September 2, 2015
Dear Higley Unified School District 4th Grade Parents,
This letter, provided to all parents with a child in fourth grade, is intended to provide information
on Arizona’s Move On When Reading (MOWR) law and the importance it places on your child’s
ability to read at or above grade level. Arizona Revised Statute § 15-701 states that if data on the
third grade statewide reading assessment is available at the end of the school year and
demonstrates that a student scores at the lower end of the “Minimally Proficient” proficiency
level, the student shall not be promoted from the third grade. The Arizona Department of
Education expects to release the exact cut score used for determining promotion/retention later
this fall.
During the 2014-2015 school year, the new statewide assessment, AzMERIT, was given for the
first time. As is common with administering a new assessment in its first year, release of the
student scores will not occur until later this fall. Consequently, schools did not have student
scores on AzMERIT in order to determine whether a student should be retained, which means
the MOWR law could not be applied to retention decisions for the 2014-2015 third graders.
Please note, this change in determining retention was put in place only for the 2014-2015 school
year. Application of the MOWR law will resume in the 2015-2016 school year.
Since AzMERIT scores from Spring 2015 will be received this fall, school districts and charters
must use the scores to identify fourth grade students who scored below the MOWR cut score on
the third grade statewide reading assessment in Spring 2015. Furthermore, schools and charters
must provide each fourth grade student performing below the MOWR cut score with at least one
of the four intervention/remedial strategies identified by the State Board.
ARS § 15-701 – The four interventions are:
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A requirement that the pupil be assigned to a different teacher for reading instruction
A summer school reading instruction
Intensive reading instruction that occurs before, during, or after the regular school day
Online reading instruction
If your child’s score shows he/she scored low on the Spring 2015 third grade statewide reading
assessment, your child is entitled to receive one or more of these reading interventions. Please
contact your child’s school if you have any questions about this new policy.
Sincerely,
Mrs. Sheryl Rednor
Director of Curriculum and Instruction
Dr. Steve Nance
Assistant Superintendent