Good news! Ken Draut, Associate Commissioner of the Office of Assessment and Accountability, and I have determined a proposed solution to the problem educators have voiced on the earliness of the spring CATS testing window that now occurs in late April and the first few days of May. Beginning in 2009, the spring CATS testing window would be moved forward into the first 13 days of May thereby providing additional time for instruction before testing occurs. This would also necessitate the No Child Left Behind reporting dates to move to later in August, which would be submitted to the United States Department of Education as part of a requested change to Kentucky’s Consolidated State Application Accountability Workbook in February of 2009.
I realize that there are some details to be worked out with this change. However, since this will not be implemented until May 2009, we have a year to plan for it and resolve any potential issues. I believe most educators will be pleased because it will provide additional instruction time prior to testing and reduce the number of days after testing until school is out.
Included as an attachment to this email is a copy of the proposed changes to the testing schedule.
I am sending this information so that you can take this change into consideration for calendar planning purposes.
I will be discussing this proposal further with the Kentucky Board of Education (KBE) at the February meeting during my Commissioner’s Report.