Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment Cogat - what does it mean?

Hello,

Our kid recently did the CogAT which is administered to all children in the first grade in our school district to see if they qualify for the next round (Iowa) of testing for the local GT program.

I don't really understand what the test tells us. All it said was: "The tests that we administered were in the areas of Picture Analogies, Number Analogies and Figure Matrices. Your child�s CogAT Age Percentile Rank is 99." There was nothing about stines (?) or breakdown that I see discussed regarding the CogAT. Is it because it is simply used for screening for the next stage?

How would you interprete this? And 99th percentile ... of what?

Since there isn't a higher score, and there seems to be a process to move on to the next round for GT services, I wouldn't worry too much. But the school should be able to answer your questions. Usually, when the CogAT is given, the results are also given with some sort of profile (a number and a letter, if I remember). If I were you, I would ask the school if they can give you more specifics about what your kid's score means (do they have any other data to share, like profile numbers?), and also what happens next in the GT process.

For school-administered tests, it is often best to discuss scores and their interpretation with school personnel as they have the full context for your child's testing experience, purposes, cohort, etc. For parents wishing to prepare themselves with a bit of background to best absorb what school staff may share, here are some general tips:

1. Schools may contract with testing companies for various levels of service both in the number of assessment areas to be administered and the complexity of the results report.

2. A web search for the name of the test and the areas administered brings one to the website of the test creator. A parent may see the areas administered as a subset of the test areas offered.

3. The website of the test creator has many pages to explore, which will help interested parents in building a background understanding of the test.

4. If unfamiliar with Stanines, a parent may wish to do a brief websearch on that. Mathnstuff offers a good introduction to the Statistical Standard Nine Normal Distribution.

Based on the information provided, you received very sparse results. Did you learn whether your child's screening test scores indicated that further testing (Iowa) will be conducted? What does your school's gifted program consist of? (Some have reported that their schools find identification to be so costly that "identification" is the only service provided.)

Presumably the 99th percentile of kids that age taking those tests.

CogAT can be age-normed or grade-normed. I believe it can also be locally or nationally normed.

It sounds like your DC's test was age-normed, so his/her scores for his/her grade ("grade-normed") could be higher (with a 99%, this could only be seen with an SAS score, which is not always provided to parents) or lower, depending upon his/her age for his/her grade.

The problem with a 99% on the CogAT is that I think it encompasses any SAS score from 135-150 for the CogAT6, for example - quite a wide range. I would have liked to have seen the SAS scores to better understand my DD's score, but this was not provided to us.

HTH!