustus F. Hawkins-Robert T. Stafford Elementary and Secondary School Improvements Amendments further expanded the NAEP program and authorized state assessments on a trial basis. Since then, the state assessment component of NAEP has been widely supported by the states and jurisdictions. More than 40 states, territories, and the District of Columbia have participated in each bi-annual cycle.

The amendments also established the National Assessment Governing Board (NAGB), which sets policy for the National Assessment of Educational Progress.

Under these amendments, NAEP continued to increase the emphasis on constructed response rather than multiple choice items; the use of more ancillary materials, such as calculators and other tools; and the inclusion of special studies with selected subsets of students.

The Improving America's Schools Act of 1994 introduced another round of design changes to expand the data that NAEP gathers. Most notably, the Act allows state assessments as a regular feature of NAEP. In 1996, NAEP is collecting information on special subsamples, and encourages authentic assessments that measure student knowledge and understanding with a variety of hands-on performance tasks, such as science kits and mathematical tools.