Dr. Ted Horrell, superintendent for the Lakeland School System (LSS) announced this morning (4.17.18) on social media sites there is a second statewide failure of the Tennessee online testing platform for this year’s testing.
“Due to a second statewide failure of the TN online testing platform, today’s TNReady testing at LMPS (Lakeland Middle Preparatory School) was interrupted, and the majority of students there were either not able to start testing, not able to finish testing, or were not able to submit their tests,” said Dr. Horrell.
“We are told that if students did complete essays, that information should be recoverable from their devices. We will continue to update you on next steps once we get direction from the TN Department of Education.
“Students will be able to bring their Chromebooks home and use them for regular instruction as usual. We will update you on any adjustments to the testing schedule that are made.”
The State testing system has been fraught with problems including issues yesterday (4.16.18), the first day for this year’s testing.
From the Tennessee Department of Education:
It appears Questar’s data center may have experienced a deliberate attack this morning based on traffic patterns. They are resetting the system, and we have shared more info on next steps with directors of schools. We will share an update when we know more.
Dr. Horrell said on Monday that the issue with Nextera, the online testing platform, had been addressed and testing would resume this morning (4.17.18).
Because LES (Lakeland Elementary School) students will take their TN Ready tests using paper and pencil, the issues should not impact testing there.
“We know how hard parents, students, and teachers have worked to be sure students were ready to show what they have learned today, and we will keep you posted on next steps as decisions are made at the state level,” said Dr. Horrell.
After the 2016-17 school year, about 9,400 of the State’s 1.9 million TNReady assessments were scored incorrectly, impacting schools in several counties including Shelby. Some of the incorrectly scored tests changed student proficiency.
Vendor servers were a problem for the 2015-16 school year testing. The state switched to paper exams and cancelled the test for middle and elementary students when enough paper copies weren’t available.
From the Tennessee Department of Education Twitter page:
We know this has presented challenges to scheduling and morale. We again apologize to our educators and students. We will be in touch with our districts later today with further info about the testing window
