Third Grade Reading Guarantee
State law requires the State Board of Education to annually increase the promotion score on Ohio’s State Test for grade 3 English language arts until it reaches proficient for the 2024-2025 school year. Accordingly, the State Board voted to raise the promotion score for grade 3 English language arts to 690 for the 2023-2024 school year. Any student who scores 690 or higher on the English language arts scaled score will be eligible for promotion to fourth grade at the end of the 2023-2024 school year.
In addition, the Ohio Department of Education has set the reading subscore alternative assessment score for Ohio’s State Test for grade 3 English language arts at 48 for the 2023-2024 school year. Any student who scores 48 or higher on the reading subscore will be eligible for promotion to fourth grade at the end of the 2023-2024 school year, even if the student scores below 690 on Ohio’s State Test for grade 3 English language arts.
Beginning in the 2023-2024 school year, a student’s parent or guardian, in consultation with the student’s reading teacher and principal, may request that a student be promoted to fourth grade regardless of the student’s score on Ohio’s State Test for grade 3 English language arts.
Students promoted to fourth grade but do not reach a proficient score of 700 or above will be placed on Reanding Improvement Monitoring Plan and will receive intensive intervention until the student is able to read at grade level. Intervention services must be aligned to the science of reading.
Third Grade Alternative Reading Assessments
The alternative reading assessment is one or more standardized assessments for reading, determined by the Ohio Department of Education for the Third Grade Reading Guarantee. It allows a third grade student to demonstrate an acceptable level of reading performance for promotion to the fourth grade. Districts may administer the approved vendor alternative reading assessment twice during the school year and once during the summer to mimic Ohio’s grade 3 English language arts test administration.
MOE is using NWEA-MAP Reading as an alternative reading assessment. Students must score a minimum RIT score of 195 to be eligible for promotion