DATE:
May 28, 2026
TO:
All Elementary School Administrators
FROM:
Carolyn Gough, Administrator of Teaching and Learning
Ben Jameson, Director of Assessment, Research and Accountability
SUBJECT:
Changes to Acadience Testing for the 2026-27 School Year
As the 2025-26 school year draws to an end, elementary school administrators should be aware of some changes to Acadience testing. Principals are encouraged to forward this information to relevant personnel.
Acadience Math:
USBE's contract with Acadience Learning for Acadience Math ends on June 30, 2026. During the 2026 legislative session, the legislature did not appropriate funding for the continuation of Acadience Math testing. Thus, Jordan School District will not be administering Acadience Math in grades K-3 for the 2026-27 school year.
Acadience Reading:
Acadience Reading will be administered to students in grades K-3 by district assessment assistants as in years past. Schools will continue to be responsible for administering Acadience Reading for grades 4-6. All Acadience Reading testing results may still be found in ALO.
Data analysis from prior years has indicated that a kindergarten student's scale score and pathways of progress score is impacted by when that student tests during the BOY and EOY windows. To a lesser degree, first grade students are also impacted by when they test.
This year, 23 schools participated in a kindergarten testing pilot that separated kindergarten benchmark testing from grades 1-3 testing with the goal of lengthening the instructional days between BOY and EOY assessments to better capture the full breadth of literacy learning and growth:
- For schools scheduled at the end of the BOY window: Kindergarten students were tested at the beginning of the BOY window while grades 1-3 were tested during their regularly scheduled testing time.
- For schools scheduled at the beginning of the EOY window: Kindergarten students were tested at the end of the EOY window while grades 1-3 were tested during their regularly scheduled time.
Preliminary analysis of the 2025-26 Acadience Reading data indicates that lengthening the instructional days between BOY and EOY benchmark testing provided more reliable benchmark scores at BOY as well as pathways of progress scores at EOY.
Thus, Assessment, Research & Accountability will be administering the Acadience Reading benchmark to all kindergarten students, as well as first grade students, at the beginning of the BOY window and end of the EOY window for the 2026-27 school year. This means that for the BOY and EOY windows, district assessment assistants will come to your schools once to complete K-1 testing and again to complete grades 2-3 testing at different times of each window. During the MOY window, we will complete testing for K-3 together.
In the next day or two, you will start receiving your testing schedule for the 2026-27 school year. Please take note of the two separate testing dates for the BOY and EOY windows.
More information about these changes will be released at a later date. In the meantime, if you have questions, please contact Ben Jameson in Assessment, Research & Accountability.
