Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment STAR testing & identification

Our school is considering tweaking identification methods. We identify separately for math and language arts. Currently they use an average of three STAR scores in math/reading, then average that with Cogat quantitative/verbal. Cutoffs are 93% for the lower GT tier and 97% for the higher.

I know the CoGAT is widely used for GT testing in public schools. What about the STAR? Is anyone else in a district that uses this? The school actually uses it mainly to track progress of kids at the other end (I believe this is what it's designed for), but since all kids take it, they decided to use it for GT id as well.

Just wondering what other schools do.

DS7 at his school last year took several STAR assessments. Its intention, I believe, is to track progress along an educational path and help plan a course for the student in alignment to common core. Being that STAR is also an achievement test (like the CoGAT), it's subject to the same issues for gifted identification (e.g., it will miss potential ability when determining eligbility for gifted services).

Unfortunately, my district seems to use STAR assessments for decisions that test authors never intended them to be used for. This was evidenced last year for us with DS's reading scores, which started at grade level in February but jumped to 3-4 grade levels ahead when re-tested in May. When we requested acceleration in the early spring, the district couldn't see past the February STAR score and refused to accelerate him. We had verbally tried to explain that he had recently had a "reading ability explosion," but they didn't seem to believe us. (They did sit up and start to pay attention when we showed them the WISC report, but that's another story for another time...)

So I did not leave with a good impression of STAR assessments to provide any real value or insight about my kid. I think gifted kids often take different learning paths, so the guided "skills to work on" was pretty much useless for us.

CogAT is an ability test rather than achievement, so by using a matrix of achievement and ability, it sounds similar to other schools. The idea in our district (using another standardized assessment, not STAR) is to broaden the pool, catching a lower-achieving high-ability kid, or a high-achiever who doesn't test well on the CogAT, along with one who does well on both. Still can miss those who don't test well on those.