Achievement District Test Coordinator Updates
March 9, 2023 |
Achievement District Test Coordinators (DTCs),
We are now less than two weeks away from Achievement testing windows opening!
Please remember the following when emailing the Achievement inboxes:
- Include your district or charter's Entity ID. Many districts and charters have similar names. Including your Entity ID assists us in researching your questions more quickly.
- State which assessment(s) your inquiry is about.
- Email only one of our inboxes (AASA, AzSCI, or Testing). Please do not copy the other inboxes on your email. This helps us track emails that have been completed vs. those that still require follow-up.
- Send questions about AASA to AASA@azed.gov, questions about AzSCI to AzSCI@azed.gov, and questions about ACT Aspire or ACT to Testing@azed.gov. We are able to respond to emails more quickly than voicemails. Please send your inquiry via email if possible.
For issues that occur while students are testing, please include in the email subject line, "Urgent-Students Testing."
When contacting Pearson Customer Support for assistance, please retain your ticket number. If you contact ADE's Assessment team for assistance with the same question or issue, please share the Pearson ticket number with us so ADE and Pearson can further assist you. |
AASA and AzSCI - Test Sessions and Testing Groups
Please do not create test sessions for AASA or AzSCI. Test sessions were automatically created when students were uploaded. Newly added students should be placed in these pre-created sessions.
Districts and schools that would like to group students by classroom, testing days, or other groupings in PearsonAccessNext (PAN) should use the optional Testing Groups function in PAN. Please see the PAN User's Guide for more information on creating testing groups. Creating testing groups will allow the ability to sort and filter to only these students to print the selected students' testing tickets and to more quickly lock/unlock students' tests.
For AASA, testing groups will transfer to reporting groups in the new AASA longitudinal reporting feature. More information about longitudinal reporting for AASA will be coming soon in the AASA Reporting Guide.
*Note for ACT Aspire and ACT: Sessions do need to be created for ACT Aspire and ACT testing. This can be completed now for ACT Aspire and for the ACT Test Window 1. Sessions can be created for ACT Test Window 2 beginning March 29. |
AASA Test Units and Sessions
Students in Grades 4-8 will have three test units for ELA: Writing, ELA 1 (Reading), and ELA 2 (Reading); and two test units for Math: Math 1 and Math 2. In PearsonAccessNext (PAN), there are two sessions at each grade level - one for ELA and one for Math. The separate units are contained within these sessions as shown in the screenshot below. |
Students in Grade 3 are set up a little differently due to the Oral Reading Fluency (ORF) field test unit. Grade 3 students will have a separate session in PAN for each ELA test unit: Writing, ELA 1 (Reading), ELA 2 (Reading), and ORF field test unit as shown in the following screenshot. For Grade 3, there will be two test units for Math: Math 1 and Math 2. As with Grades 4-8, these units will be in one Math session. |
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Testing Tickets for Online Testing
Each test session will have a separate testing ticket. Therefore, students in Grades 4-8 will have one ELA testing ticket and one Math testing ticket. Districts/schools may choose to print multiple copies of the testing tickets in order to provide students with a separate testing ticket for each test unit. We have heard from some districts who are printing the testing tickets for different test units on different colored paper in order to distinguish them. This is not required but is an option.
Because students in Grade 3 will have four separate ELA test sessions in PAN, there will be four separate corresponding testing tickets for ELA. Grade 3 students will have one testing ticket for Math due to having only one Math session in PAN.
AASA testing tickets are secure test materials and must be kept in secure, locked storage when not in use. Testing tickets must be collected from students following each test unit and securely destroyed after testing. Do not allow students to test with an incorrect testing ticket. The use of an incorrect testing ticket during testing is a test security violation and will result in the student's test being invalidated. Please verify student name, SSID, session and grade, date of birth, and test prior to AASA administration. |
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AzSCI Test Units, Sessions, and Tickets
Reminder: There will be three AzSCI test units at each grade level (Grades 5, 8, and 11), with an estimated time of 60-90 minutes each. The three test units will be included in one test session in PearsonAccessNext (PAN). Each student will require one testing ticket, which will be used to access all of the test units.
AzSCI testing tickets are secure test materials and must be kept in secure, locked storage when not in use. Testing tickets must be collected from students following each test unit and securely destroyed after testing. Do not allow students to test with an incorrect testing ticket. The use of an incorrect testing ticket during testing is a test security violation and will result in the student's test being invalidated. Please verify student name, SSID, session and grade, date of birth, and test prior to AzSCI administration. |
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Test Administration Manuals
AASA: Hard copies of Test Coordinator's Manuals and Test Administration Directions will be delivered to districts either the week of March 20th or the week of March 27th, depending on the delivery window that was selected in PearsonAccessNext (PAN). These manuals are also available electronically from the AASA page of our website and in PAN under Support > Documentation.
AzSCI: Hard copies of Test Coordinator's Manuals and Test Administration Directions will not be sent automatically. A limited number of copies are available to order through PAN. These manuals are posted on our AzSCI webpage. They may be used electronically for test administration or may be printed from the website. They will also be added to PAN under Support > Documentation very soon.
ACT Aspire: Hard copies of Test Coordinator Manuals and Room Supervisor Manuals will not be sent and are not available to order. These manuals are posted on the ACT Aspire page of the ACT website, under Step 5: Administration.
ACT: Hard copies of the ACT Test Coordinator Information Manual and ACT Administration Manuals have been sent to districts and charters. These manuals are also posted on the ACT website, under Step 5: Administration. |
Work Requests in PearsonAccessNext - AASA, AzSCI, and ACT Aspire
Please check each PearsonAccessNext site daily for work requests that may be waiting for approval. District Test Coordinators should look for the red bell at the top of the screen. The red bell indicates that a work request is pending approval to transfer a student. These transfers need to be completed in a timely manner so that students may be set up for testing after they have transferred to a new school. |
Please use the following guidelines when approving work requests for AASA, AzSCI, and ACT Aspire.
- If a student has not started testing, APPROVE the work request.
- If a student has completed one or more test units, but has not completed the entire test, APPROVE the work request.
- If a student has completed all test units of the assessment, REJECT the work request, and indicate in the Comments field, "Student has already completed testing."
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ACT Updates and Reminders
For issues during ACT testing, please contact ACT at 319-337-1567. This is an Arizona-specific ACT number, and any technical issues or concerns that occur during testing will be prioritized.
MyACT
Please see the ACT website for information about students completing MyACT. Resources are included under Step 4: Preparation, under the heading "Complete Non-Test Activities." Students may complete the non-test information in MyACT before testing and up to two days after students finish testing. This may be completed on a separate date from actual testing. Students who set up a MyACT account will have the opportunity to send their ACT scores to up to 4 colleges or scholarship agencies for free and will receive their test results faster than waiting for paper score reports.
ACT State Use Questions
Arizona will not have state questions on the ACT this year. The state questions are mentioned on page 74 of the ACT Online Testing Administration Manual. When students see the "State Questions" screen ahead of the online ACT test, they can skip to the next step. |
Audra Ahumada
Deputy Associate Superintendent of Assessment
Arizona Department of Education
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Joseph M. Guzman, Ph.D.
Associate Superintendent of Standards, Assessment, Accountability and Research
Arizona Department of Education |
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