(1) The superintendent of public instruction shall identify a collection of reading passages and assessment procedures that can be used to measure second grade oral reading accuracy and fluency skills. The purpose of the second grade reading assessment is to provide information to parents, teachers, and school administrators on the level of acquisition of oral reading accuracy and fluency skills of each student at the beginning of second grade. The assessment procedures and each of the reading passages in the collection must:

(a) Provide a reliable and valid measure of a student's oral reading accuracy and fluency skills;

(b) Be able to be individually administered;

(c) Have been approved by a panel of nationally recognized professionals in the area of beginning reading, whose work has been published in peer-reviewed education research journals, and professionals in the area of measurement and assessment; and

(d) Assess student skills in recognition of letter sounds, phonemic awareness, word recognition, and reading connected text. Text used for the test of fluency must be ordered in relation to difficulty.

(2) The superintendent of public instruction shall select reading passages for use by schools and school districts participating in pilot projects under RCW 28A.300.320 during the 1997-98 school year. The final collection must be selected by June 30, 1998. The superintendent of public instruction may add reading passages to the initial list if the passages are comparable in format to the initial passages approved by the expert panel in subsection (1) of this section.

(3) The superintendent of public instruction shall develop a per-pupil cost for the assessments in the collection that details the costs for administering the assessments, booklets, scoring, and training required to reliably administer the test. To the extent funds are appropriated, the superintendent of public instruction shall pay for the cost of administering and scoring the assessments, booklets or other assessment material, and training required to administer the test.

Part headings not law—1999 c 373: "Part headings used in this act are not any part of the law." [ 1999 c 373 § 601.]

Findings—1997 c 262: "The legislature acknowledges the definition of reading as "Reading is the process of constructing meaning from written text. It is the complex skill requiring the coordination of a number of interrelated sources of information." Marilyn Adams, Becoming a Nation of Readers 7. The legislature also acknowledges the role that reading accuracy and fluency plays in the comprehension of text. The legislature finds that one way to determine if a child's inability to read is problematic is to compare the child's reading fluency and accuracy skills with that of other children. To accomplish this objective, the legislature finds that assessments that test students' reading fluency and accuracy skills must be scientifically valid and reliable. The legislature further finds that early identification of students with potential reading difficulties can provide valuable information to parents, teachers, and school administrators. The legislature finds that assessment of second grade students' reading fluency and accuracy skills can assist teachers in planning and implementing a reading curriculum that addresses students' deficiencies in reading." [ 1997 c 262 § 1.]