Additional Opportunity to Request Paper Materials for the Spring 2023 STAAR Administration

The purpose of this communication is to provide information regarding an optional process to request additional paper test materials for the spring 2023 administration of the State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness (STAAR®).

House Bill 3261, enacted by the 87th Texas Legislature in 2021, requires state summative assessments to be administered online by the 2022–2023 school year. This transition requires nearly all students to be assessed online, with the exception of students who require accommodations that cannot be provided online.  

Texas has largely already transitioned to online testing with over 78 percent of STAAR tests administered online in spring 2022 and full online testing in December 2022. A process currently exists for districts to register students for a special paper administration of STAAR.

Based on feedback, the Texas Education Agency (TEA) will be providing an optional process to request additional paper test materials for the spring 2023 STAAR administration to assist school systems with the implementation of the first year of administering STAAR primarily online.  

For students who have already qualified and been registered for a special paper administration of STAAR, there are no changes in testing policies or procedures. The additional STAAR paper test materials may be used for other students. District leadership may decide which students will be administered STAAR using the additional paper test materials. Orders for additional STAAR paper materials may not exceed one percent of the number of students the district currently has registered in the Test Information Distribution Engine (TIDE).

For this purpose, TEA has created a new materials order window scheduled for March 20–24, 2023. District testing coordinators will need to:

1. update paper test material counts (without exceeding one percent of the number of registered students) in TIDE;
2. provide a list of the students who will be using the additional paper test materials; and
3. update the test mode and paper test format in TIDE for each student.

More specific information about the new order window process will be sent to district testing coordinators in a separate communication on March 10. The new order of additional STAAR paper test materials will arrive in a separate shipment before the testing window opens. Again, these paper test materials are in addition to the number of paper test materials districts have initially ordered for special paper administrations of STAAR.

As a reminder, there are no paper answer documents for STAAR. Students taking a paper test must record their responses in their test booklets, and authorized district staff members must submit the student responses in the Data Entry Interface (DEI) to be scored and reported. All student responses for paper administrations of STAAR must be submitted in DEI by 11:59 p.m. (CT) on the last day of each testing window.

If you have questions regarding the information in this communication, please contact TEA using the Student Assessment Help Desk.