What does a norm-referenced assessment primarily focus on?

A norm-referenced assessment is designed to compare an individual's performance against that of a group of peers, which is why the focus is on performance comparison to a peer group. This type of assessment measures how a student's performance ranks relative to others, often resulting in a percentile score that indicates how a student performed in comparison to a norm group.

For example, if a student is in the 75th percentile, it means they scored better than 75% of the individuals in the norm group. This helps educators understand where a student stands in relation to their peers and assists in identifying areas where they may need additional support or enrichment.

The other options focus on different aspects of assessment. Individual skills mastery emphasizes personal achievement on specific learning outcomes without peer comparison, curriculum coverage takes into account how much of the instructional content has been addressed, and standard performance targets are about meeting predetermined benchmarks rather than comparing to peers. Thus, while these elements are important in educational assessments, they do not define the core objective of a norm-referenced assessment.