‘Unacceptable’ system crash halts STAAR testing in Fort Worth, other school districts
School districts across the state, including Fort Worth ISD, halted some STAAR online testing due to a system crash on Tuesday, the district said in a news release.
Technical difficulties with the online testing platform forced districts to pause or postpone some testing. The issue impacted students taking the online grade 4 writing, grade 7 writing, and English I tests, Fort Worth officials said. Thousands of other Fort Worth ISD students continued taking the paper version of the tests without issue.
At 10:17 a.m., the Texas Education Agency advised districts if they were having issues that they should stop online testing for the day, the TEA said in a statement. Online testing will resume Wednesday, the agency said.
“We understand the frustration this has caused students, parents, teachers, and administrators,” the agency said in a statement. “What happened today is completely unacceptable.”
The problems were on the end of the test vendor, Educational Testing Service, TEA said. ETS will not continue as the STAAR testing vendor in 2022, and another vendor, Cambium Assessment, will take over online testing functions.
ETS posted updates to the STAAR Assessment Management System dashboard every 10 minutes to keep districts updated of the progress in resolving the issue, FWISD said in a press release.
Other major school districts, including Dallas ISD, Austin ISD and Houston ISD, also faced issues with the online testing service.
“All involved in public education in Texas should expect better than what they have experienced today; we are working to ensure that our students do not experience future testing issues,” the TEA said.
As of Tuesday at 10:30 a.m., the connectivity issues with the online system had not been fixed. The Fort Worth district said it would provide updates no later than Wednesday.
The online testing is part of a plan required by the Texas Legislature for the Texas Education Agency to transition all STAAR testing to online platforms by the 2022-2023 school year.
This story was originally published April 6, 2021 at 12:15 PM.
