Performance-based assessment is unquestionably superior to the instrumental rationality of high-stakes standardized testing and the audit culture that testing regimes inspire. It is more likely to engender opportunities to witness the un-measureable: vision, imagination, and compassion. Performance assessments must be culturally responsive in order to truly serve the needs of students from all backgrounds. It must minimize the distance between learning and everyday life--a gap so often dismissed in schooling. It must be critical in stimulating engaged learning, and it must be critical in provoking social agency. If performance-based assessment is going to be of any value, it must be situated within a comprehensive process that animates educators to move beyond our own comfort zones and assist us in being more self-reflective, equity minded, and socially engaged.