Littleton Public Schools, like every district in Colorado, is required to assess all of its students. State law (Section 22-7-409(1.2)(I)(A), C.R.S.) requires that every student enrolled in a public school take the state's assessments..  

The district believes that participation in these assessments provides parents and guardians very important data and information that includes:

• academic achievement data which indicates progress toward achieving career and college readiness;
• academic growth data which indicates progress through the academic standards;
• diagnostic information that will help teachers and schools make instructional and placement decisions as well as monitor progress.

Additionally, the data provided by the state assessments are important to the school and district. Schools and teachers use this data for a variety of purposes; as part of the body of evidence of student learning, for school improvement, and for program decisions such as intervention and enrichment opportunities.  This data provide the district with external measures which schools use to make instructional decisions and evaluate instructional programming.

For the broader Littleton community, accurate assessment results, which measure our expectations for students, are a critical indicator of the academic health of the overall school and district. Littleton Public Schools and the community place a high value on our performance and district accreditation rating. This rating is based on several measures including student achievement, student growth, growth gaps, graduation rates, dropout rates, and ACT scores. A high level of student participation in the state assessment (95 percent participation) is a factor in our ability to maintain our rating of Accredited with Distinction - the highest level of academic accreditation given by the state.

The Littleton Public Schools website has information about Assessments and Schedules.

Please see our Assessment FAQs for additional information.

State law also requires that the district have a process for parents/guardians who wish to exempt their child from certain state assessments.  This process is outlined in our Board of Education policy regulation IKA-R-2 State Assessment Exemption Procedures.  A letter that parents/guardians may use to exempt their child can be found in Board of Education policy exhibit IKA-E Board Docs.