Friendship Public Charter School Countdown To DC-CAS Newsletter Get Ready, Get Set! Dear Parents, Next week, your child will begin taking the District of Columbia Comprehensive Assessment Test (DC-CAS)—one of the most important exams of the school year. Friendship principals, teachers and support staff have worked tirelessly to ensure that your student is ready with the academic skills and confidence needed to achieve DC-CAS performance standards. We believe parents should be informed and involved in the test preparation process. That is why we encourage you to review Friendship’s Countdown to DC CAS newsletter. In this newsletter, you will find vital DC-CAS information, testing dates and test-taking tips for students and parents. At Friendship, we believe that every student can achieve the highest standards!
What is the DC-CAS? The DC-CAS is the District of Columbia’s basic skills assessment test for students in grades 3 through 8 and grade 10. The test evaluates students’ annual yearly progress in the areas of math, reading, composition and science. This year, the DC-CAS will be administered over a two-week period starting Tuesday, April 17 through Thursday, April 26. Introduced in 2006, the DC-CAS is more rigorous than the District’s previous assessment test, the Stanford-9, because it measures students’ knowledge through a combination of multiple choice and constructed-response questions. Students are required to analyze and compare data; identify clues to problem-solving and explain in three to four sentences how they arrived at their answers. Additionally, the higher-level thinking skills measured by the DC-CAS are aligned with federal No Child Left Behind standards that require schools to annually measure how well students are learning what is taught in the classroom.