I am also on the 267 list serv and received this. I am not a MISIC
school and don't MAP test so I don't have anything but anecdotal
information.
I will add my experience for the first week. I will start with a snip
of the email I sent our staff after day 2
--snip--
WARNING--you may not be happy after reading this. . . .
after two days of MAP testing at the elem, we are in the same boat as
every other district I have heard of this fall. The general consensus
is MAP testing is a hit-or-miss undertaking at this time.
Yesterday (day 1) went pretty well for our testing with the only
issues being for about 8-10 kids at the end of the day. They answered
all of the questions and then the program crashed on them before
reaching the score screen. (tech support was aware of this issue but
has no fix at the present time) However scores should still be valid
and reportable, etc. I would give the testing day about an A-.
Today (day 2) was more similar to what other schools have been
reporting. mostly good through the first group of testers. We could
only get about half the second group to get to the testing stage.
Understandably, those teachers decided to try again another day hoping
to be able to test everyone at the same time instead of only part of
the class. After some changes that would hopefully help, we were able
to test almost all of the third group. Still not successful with at
least a couple of the kids. I give the testing day a D --we were
able to test over half of the students we tried, but with much headache.
after spending 1.5-2 hours on the phone with tech support with them
giving me suggestions that "might" help, they did admit that they are
"experiencing extremely high levels of support calls" due to problems
with the testtaker program. They said solving these issues has the
"highest priority possible" but they also indicated that there is no
imminent solution coming. Their suggestion is basically to limp
through this testing session and they hope to have it fixed by next
time.
Sooooo, all of this to say, after having our most trouble free year
of testing in 08-09, be prepared for probably our most troubling test
session this fall. I ask for your patience with the proctors and me.
Please also consider testing scenarios different than the planned
schedules if that means we can get-er-done.
--end snip--
now some background. I was running the NWEA sharepoint (using afp) on
an emac (10.3.9) -I know what a power beast, but it actually has
worked very well for the last several years and that is all that it
does. at the elem machines are a mix of PPC (80%) and intel (20%) all
running 10.5.6. We started with 6.0.2 on the PPC machines and 6.1 on
the intels-because NWEA said we were supposed to use the newer
version! I also tried 6.4 on the intels.
I will say that days 3 and 4 of elem testing went very well. I
switched to connecting via smb and using 6.0.2 on all (PPC and Intel)
machines. also throw in a couple of server restarts to make everyone
happy and off we went.
Now I only get to worry how it will work at my HS next week where I am
90% intel and 10% PPC and testing 70+ at a time instead of 50 at a time.
may the road rise up to meet you, may the sun shine at your back and
may testtaker not bite you in the rear.
On Sep 18, 2009, at 12:29 PM, Randy Baker wrote:
Not sure of what the problem is.
We started our MS testing Wed with a mix of iBooks running
10.4.11(TT 6.0.2) to iMacs(Intel) 10.4.11(TT 6.4) to iMacs(new this
summer) running 10.5.6 and TT 6.4. Went flawlessly. Matter a fact
the intel iMacs ran faster than I have ever seen MAP testing run. So
I am thinking great.
Thu we started our Elem (k-4). Combo of iBooks like above and
macbooks running 10.4.11 with TT 6.4. Constant crashes, freeze ups
and other isues pretty much like others have talked about with the
macbooks. Today I took all of those back to TT 6.0.2 and we have had
only one issue come up which seems to be connected to a single
question on the Primary grades test.
Monday we start at the HS which is identical to the MS set up so
will see what happens.
All of our servers are 10.4.8.
On Sep 18, 2009, at 10:51 AM, Geoff Tessau wrote:
I wonder if it is related to 10.5.6. My labs are 10.5.6 at the MS
where the problems were, but Ackley which ran fine is only at 10.5.4
------------------------------------------------------------
Geoff Tessau
On Sep 17, 2009, at 12:48 PM, Mark Culver wrote:
Howdy,
I had many of the same problems as Geoff for MAP. However I am
still
running a 10.4 server. The new 10.5.6 machines crashed halfway
through testing and froze everything. As soon as I shut down the
lab
the 10.4 machines came back online and started spitting out scores.
We decided not to use the new iMacs and just finished testing on the
our older labs. After the initial two day disaster that seemed to
solve our problems. We were running the newer version of
Testtaker as
well - 6.2? However this was installed this summer, leads me to
wonder if NWEA updated Testtaker and didn't bother to say anything.
So my week of joy is over, and I wish you all the best of luck!
Mark
Have a GREAT day!
Scott Swartz
Technology Director
Eldora-New Providence Schools
1010 Edgington
Eldora, IA 50627
voice: 641-939-5631 ext 1103
fax: 641-939-5057
Karl H. Hehr
Technology/Curriculum Director
South Hamilton CSD
www.s-hamilton.k12.ia.us
515.827.5418 (W)
515.209.9767 (C)
515.827.5368 (F)
Luddite by Degrees
1) Anything that is in the world when you're born is normal and
ordinary and is just a natural part of the way the world works.
2) Anything that's invented between when you're 15 and 35 is new and
exciting and revolutionary and you can probably get a career in it.
3) Anything invented after you're 35 is again the natural order of
things
--- Douglas Adams
On Sep 28, 2009, at 10:23 AM, Jackie Fonley wrote:
Has anyone who has tested MAP this fall had bad experience with the
science tests? We are having MAJOR slowdowns with the science test
beginning last week. Not sure if it's something locally so I
thought I'd check. We were running fine until then.
?
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