California English Language Development Test (CELDT) Annual Assessment
State law (Education Codes 313 and 60810, 60812) and federal law (No Child Left Behind Act of 2001) require all English learners be tested annually for English language proficiency with the CELDT within the testing window July 1 – October 31. All CELDT testing of English learners must be completed by that date. There are no parent waivers for the CELDT.
Deadline to Return 2005 CELDT Annual Assessments
The CELDT annual assessment window ended October 31, 2005. School districts are reminded to return the completed tests promptly to CTB/McGraw-Hill (CTB), the test contractor, for scoring. Please note that the CELDT Form E Test Coordinator’s Manual indicates November 8, 2005, as the last day for pickup requests of test materials to meet the November 15, 2005, final receive date.
Any annual tests received by CTB for scoring after November 15, 2005, will be shipped back to the school districts at district expense. School districts sending in tests after the deadline are considered to be out of compliance with state and federal requirements and may be liable for excessive materials charges. Late tests not scored by the test publisher are to be scored locally and the results kept on file. Locally scored results will not be reported on the California Department of Education (CDE) Web site.
The CELDT is a highly secure test, and anyone who has access to the test must sign a security affidavit that is on the CELDT Web page. Please maintain professional responsibility in protecting the security of the test. If you have questions or concerns about the CELDT, please do not include actual test items in your correspondence.
Initial Identification Assessment
Initial identification assessment is ongoing. The CELDT is to be administered for initial identification purposes to a pupil whose primary language is other than English, as determined by the Home Language Survey, and who has not previously been assessed for English language proficiency in a California public school. Initial assessments must be scored locally and then submitted to the test contractor for official scoring.
Reminder
CELDT Form E is to be used for the 2005-06 school year for initial identification and for annual assessment.
Initial Identification Results
Initial identification data from July 1, 2004, through June 30, 2005, will be posted in November on the CELDT Reporting Web site. The 2005 annual assessment results will be posted on the Web site in February 2006.
Special Education
To determine appropriate testing variations for students with disabilities, individual education program (IEP) teams are encouraged to refer to the Matrix of Test Variations on the Student Testing Web page. For students using testing variations, the appropriate fields indicating accommodations, modifications, or alternate assessment must be completed on the CELDT demographic information sheet at the time of testing. The individual student proficiency report will indicate Beginning for the test or section of the test administered with modifications or with an alternate assessment. It is the responsibility of each student’s IEP team to review the CELDT results to determine the student’s actual level of English proficiency.
Title 5 Regulations
The Title 5, Division 1, Chapter 11 of the California Code of Regulations, CELDT, defines and delineates specific requirements. The regulations can be found on the California Code of Regulations Web site (Outside Source).
CELDT District Coordinator (CDC) Contact and Transfer of Student Scores
As stated in the regulations, all school districts, even those that do not currently have English learners enrolled, are required to have a CELDT District Coordinator (CDC).
In order to comply with state and federal accountability requirements, CDCs are reminded that as stated in the regulations, it is the responsibility of each CDC to establish a district procedure so that whenever a pupil transfers from one school district to another, the pupil’s CELDT records shall be transferred by the sending district within 20 calendar days upon a request from the receiving district where the pupil is now enrolled (California Code of Regulations, Title 5, Section 11512).
CELDT District Coordinator Contact Information
Notifications regarding the CELDT are regularly sent to the CELDT District Coordinators. The test contractor maintains an online database with CDC contact information located on the CELDT Testing Web site (Outside Source). Changes/updates must now be made online; change requests by telephone or e-mail will no longer be accepted. It is each CDC’s responsibility to ensure that the information is current and accurate. Each CDC is advised to log on and verify that contact information is correct.
Personal e-mail addresses are not accepted for security reasons. If a CELDT district coordinator does not have a district e-mail address, the CDE recommends that a mailbox designated as CELDT be established in the school district to allow the CELDT district coordinator and any additional designees access to CELDT information. Specific instructions have been sent to each CDC via e-mail and through regular mail. The CTB help desk at 800-994-8594 is available for assistance in accessing the online database.
Reporting Results
Districts must inform parents of CELDT results within 30 calendar days of receiving results from the testing contractor.
Test Results Interpretation Guide
This brief guide, in English and in ten other languages, is designed to provide general information to parents about the CELDT, how the results are reported, and what these results mean. More information can be found on the CTB Web site (Outside Source).
Apportionment
School districts are no longer required to submit monthly certifications of compliance to the CDE. Annually, on November 15, the CDE will distribute to each school district an Apportionment Information Report with the number of pupils assessed with the CELDT based on the number of answer documents submitted to and scored by the test contractor. This is for those tests administered during the previous school year (July 1 through June 30). The superintendent of each school district must certify the accuracy of the apportionment information in order to receive apportionment funds.
Post-Test Workshops
The CTB will be providing Post-Test Data Workshops during the months of October and November throughout the state. These sessions will focus on the interpretation and use of CELDT student data. They are tailored to participants with data processing skills who work directly with student data files and those staff who use CELDT data to make educational decisions. If you are interested, please submit the names of those staff that meet the criteria to jalexander@sjcoe.net, or you may contact the San Joaquin County Office of Education at 209-468-9257.
