Results Matter and Kindergarten Assessment

Similar to publicly funded preschoolers, Colorado’s Achievement Plan for Kids (CAP4K, SB08-2012) requires that all publicly funded kindergarteners receive individual school readiness plans that are informed by a school readiness assessment. Beginning in 2010, the School Readiness Assessment Committee developed kindergarten assessment guidelines and tool options similar to Results Matter. Since that time, CDE has attempted to create a vertically aligned system of assessment across preschool and kindergarten. However, the decision-makers and policies are somewhat different at the preschool and kindergarten levels. CDE has created a side-by-side comparison of policies and features for preschool and kindergarten assessment to help districts make sense of the similarities and differences at each grade level. 

These differences — things like assessment timelines, documentation opt-in, OSEP reporting, and grade-specific assessment protocols — require customizations and constraints unique to Results Matter/preschool and kindergarten that currently prevent CDE from maintaining a single license in the assessment tools common to both grades, i.e. GOLD® and COR. 

As a result, school districts must maintain separate licenses when using either GOLD® or COR at both grade levels. Records for publicly funded kindergarteners should not be present in the Results Matter/preschool license. Likewise, user accounts for public kindergarten teachers do not belong in the district’s preschool license but rather the district’s kindergarten license. Private kindergartens are not subject to kindergarten school readiness assessment requirements and may participate voluntarily under the Results Matter license.

Pay careful attention when adding kindergarten portfolios as any inadvertently added to the preschool license will use up active portfolios purchased for preschoolers, and may be difficult to replicate in the kindergarten license. In addition, kindergarten teachers should make sure to access the proper user. Some veteran teachers using GOLD® have legacy user accounts from the Results Matter license when kindergarten assessment was transitioning from one license to two.

For help understanding which account is which, contact your district administrator or Results Matter staff. If you discover kindergarten data has been incorrectly added to the Results Matter license, notify CDE immediately.

More kindergarten information available on CDE’s School Readiness website.