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East Ridge Middle School Letterhead

Dear Parent/Guardian,

The Florida Assessment of Student Thinking (FAST) is a progress monitoring tool that will be administered three times per year to track your student’s progress in learning the Benchmarks of Excellent Student Thinking (B.E.S.T.) Standards throughout this school year. The purpose of this letter is to inform you that your student will participate in the first administration (PM1) of the Grade 6-8 Florida Assessment of Student Thinking (FAST) Reading assessment on September 8, 2022, and the Grade 6-8 Florida Assessment of Student Thinking (FAST) Mathematics assessment on September 13, 2022. Your student’s results from PM1 are for informational purposes only, and your student’s school will provide you with information about how to access the results after testing is completed.

FAST assessments are computer-adaptive tests taken on a computer or tablet. The questions get easier or more difficult depending on how the student responds, and each student will see different questions from a common item bank. Each test attempt (PM1, PM2, and PM3) will present 35–40 items that will cover the entire test “blueprint,” meaning students will encounter items representative of the standards within the subject or grade level. For more information on the test design, please visit https://www.fldoe.org/accountability/assessments/k-12-student-assessment/best/. If you or your student would like to interact with the online testing platform or review FAST Reading and Mathematics sample items at home, sample test materials are available at https://flfast.org/families.html.

If you have any questions related to this test administration, you may contact Bridgitte Marshburn at MarshburnB@lake.k12.fl.us.

For more information about the FAST program, please visit the portal at FLFAST.org.

Thank you for supporting your student and encouraging him or her to do his or her best during this test administration.

Sincerely,

Jamie M. Sidoruk

Principal

Testing Protocol

  • Students should bring fully charged Chromebook to all testing sessions
  • Students should have photo ID (high school students) to present to test administrator
  • Students should have a small bag to keep personal items such as phones and other electronics while they are in the testing environment
  • Students must completely turn off all cell phones (power off, not on silent or vibrate) and alarms. 
  • Student may not be in possession of electronic devices, such as smart phones, wireless ear buds, smart watches,  at any time during testing--including breaks.