Testing in transition: From CSAP to TCAP and beyond

The Colorado Student Assessment Program, the state’s annual tests for more than a decade, was administered to students in grades 3 – 10 for the last time in spring 2011. CSAP will be replaced by the TCAP – the Transitional Colorado Assessment Program – in spring 2012.

TCAP will test content common to both Colorado’s old Model Content Standards and its newly adopted Colorado Academic Standards. It will assess the same subjects and grades as the CSAP.

In spring 2013, students will again take the TCAP plus they’ll see some pilot items from the new – as yet unnamed – state exams to be rolled out in spring 2014.

State Board of Education members unanimously adopted attributes of the new state exams in December 2010, including:

• Adding tests for students in preschool through grade 2 to check their readiness
• Adding a social studies exam to be given once in elementary school, once in middle school and once in high school
• Adding interim exams in every grade to check progress, though results will not be used for accountability

Why the transition?

CSAP was phased out as part of the implementation of the 2008 Colorado Achievement Plan for Kids, or Senate Bill 08-212. Former Gov. Bill Ritter’s education initiative called for preparing all students for postsecondary and workforce readiness.

CAP4K led to the adoption of new state academic standards in 2009. The standards are “fewer, clearer and higher,” according to the Colorado Department of Education.

“The transitional test will encourage districts to move forward with their implementation of the new standards, while providing time for the preparation of students for the higher expectations to come,” said Jo O’Brien, assistant commissioner in the CDE’s Office of Standards and Assessment.

“It is important for students to have been taught the new standards, including new learning skills, by the time the new assessment is in place in 2014.”

State officials are expected to select a vendor for the new assessment system in late 2011. TCAP is being developed with the help of CTB/McGraw-Hill, the state’s CSAP vendor.

The end of CSAP

CSAP began in 1997 with reading and writing tests for the state’s fourth-graders. Additional grades were added each year and math and science exams were added in 2000.

Creating, administering and grading the exams eventually became a $16 million annual expense for the state. The CDE’s most recent contract with CTB/McGraw-Hill totaled $83 million for years 2007-2011.

CSAP results became the basis – in large part – for various state efforts at rating schools, from the “excellent” to “unsatisfactory” ratings favored by former Gov. Bill Owens to the current accountability system with labels ranging from “performance” to “turnaround.”

As CSAP evolved, so did the sophistication with which test results were viewed. Colorado’s Growth Model, which pulls apart the results to gauge individual student progress from one year to the next, will continue to be used with new exams.

Did CSAP improve student achievement for Colorado pupils? In recent years, the headlines from the state’s annual press conferences was often, “Flat results.”

But statewide results did improve over the duration of the tests. In 1997, 55 percent of the state’s fourth-graders scored proficient or advanced in reading. In 2010, it was 66 percent.

Math exams were added later. In 2000, the first math tests were given to the state’s eighth-graders – 35 percent scored proficient or advanced. In 2010, 51 percent of eighth-graders achieved proficiency.