The Effect of Florida Assessments for Instruction in Reading Programs on Florida Standards Assessments Test Score

The United States public school system has annual reporting measures that have been set up to hold local school districts and teachers accountable to the U.S. Department of Education for students' academic success. In particular, reading comprehension and literacy skills have been a focal point for public schools across the nation. The Florida Department of Education adopted the Florida Standards Assessments (FSA) in 2014 as its annual standardized testing instrument and provided schools with the Florida Assessments for Instruction in Reading-Florida Standards (FAIR-FS) diagnostic program to prepare students for success on the FSA. The specific problem addressed in this study was the predictive qualities of the FAIR-FS program on the FSA-ELA (English language arts). To test the null hypothesis in this study, a linear regression analysis of archival data examined the relationship between a random sample of third-grade students' FSA-ELA test scores and the FAIR-FS. This study also evaluated the potential correlation between student ethnicity and successful reading test scores from the FAIR-FS and FSA-ELA. The data supported the hypothesis of a significant correlation [F(2,97) = 37.40, p < .001, with an adjusted R squared value of .42] between the FAIR-FS as a predictor of students' achievement scores on the FSA-ELA. Contrariwise, the data showed no relationship between student ethnicity and passing FSA-ELA test scores with the FAIR-FS as a predictive tool. Recommendations for future research include exploring the effects of the FAIR-FS and the FSA-ELA from other school years, incorporate additional categories of student ethnicity beyond the scope of this study, expand this analysis in other Florida school districts, include the ELL and ESE student populations, and other grade-levels such as middle and high school.