Create a test event

Data Package: Online Testing

Role: Account Holder or Administrator

The process for creating test events for your assessments is described below.

Note: Only users with the DataManager roles of Account Holder or Administrator can create and manage test events.

**To create a Cognitive Abilities Test™ (CogAT®), Iowa Assessments™, or Logramos® test event:**

1. Click the Assessments heading, then select Test Events.

Assessments: Test Events submenu

The Test Events Overview page opens to the All Test Events table, which defaults to events that are currently open. Typically, your district will have 0-2 open test events at a time, one per assessment type, one season or quarter at a time.

IMPORTANT: Test events constitute the broadest grouping of test assessments, incorporating locations, grades/levels, batteries/domains, and students. Create one only per assessment type and testing period, and select the broadest possible participant group and roster. If you see an open event with the same assessment type as you are about to create, use that existing event rather than creating a new one for the same testing period.

2. Click the Create a New Test Event button.

The Create a New Test Event modal opens. Asterisks(*) denote required fields.

3. Enter a unique name in the TEST EVENT NAME field.

Tip: Use a naming convention used across your institution that is easily recognizable when running reports. For example: test family/form/season/year (or, "Iowa G Fall 2020" or "CogAT 8 Spring 2021").

4. In the TEST EVENT ASSESSMENT TYPE, select the test that students will be taking.

Note: Options vary according to which assessment types your system or district has purchased. The image below shows all options (listed in alphabetical order).

The selection you make in this field determines, in part, which fields are available in the rows below it.

5. In the TEST EVENT PARTICIPANT LIST, click Select Participants to display the location hierarchy. The list shows only those locations at or below your location level.

1. Click the right-facing arrows to expand nodes in the hierarchy, the down-facing arrows to collapse them.
2. Click one or more check boxes to select the participant list. Typically, this selection consists of one district. If, however, you have a subset of schools or classes participating in testing, select only those buildings or classrooms. Groups that are not selected will not be able to participate in the newly created test event or any related assignments or sessions.
3. Click outside the selection field to close the hierarchy.

6. In the TEST EVENT ROSTER field, select a student roster to apply to the test event. Note the following regarding test events and rosters:

Once the test event is created, you cannot change the roster used for this test event. However, students can be added or removed from the current roster. See Adding a Student to a Roster for instructions.
See Building Rosters from OMR Scanning for information about building a roster using the optical mark recognition (OMR) option. This is a unique designation for OMR scanning when students and locations are not loaded into DataManager in advance of testing.

7. In the Test Event Date box, type or use the drop-down calendar to enter the date of testing. The date should occur midpoint between your start and end date, with a maximum window of 60 days.

Test administration dates

For CogAT, Iowa, and Logramos assessments, your test event date should reflect the midpoint in your test administration window. If you administer tests from September 1 to September 30, then select September 15 as your test event date.

You can begin testing up to 30 days prior to and 30 days after the test event date. During this time, you can administer tests to multiple schools within a school system and multiple grades within a school. Test events automatically expire 30 days from your test event date so that your estimated administrations can be reconciled against the number of students that actually took the test.

While not recommended, it is possible to extend the test event window beyond 30 days. (A common reason for reopening a test event is to process makeup sessions that occur after the majority of students have been tested.) If you want the testing window to exceed five weeks, consider setting up monthly test events. Limiting the duration of your test events will ensure the most valid and reliable data possible in your score reports. To that effort, if testing is completed in less than 30 days, you may close a test event prior to its 30-day expiration so that scores can be aggregated and reports produced.

If you are administering a two-part CogAT test, screening and post-screener, set up the post-screener event immediately after you have set up and saved the screening, and ensure that the post-screener occurs within 30 days of the screening.

You can back-date a test event up to 60 days prior to the current date. This allows you to account for test administrations that have already occurred but have not yet been scanned and scored. Setting a test event in the past allows you to have your data scored using a midpoint date in the past. In these cases, the test event automatically expires 30 days from the date you enter the event into DataManager.

8. For NORMATIVE YEAR, choose from the first two options for online testing or select one of the four if you are setting up OMR testing.

Normative years must match for blended reporting of online and paper testing for a single assessment (e.g., either Iowa Assessments or CogAT). Norm years do not need to match for independent test events or predicted scores using the Iowa Assessments and CogAT.

OMR users can specify 2011 norms for both Iowa and CogAT, 2017 norms for both, or 2011 for one and 2017 for the other.

9. Select a season or quarter-month for the NORMATIVE PERIOD. (Options are based on the test event date you entered.)

(Iowa Assessments and CogAT) A normative period is a period of time, typically a school semester or season (fall, midyear, or spring), for which comparative data (norms) are available. When you select the test event date, DataManager determines the corresponding normative period so that the correct norms are applied to the test results. For example, if you select a date in September for your test event, and tests are taken within that test event time frame, student scores will be compared to a nationwide group of students who were tested in the fall season.

The table below displays how the Assessments application determines the normative period based on the selected test date.

If you test...	The normative period is...
Between August 1st and November 30th	Fall
Between December 1st and February 28th or 29th	Midyear
Between March 1st and July 31st	Spring

Quartermonth norms

Quartermonth norms are offered for the Iowa Assessments™. They provide normative data based on a specific week of testing as opposed to the entire fall, midyear, or spring semester/season. This provides a more precise measurement of student normative scores.

10. (Optional) Select options for this test event. Refer to the table below.

Option	Action
Achievement scores (used for Iowa Assessments and Logramos only, ignore for CogAT)	In the Achievement Scores list, select the achievement scores you want to be included on reports. Common scores such as National Percentile Ranks, Grade Equivalents, Stanines, and Scaled Scores are automatically provided with your order. Local and private school percentiles (PRIV) may also be available for scoring and reporting. The scores included in this list are optional, and no scores need be selected if you do not want them as a part of your testing program.
Ability scores (used for CogAT only, ignore for Iowa Assessments)	In the Ability Scores field, select the ability scores you want to be included on reports. A number of common ability scores are automatically provided with your order. The scores included in this list are optional.
Program label suppression	For SUPPRESS PROGRAM LABEL(S), leave the default selection of Yes if you do not want information about students' participation in sensitive district-wide or school-based programs to appear on class-level reports (for example, Free or Reduced-Price Lunch).

11. Click to select or clear any of the Online Testing Details that appear on the page. Selections vary according to your previous specifications.

Allow Calculator Use (Iowa Assessments and Logramos only) specifies whether a calculator will be available during online test administration.
Allow Audio Test Administration specifies whether online testing with audio will be available during this test event. Audio for Iowa Assessments is in English, for Logramos in Spanish, and, for CogAT, in English, Spanish, or, if enabled during system administration setup, in one of six additional languages (see CogAT additional audio languages).
Allow Draw Screen provides the creator of a test session the option of allowing students to doodle on a blank screen while they wait either for a test to begin or for other students to complete a test. If you select it, the test session creator can allow or prevent students access to a doodle page. If you select Do not allow Draw Screen, the test session creator does not see the option for a doodle page. In this case, students will see a static screen with their name on it and no drawing tools. For more information, see Create a Test Session.
Allow Remote Proctoring allows you to engage one of the remote proctoring solutions adopted by Riverside Insights®.

12. Click Save. A message confirms that the test event has been created, and the Create a New Test Event modal closes. The Test Events Overview page shows the newly created event in the All Test Events table.

Note: DataManager prevents you from accidentally creating multiple, overlapping test events, which can cause problems with reporting, by checking for other open and/or closed test events in a specific normative period. See these guidelines for options on working with multiple test events within a given normative period.