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Naiku Spotlight: Grandville HS Takes PSAT Practice Test on Naiku

Grandville High School, located on the southwest side of Grand Rapids, Michigan, has been using Naiku since the start of this school year. In addition to their regular classroom assessments, Principal Chris Vanderslice wanted to look for ways to gather meaningful data to better prepare his students for the state mandated PSAT test. He also wanted to create opportunities for his 9th and 10th grade students to practice before they took the PSAT. With just over 2,000 students in the high school, giving a practice test to all students is usually a large task. This year, Principal Vanderslice decided to give the PSAT practice test on Naiku.

After creating two new classes in his Student Information System (SIS), one with every 9th grader in the school and the other with every 10th grader, the classes were then synced to Naiku. Principal Vanderslice then entered all the items into Naiku. “The process of adding the assessment items into Naiku was very easy and straight forward.  I tagged each item to the skill or standard that PSAT uses,” noted Principal Vanderslice.

On testing day, half of the school day was blocked off for the PSAT pretest. “Overall, the experience was great,” said Vanderslice. “Our students found that accessing the assessments in Naiku was easy as well.” After the students finished the test, Vanderslice closed and scored the assessment to get immediate results. “It was pretty amazing, to me, that I was able to get this data back so quickly. I have been able to share the breakdown, by standard, of how our students performed on the PSAT, in each subject area, with our teachers.  They are using it to make instructional adjustments in their classroom.”

Principal Vanderslice summarized their experience by stating that “the biggest takeaway that I have, along with my teachers, is how quickly we can get very meaningful data back that can immediately impact their instruction.”

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