SECTION I: MAJOR PROVISIONS OF OHIO ADMINISTRATIVE CODE RULE 3301-7-01 (C) In monitoring practices related to preparing students for an assessment, each school district shall use, but not be limited to the following standards for determining what practices are unethical and/or inappropriate: (1) Any preparation activity that undermines the reliability and/or validity of inferences drawn from the assessment results; (2) Any practice that results solely in raising scores or performance levels on a specific assessment instrument, without simultaneously increasing the student’s achievement level as measured by other tasks and/or instruments designed to assess the same domain; (3) Any practice involving the reproduction of actual assessment materials, through any medium, for use in preparing students for an assessment; (4) Any preparation activity that includes questions, tasks, graphs, charts, passages or other materials included in the assessment instrument or in a parallel form of the instrument, and/or materials that are paraphrases or highly similar in content to those in actual use; (5) Preparation for the assessment focuses primarily on the assessment instrument or a parallel form of instrument, including its format, rather than on the objectives being assessed; (6) Any practice that does not comply with, or has the appearance of not complying with, statutory and/or regulatory provisions related to security of assessment instruments used in schoolwide or districtwide programs; and (7) Any practice that supports or assists others in conducting unethical or inappropriate preparation activities. (D) Except as specifically permitted by written instructions provided by the developer or as provided through an individualized education program (IEP), each school district shall use, but not be limited to, the following standards for determining what practices related to administering and scoring assessments are unethical and/or inappropriate: (1) Any assessment instrument used for purposes other than that for which the instrument has been validated; (2) Any practice resulting in a potential conflict of interest or one that exerts undue influence on those administering or scoring the assessment, making the assessment process unfair to some examinees; (3) Any modification in procedures for administering and/or scoring the assessment that results in nonstandard and/or delimiting conditions for one or more students; (4) Any practice that allows persons without sufficient and appropriate knowledge and skills to administer and/or score the assessment; (5) Any administration or scoring practice that produces results contaminated by factors not relevant to the purpose(s) of the assessment; (6) Any practice excluding one or more students from an assessment solely because the student has not performed well, or may not perform well, on the assessment and/or because the aggregate performance of the group may be affected; (7) Any practice such as a gesture, facial expression, use of body language, comment, or any other action that guides students’ responses during an assessment; (8) Any practice such as providing to students, either immediately preceding or during administration of an assessment, any definitions of words or terms contained in the actual assessment instrument; (9) Any practice such as erasing, darkening, or rewriting, or in any other way correcting or altering student responses to an assessment task either during or following the administration of an assessment. (10) Any practice that supports or assists others in unethical or inappropriate practices during administration and/or scoring of assessments. (E) In monitoring practices related to interpreting and/or using assessment results, each district shall use, but not be limited to, the following standards for determining what practices are unethical and/or inappropriate: (1) Providing interpretations of, and/or using, assessment results in a manner and/or for a purpose that has not been validated; (2) Making false, misleading, or inappropriate statements and/or unsubstantiated claims that lead to false or misleading conclusions about assessment results; (3) Any practice that permits certificated employees or volunteers without the necessary knowledge and skills to interpret the results of an assessment; (4) Any practice that violates, or places at risk, the confidentiality of individually identifiable information; (5) Any practice that provides an interpretation, or suggests uses, of assessment results without due consideration of the purpose(s) for the assessment, the limitations of the assessment, the examinee characteristics, any irregularities in administering and/or scoring the assessment, or other factors affecting the results; and (6) Any practice that supports or leads others to interpret or use assessment results in unethical or inappropriate ways. (F) Chartered nonpublic schools that administer state proficiency tests shall apply the standards contained in this rule to determine whether or not unethical and/or inappropriate practices are used by staff or volunteers to prepare students for, administer or score, and/or interpret or use the results from these tests. (G) Each school district and participating chartered nonpublic school shall cooperate with the state board of education conducting an investigation of alleged unethical assessment practices by school district employees or volunteers. SECTION II: MAJOR PROVISIONS OF OHIO ADMINISTRATIVE CODE RULE 3301-13-05 (A) All assessment questions and all other assessment materials, which are considered part of an assessment, including, but not limited to, oral or written directions, reading passages, writing prompts or styles, charts, graphs, maps, and tables shall be considered secure, thus prohibiting any person from revealing any specific question and/or materials that a person knows are part of an assessment. (C) The assessment materials that are specifically designated as “practice tests” and any assessment released by the department of education as a public record are not considered secure. (D) Persons designated as test coordinators shall ensure that all assessment security provisions are met while assessment materials remain in a school district or participating school. (E) Persons designated as examiners shall ensure that all assessment provisions are met while each assessment administration session, including makeup sessions, is in progress and account for all assessment booklets by serial number, all CDs containing English audio and foreign language translations of the assessments, all answer documents, and all tape recorded student responses from the translation sessions received from a building test coordinator, until such time that an examiner returns said assessment materials to the building test coordinator. (F) No person shall reveal, cause to be revealed, release, cause to be released, reproduce, or cause to be reproduced any secure assessment materials through any means or medium including, but not limited to, electronic, photographic, photocopy, written, paraphrase, or oral. (G) No unauthorized person shall be permitted to be in an assessment room during any assessment session or be permitted to have access to any secure assessment materials at any time such materials are in a school district or participating school. (H) Each school district and participating school shall establish written procedures to protect the security of the assessment materials from the time such materials are received in the school district or participating school until they are returned to the district’s central collection location and from there shipped to the scoring contractor. (I) Any alleged assessment security violation of an ethical testing practice, this rule, or the school’s security procedures must be reported to the department of education as soon as it becomes known to the school district or participating school. (J) By the first of October of each school year, each school district and participating school shall communicate in writing and discuss with all employees who have access to the secure assessment materials and students who are being tested the applicable written security procedures and actions to be taken in response to any violations established pursuant to paragraph (H) of this rule. Students and staff shall be reminded orally of these provisions prior to the beginning of each assessment administration period by an assessment coordinator and examiner. | 