Assessment and Accountability Update - January 5, 2012

1/5/2012 8:00:00 AM

The Assessment & Accountability Update for January 5, 2012 is now available.

You can access this and past issues of the Assessment & Accountability Update on the ODE website.

In This Issue:

2011-12 Winter Writing Test Window Opens
2011-12 ELPA Test Window Opens Next Week
Grade 11 Restriction for Writing Assessment to Continue through 2012-13
Best Practices Guide for Administering OAKS
Revising an OAKS Writing assessment for use as an Essential Skills local performance assessment (work sample)
iPAD/Mobile Tablet Use on Oregon Assessment of Knowledge and Skills (OAKS) is Prohibited for Students

2011-12 Winter Writing Test Window Opens

The Winter Writing test window opens for Grade 11 students only on Wednesday, January 11, 2012. The online writing test window lasts from January 11 – March 16. The paper-based writing test window lasts from January 11 – February 23. Districts administering the winter paper-based writing test received their shipment of secure materials between January 2 – January 4. This shipment included both English and Spanish tests. Districts that ordered Braille Writing tests will receive a separate shipment including the Braille version of the test. Districts must ensure that all secure test materials are stored in a secure area in accordance with Part IV – Test Security of the 2011-12 Test Administration Manual. Remember to keep all boxes in which your shipment arrives for use in returning completed Writing tests for scoring.

Districts will receive a return kit in a separate shipment by Thursday, February 9, 2012. This return kit will include return mailing labels, a return checklist, and an overage certification form. Districts submitting non-precoded “overage” booklets for scoring must sign this form and include it with their shipment certifying that overage booklets were only used to test eligible Grade 11 students who had not previously taken and passed the High School Writing test.

Winter Writing is the first of two test windows for eligible Grade 11 students to take the state writing assessment. The Spring Writing test window opens Wednesday, April 11, 2012. Please note that students may only take the test once and must choose to take the assessment either in the paper or online format during ONE of the two windows. For additional information about administering the Writing assessment, please refer to Appendix G of the 2011-12 Test Administration Manual (http://www.ode.state.or.us/wma/teachlearn/testing/admin/2011-12_appendix-g.pdf PDF

2011-12 ELPA Test Window Opens Next Week

The English Language Proficiency Assessment (ELPA) window opens on Wednesday, January 11, 2012. This state assessment is required each year for all students eligible to receive NCLB Title III services. For additional information about the ELPA, please refer to Appendix H of the 2011-12 Test Administration Manual (http://www.ode.state.or.us/wma/teachlearn/testing/admin/2011-12_appendix-h.pdf PDF

).

In anticipation of the opening of the 2011-12 ELPA Window, ODE has the following reminders (from the Test Administration Manual and the ELPA Users Guide):

For 2011-12, the ELPA is a single assessment made up of two segments. The first segment of the ELPA will include the Reading, Writing and Listening items. At the end of the first segment, students are given the opportunity to review their answers prior to finalizing them. Next, there is a second segment for the speaking items. A separate Test Administrator (TA) approval is required for the speaking segment, so that the segments can be separated as the teacher or school prefers. Some districts will separate local test windows for the two segments, both for scheduling purposes and to prevent potential student fatigue.

For each qualifying ELL, the LEP flag must be set to “yes” in the Test Information Distribution Engine (TIDE) in order for an ELPA opportunity to be presented to the student. Students will not be able to access the ELPA until this step has been done by the district.

As districts and schools prepare to administer the ELPA, computers being used for the ELPA need to be checked by doing the ELPA Practice Test prior to operational administration:

to learn what particular updates might be required (For example, JAVA or the headset drivers), and
to ensure that the internal volume on the computers are reviewed and modified as needed.

Prior to logging a student onto an ELPA assessment, it is recommended that the internal volume on the computer is reviewed and modified as needed. For Windows systems, an internal low- to mid-volume setting for the ELPA is recommended. TA’s should preview these settings prior to student arrival to ensure that the settings are at an acceptable level.

For the ELPA speaking segment, each student must have a valid recording. Once again this year, the recording feature will be sensitive and may produce an error message even when a valid recording was registered. If a student gets an error message indicating that their speaking response may not have registered, the student should play back their recording. If the student can hear the recording, then the recording is valid and does not need to be re-recorded. In this case, the student should accept the response and move to their next item. If the student cannot clearly hear the recording, then the student should re-record the response after checking the volume and placement of the microphone. Once the student is satisfied with the recording, the student should accept the response and move to their next item.

The data delivery table outlines the receipt of student score reports based upon the testing dates. Students must have completed and submitted both segments of the ELPA in order to receive a score in a particular batch.

Batch	Testing Dates	Scoring Window (approximate)	Data Extract (from Hand Scoring to Quality Assurance)	Data Delivery to ODE	Data Delivery to Districts
1	1/11 – 1/31	2/2 – 2/17	2/22	3/5	3/15*
2	2/1 – 2/29	3/5 – 3/16	3/21	3/30	4/13
3	3/1 – 3/31	4/4 – 4/17	4/20	5/2	5/15
4	4/1 – 5/10	5/2 – 5/18	5/23	6/4	6/15
*pending validation of calibrations

As with the other OAKS assessments, a student must complete and submit an ELPA test within 45 days of starting that test, otherwise the test opportunity will expire.

A participation reminder about the ELPA: as opposed to the other OAKS assessments, students must complete 100% of the items administered in both segments to count for participation. Please see the Test Administration Manual, Appendix H, for details concerning the ELPA administration for students on IEPs.

Grade 11 Restriction for Writing Assessment to Continue through 2012-13

Due to budgetary restrictions, during its 2011 Session, the Oregon State Legislature determined that the Writing Performance Assessment will only be available for students enrolled in Grade 11 who have not already met or exceeded the state achievement standard on the Writing assessment. As described in ODE Numbered Memorandum # 001-2011-12 (http://www.ode.state.or.us/news/announcements/announcement.aspx?ID=7543&TypeID=4), this restriction went into effect starting in 2011-12.

Absent additional action by the Legislature, this restriction will remain in effect through 2012-13. Given that the Writing Essential Skills graduation requirement first goes into effect for the 2009-10 9th grade cohort, many of whom are anticipated to graduate in 2012-13, districts should begin planning to provide additional assessment options for those students who do not pass the Writing assessment this year as 11th graders. A full list of approved Writing Essential Skills assessment options is included in Appendix K of the 2011-12 Test Administration Manual (http://www.ode.state.or.us/wma/teachlearn/testing/admin/2011-12_appendix-k.pdf PDF

Best Practices Guide for Administering OAKS

On December 1, 2011 ODE presented the draft Best Practices Guide to the State Board of Education for the Board’s consideration. The updated Best Practices Guide will be presented to the Board for formal adoption on January 19, 2012. In response to stakeholder feedback, ODE has updated the draft Best Practices Guide to guide districts in how to meet the challenge of providing for students who are not engaged in re-testing.

The updated draft Best Practices Guide and anticipated revision to Part VI of the Test Administration Manual are posted at http://www.ode.state.or.us/go/tam. In anticipation of adoption by the State Board of Education on Thursday, January 19, 2012, ODE has also posted two sample parent letters to assist districts with their communication strategy.

Revising an OAKS Writing assessment for use as an Essential Skills local performance assessment (work sample)

ODE has recently received several questions from the field regarding the potential for high school students who did not meet the standard on an OAKS Writing assessment to revise their test for use as one of the three required writing work samples to demonstrate proficiency in the Essential Skill of Writing. ODE has determined that allowing students to revise their non-meeting OAKS Writing assessment as a work sample is permissible so long as the following conditions are met:

Districts must adhere to all test security requirements and protocol, as described in Part IV of the Test Administration Manual (TAM):

http://www.ode.state.or.us/wma/teachlearn/testing/admin/2011-12-tam.pdf

Districts are prohibited from maintaining copies of the secure writing prompts for any purpose, as described in Appendix G of the TAM (page G-11):

http://www.ode.state.or.us/wma/teachlearn/testing/admin/2011-12_appendix-g.pdf

Districts that offer revision opportunities to OAKS Writing assessment student responses as work samples must follow all revision guidelines as described in Appendix M of the TAM (page M-8, link below). Teachers may only provide feedback via the official state scoring guide and/or the optional feedback form. Except for the use of these forms, no teacher feedback is permitted for work samples applied toward the Essential Skills graduation requirement. Teachers may not discuss the students’ work with them, make any written or oral comments, or point out any specific errors or places in the work sample that need attention. Absolutely no coaching or prompting is allowed, since it’s critical that the work sample be representative of independent student work.

http://www.ode.state.or.us/wma/teachlearn/testing/admin/2011-12_appendix-m.pdf

OAKS Writing assessments that are revised as work samples may only count for one of the three required writing samples used as evidence to meet the Essential Skills graduation requirements.

OAKS Writing assessments that are revised as work samples may not be used to meet the annual local performance assessment (“opportunity-to-learn”) requirement.

Questions should be directed to Derek Brown (derek.brown@state.or.us eMail

) at 503-947-5841.

iPAD/Mobile Tablet Use on Oregon Assessment of Knowledge and Skills (OAKS) is Prohibited for Students

Stakeholders – including IT Managers, the Assessment Advisory Committee, and the ELPA Content Panel -- provided feedback in regard to benefits and risks associated with student use of mobile devices for taking summative assessments like OAKS Online or ELPA. At this time, there is no evidence that taking OAKS Online on an iPAD/Mobile Tablet would be an equivalent experience as on a desktop or laptop computer. With the spectrum of concerns regarding the validity and security of a summative assessment delivered on a mobile tablet, ODE’s Office of Assessment and Information Systems has decided that the use of iPAD/Mobile Tablets during OAKS Online or ELPA is prohibited for students at this time. Potential academic dishonesty issues, equity and ergonomic (scrolling time) issues were taken into account before the final decision was made.

The use of mobile tablets by Test Administrators is allowed in order to proctor the OAKS Online or ELPA currently.

For further information, a brief can be located at http://www.ode.state.or.us/search/page/?id=3521.

State Board Adopts Revised Report Card Distribution Rules

During the last legislative session the Oregon legislature amended ORS 329.105 relating to school and district report cards. These amendments included a revision in the school and district report card distribution requirements. In response, the State Board of Education adopted at its December meeting a change to OAR 581-022-1060 that provides more options for school and district report card distribution. The new distribution rules are as follows.

Out of District Test Scores Available January 6 in the Assessment Warehouse Extract Application

An update of the Assessment Warehouse Extract application will allow users to download all historical test data for a student that they have claimed, regardless of where the test was taken. The update will take place January 5, with the data becoming viewable January 6. Access to the historical data is granted to the resident and the attending institution listed on the test record, the current SSID record or any past Cumulative ADM record. Please note there is a one day lag between claiming the student(s) in the SSID System or the current Cumulative ADM collection and the historical assessment data being available. This reporting file format can be found at: https://district.ode.state.or.us/wma/apps/cc/asmtreportingfileformat.xls Excel Spreadsheet

.

If you have questions or need assistance with your student data, please contact your Regional Assessment Support Partner PDF

Fall Membership Previews and Final Report

Week of January 2nd: Second Preview sent to districts for review.
Week of January 16th: Third Preview sent to districts for review.
Week of January 30th: Final Preview sent to districts.
February 8: Fall Membership Press Release.

Note that all changes must be made in first period Cumulative ADM before January 30 in order to be reflected in the Final Preview and Final Fall Membership Report.

If you have questions or need assistance with your student data, please contact your Regional Collections Support Partner PDF

Second Period Cumulative ADM

The second period Cumulative ADM data collection is currently open and will close January 13, 2012. The collection will remain closed January 16-20, 2012 to allow ODE to review the submitted data. The collection will be reopened again to all districts January 23 – February 1, 2012 for district review of the audit report and to make corrections as needed. The collection period is from July 1, 2011 through December 30, 2011.

If you have questions or need assistance with your student data, please contact your Regional Collections Support Partner PDF

Cohort Graduation Reports

The final posting of Cohort Graduation Reports and NCES Dropouts and Graduation Reports has been scheduled for January 12. These refreshed reports should reflect all approved updates, resolved merged student issues, and updated Cumulative ADM records.

Our ODE Communications Office has scheduled the public release of Cohort Graduation and NCES Dropout Reports for March 13.

If you have questions or need assistance with your student data, please contact your Regional Collections Support Partner PDF

OAKS Online Tests Administered To Date

As of December 16, 2011 the following number of tests have been started and reported by subject:

	Math	Reading	Science	Social Sciences	Total
Started	55,259	90,553	19,655	944	166,411
Reported	53,326	85,836	19,260	911	159,333

- end -