Colorado Student Assessment Program

The Colorado Student Assessment Program (CSAP) was an assessment required by the No Child Left Behind Act administered by the Unit of Student Assessment in the Colorado Department of Education (CDE). The CSAP was designed to measure how well students are learning material from the Colorado Model Content Standards, the established content standards that all Colorado public school students should learn. The CSAP only tested four (mathematics, reading and writing, and science) of the thirteen subject areas in the Colorado Model Content Standards.

Starting in 3rd Grade, and continuing until 10th Grade (Sophomore year of High School), all students were expected to take their grade level's version of the CSAP, testing for which typically occurred during the Spring semester from early February to late March. All grades were tested in Reading, Writing, and Math, and only 5th, 8th, and 10th graders are tested in Science. The 3rd and 4th Grade versions of the CSAP are also available in Spanish to accommodate the high number of Spanish-speaking students in Colorado public schools who concurrently learn English. In 11th Grade (Junior year of High School) students were required to take the COACT (a Colorado specific version of the ACT) in place of the CSAP. The COACT is also administered by the Unit of Student Assessment.

CSAP was graded on a scale of four proficiency/performance levels. Level 4 is referred to as "advanced," level 3 as "proficient," level 2 as "partially proficient," and level 1 as "unsatisfactory." The Colorado Department of Education website details their standards for each level on each test, and how each score is determined.

Schools are rated by the averaged CSAP scores of their students. Low-scoring schools are eligible for School Improvement Plan assistance from the Colorado Department of Education. If a school receives an unsatisfactory rating (level 1) for two consecutive years it will be recommended it be turned into a charter school—unless it had an improvement of 0.5 of a point greater from the standard deviation over the immediately preceding year's overall standardized, weighted total score. Schools with three consecutive unsatisfactory ratings will be converted into charter schools. School districts with consistently low-scoring schools can lose their accreditation.

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