Benchmark Round One

Our first round of benchmark assessments has concluded, and they have been a resounding success. Thousands of benchmarks were given, and this will give all of the participating schools great comparison data.

The two biggest problems that were encountered involved turning off the pop-up blockers and making sure that classes were created properly. The pop-up problem is pretty simple, and the class creation problem requires that ELA or Math at the appropriate grade level must be in the course list on your class details. We found our way through these problems. A couple of other problems that arose involved students not being enrolled in the class and teachers not realizing that a test code must be entered to take the assessment.

The real reason for the benchmark assessments is to get a look at how your school, building and classroom are doing in some of the essential skills which are tested in the Iowa Core Curriculum. The data raises a lot of questions, and that is a valuable part of the educational discussions that must take place in schools. This one small piece of data may help you and your school make decisions not only applying to your classroom but to district goals as well. We hope the classroom teachers will validate individual classroom results with further formative assessments. Larger samplings of questions that zero in on single skills will help teachers make even further instructional decisions.

The next round of reading benchmarks starts on October 5th, and the next math benchmark assessment will begin on January 4th.

If you have further questions about the benchmark assessments, you can look at the benchmark information at our website, www.skillsiowa.org or you can contact your project leader.