|
Questions Frequently asked about the KYOTE Program
- Where can I learn how to get started with KYOTE?
ANSWER: The KYOTE User Guide at http://www.kyote.org is the place to start looking for answers to questions about setting up to schedule and administer KYOTE exams and to view and interpret the outcomes. Answers to most of the questions below will, in fact, be found in that document as it is continuously updated.
- Who can use KYOTE and what does it cost?
ANSWER: KYOTE can be used by any Kentucky school, college, or university. There are no charges or fees of any kind.
- Who pays for KYOTE?
ANSWER: The Kentucky Council on Postsecondary Education supports the deveopment and operations of the reading and writing exams. Through contracts with the University of Kentucky it underwrites a portion of the KYOTE programming and equipment costs. All other costs of the program are contributed by volunteer faculty and staff of Kentucky colleges and universities as part of their outreach mission and by schools, and public institutions with the support of their administrations.
- What exams are available?
ANSWER: The exams currently available are:
a. math college readiness
b. reading college readiness
c. writing college readiness
d. college algebra
- How does my school arrange to use KYOTE?
ANSWER: See the user guide
- How do the college readiness scores get to KDE?
ANSWER: College readiness scores are automatically sent to KDE
- Who owns and who can access the KYOTE data?
ANSWER: Ultimately, KYOTE submissions and scores are the personal property of individual
students. Since they are administered in instructional contexts, schools that administer
a KYOTE exam have full access and use of the data for instructional and institutional
and research/improvement. KDE has access to Kentucky public school data for the purpose
of assessing college readiness under the provisions of SB1 of the 2009 Kentucky General Assembly. Colleges that administer the exams have full access to the data for placement purposes.
- How do scores get to colleges and universities?
ANSWER: Colleges and Universities that administer KYOTE exams automatically have access
to those exams and scores. Individual students can use their KYOTE accounts to direct their
KYOTE scores to colleges and universities that have set up placement classes to receive them
( see the User Guide).
- Which colleges and universities are currently set up to receive KYOTE scores?
ANSWER: As of April 27, 2013, the institutions to which students can direct their scores are:
a. The University of Kentucky
b. Northern Kentucky University
c. Hazard Community and Technical College
d. Eastern Kentucky University
e. Kentucky State University
f. Owensboro Community and Technical College
g. Somerset Community and Technical College
h. Ashland Community and Technical College
i. Murray State University
j. Morehead State university
k. Gateway Community and Technical College
l. University of Louisville
m. Western Kentucky University
n. Bluegrass Community and Technical College
o. Elizabethtown Community and Technical College
- How does a college get set up to receive scores directed to it by students?
ANSWER: A college sets up a placement class and acquires the permissions needed to schedule KYOTE exams ( see the User Guide). In addition, the owner of the college class logs on at www.kyote.org, selects "Help" on any page, and enters and submits a request that the placement class be listed to receive student-directed scores. Please identify the class by name as it is possible ( but not a good idea) for institutions to have established more than one placement class.
- Can institutions charge fees to recover the cost of administering KYOTE?
ANSWER: No fees or charges of any kind are permitted.
- How often can the exams be given?
ANSWER: The general guideline is that an exam can be given once per semester/ trimester.
There are, however, variations on this theme which can be found in the User Guide.
- A student took the KYOTE math exam and got a passing score but his/her scores don't appear on the exam results page. Can the score be recovered?
ANSWER: After investigating a large number of such questions, in 100% of the cases
it was found that the student had taken a practice exam. Depending on the setup of local
machines, it apparently can happen that if a student presses ENTER rather than "Start Examination" the machine will open the practice exam currenly in that menu at the top of the page. The developers have been able to reproduce this only on one version of an Apple I-pad but it apparently can happen. Warning popups do come up if this happens. If it does the thing to do is to press the "Start Examination" button.
- How can students direct their scores to colleges or universities that do notappear on the page where institutions are selected to receive the scores? Can't KYOTE simply make the scores available to colleges and universities?
ANSWER: There are two problems. First, if the college or university hasn't set up a placement class then they wouldn't have a mechanism to receive the scores. More fundamental is the fact that the scores are privileged information which the KYOTE program does not own but simply exercises stewardship. Beyond a few very narrowly defined instructional and assessment parameters, the program has no right to distribute the data.
- Could placement exams for other disciplines be put on KYOTE?
ANSWER: Certainly, interested groups or individuals can write Paul Eakin (paul@ms.uky.edu)
Steve Newman (NEWMAN@nku.edu).
- Can colleges put their own placement exams on KYOTE?
ANSWER: Yes, see the contact information in the previous answer.
- When will the writing exam be available?
ANSWER: The writing exam is currently available. It is quite different from the math and
reading exams as it is scored by Kenucky language professionals. Students enter essays
online, each of which is routed to multiple scorers in different school districts. Schools that schedule KYOTE writing exam sessions are expected to contribute to the scoring pool. Details are in the User Guide.
- What information do colleges and institutions receive scores from students and in what form?
ANSWER: In order to receive KYOTE data, institutions must have set up a KYOTE
placemen class (see the User Guide). When a student directs his/her scores to an institution
those scores are accessible through the institution's placement class in the same form and thought the same process used to retrieve data from sessions scheduled through the college's own placement class. The data includes scores by item (from a spreadsheet) and views of exactly what the student submitted.
- Can private colleges use the KYOTE system?
ANSWER: Yes. Simply follow the procedures in the User Guide
- Do private testing, tutoring, and assessment services have free access to KYOTE?
ANSWER: No
- Is there more documentation available on the writing exam?
ANSWER: The following are links to brief pdf documents on the scheduling, taking, and scoring of KYOTE writing exams.
a. Scheduling and taking KYOTE Writing Exams:
b. Scoring KYOTE Writing Exams
- Are there other exams and services in the works?
ANSWER: A new calculus placement exam is in process. In addition, there are several math courses, complete with free texts and complete online homework sets in the pipeline. These include the sets for the (free) NKU Transitional Mathematics Course http://kyote.nku.edu/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=49&Itemid=54 and the ( free) Whitman College Calculus course http://www.whitman.edu/mathematics/multivariable/ . The process of setting up, enrolling students, and operating these free online homework sets is exactly the same as that that of setting up a placement class. The only difference is that a different list is associated to the class and the activity and all data are entirely under the control of the teacher-owner of the class. Contact Paul Eakin (paul@ms.uky.edu) for information.
- I have three sets of students taking KYOTE exams 9-10, 10-11, and 2-3 in the same day. Do I make the session run from 9-4?
ANSWER: NO. Kyote sessions should never be scheduled for more than one enough time to accommodate one group of students. Schedule different sessions with different passwords for different groups. The system can handle large numbers of sessions.
Having sessions run significantly after one group has left the exam is the same as allowing students to leave with copies of the same exam that subsequent groups of students will take. Separate sessions should be scheduled for every group of students. This is very simple to do with the "clone session" feature.
- What happens if a student is delayed getting started on an exam or needs extra time as part of an individual learning plan?
ANSWER: If an exam is scheduld from 9:00-10:00 and a student starts at any time between 9:00 and 10:00 and has not submitted then he/she can continue working for as long past 10:00 as the proctor will permit. Proctors should make note of such extensions as part of the KDE-required exam record.
- On the KYOTE exams, what accommodations are permitted for students with diabilities?
ANSWER: The same ones permitted by KDE for other exam such as ACT, COMPASS, etc.
|
|
|
|
modified: Monday, April 29, 2013
| | | |
|
|
Modified 1/18/2008 12:55
|