Arkansas education leaders have selected a company for developing a state testing system for grades three through 10 that will replace the ACT Aspire in the 2023-24 school year.
Cambium Assessment Incorporated, or CAI, was selected from among six companies that responded to a request for proposals to help in developing the state-required tests in literacy, math and science.
Stacy Smith, a deputy commissioner for the Arkansas Division of Elementary and Secondary Education, and Hope Worsham, state director for Elementary and Secondary Education Emergency Relief, announced the Cambium choice.
The selection now must go to the Arkansas Legislative Council for review and possible final approval of what is expected to be a seven-year contract valued at about $75 million.
The online Aspire tests are being discontinued after the 2022 and 2023 spring testing seasons by the ACT, which produces the college entrance exam.
Over the past several months, Worsham led an effort to survey educators and parents about desired features in a new testing program. That led to issuing a request for proposals and a review of the responses.
"Cambium is the vendor, but this is really going to be Arkansas having a say in their investment and customization for us," Smith said. "The vendor has a lot of assessment questions that are aligned [to Arkansas academic content standards] but we really made it clear in the RFP -- because we really listened to teachers who said they wanted a say and 'we want to make sure the alignment pieces are there.'"
Worsham said she anticipates teacher groups and others can begin working on the test development as soon as this spring and summer in anticipation of the 2024 tests.
"The plan is to have Arkansas teachers review every item inside the Cambium [question] bank to make sure that they do align with the Arkansas state standards," Worsham said.
"If any item does not align, it will not be used," she said. "Where we see places where there are not questions that align to the Arkansas state standards, then our teachers will write items and review those items to fill those holes."
For example, Worsham said, there is a genre of writing that is in the Arkansas standards that Cambium does not have questions to cover in its bank. As a result, there will be an item-writing workshop of Arkansas teachers on that topic as soon as this summer.
"We are excited about the teacher input and the professional development opportunities for our teachers," she said.
The testing system will also provide teachers the opportunities to create tests throughout the year on certain skills using questions from the question bank. There is opportunity for schools and districts to similarly create regularly scheduled interim assessments to monitor student skills efore the end-of-the-school year test.
The system will score the formative and interim tests for the teachers.
On the high school level, the ninth-grade and 10th-grade tests will not be subject specific -- such as a specific test for algebra. That was a topic of debate, Worsham said.
The online testing program will include features that make it possible to compare Arkansas student achievement to achievement nationally, Worsham said in response to questions.
The Arkansas Board of Education will set the minimum achievement scores for proficiency in the fall of 2024 -- after the tests have been given to students earlier in the spring.
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