CTB/McGraw-Hill's Acuity Leads the Educational Assessment Industry in 2010

MONTEREY, Calif., Jan. 26, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- CTB/McGraw-Hill, a leading provider of PreK–12 and adult education assessments, today announced that 2010 was an outstanding year for the company's Acuity® InFormative Assessment™ solution. In 2010 Acuity swept the industry with three significant awards – the CODiE Award for Best Student Assessment Solution, the Tech & Learning Magazine Award of Excellence, and the District Administration Readers' Choice Top 100 Products Award. The CODiE and District Administration honors were the second wins for Acuity for those awards. Several major features were added to Acuity in 2010, and CTB also formed strategic alliances with top educational and technology organizations to offer enhanced features and classroom support services for Acuity.

Acuity's prominence is attributed to the company's commitment to meeting educator needs with innovations that capture the imagination and attention of the marketplace. The Acuity solution is a unique and results-driven solution that is palpably influencing the way educators are approaching classroom teaching and decision making.

"Acuity represents the very best of today's assessment technology," said Ellen Haley, president of CTB/McGraw-Hill. "We are so pleased with Acuity's success and its acceptance by educators.  For 85 years, CTB has been a leader in applying research and innovative product development to advance assessment excellence. CTB strives to provide educators with the best available assessment content, data and technology, in order for them to provide targeted instruction, based on accurate, real-time student data. Acuity is the latest in a long line of innovations from CTB that drive effective and efficient instruction."

Acuity is a groundbreaking interim and formative assessment solution that helps teachers quickly and accurately measure student performance and use assessment data to deliver targeted, individualized instruction. Used by more than 65,000 teachers and 1.5 million students nationwide, Acuity reflects a new generation of assessments, which actively engage educators by supporting their efforts to deliver better, data-informed instruction. Acuity is a complete system, offering ongoing skills measurement, data analysis, in-depth reporting, and resources for specialized instruction and intervention. CTB also offers corresponding implementation and support services, as well as professional development services and an online community.

Major Acuity highlights of 2010 are presented below:

AWARDS

CODiE – For the second consecutive year, Acuity was recognized by the Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA) as the "Best Student Assessment Solution." CODiE Awards are the education industry's only peer-reviewed awards and are highly influential in the educational technology market.

Tech & Learning Magazine Awards of Excellence – Acuity was designated a winner of "Best Upgraded Product" for new applications of educational technology that make significant enhancements to existing products.

District Administration Reader's Choice Top 100 Products Award – Acuity was named by the readers of District Administration as one of the Top 100 products for 2010. This award recognizes outstanding products that help educators teach more effectively.

NEW PROGRAMS AND FEATURES

Two new programs were released:

• Acuity PhD™ – An online professional development library with one- to two-hour video courses targeted to specific educator roles.
• Acuity Online Community – An online forum where Acuity users collaborate, exchange ideas, and make suggestions for future product enhancements. The Community includes live webinars, best practices articles, interactive tutorials, training materials, and videos.

Several new features were added to the Acuity assessment:

• Auto Assign - Automatically assigns instructional resources to students based on their Acuity assessment results.
• Self-Service Roster – Multiple enhancements to self-service rosters enable more comprehensive reporting and keep Acuity synchronized with student populations.  
• Custom Test Builder – Several updates provide more flexibility in creating custom assessments.
• Embedded Video Tutorials – Provides direct access from the Acuity Menu to online "how-to" videos.
• Data Extract – Adds the ability to extract the results of student assessments for additional analysis and for loading into longitudinal data warehouses.
• Instructional Resource Report – Generates reports of the results of an entire class's performance on Acuity's embedded instructional resources.

STRATEGIC ALLIANCES

Battelle for Kids – CTB formed an alliance with Battelle for Kids, a national, not-for-profit organization that provides strategic counsel and solutions to educational institutions. Online educator professional development courses developed by Battelle for Kids are now available with Acuity.

Promethean – CTB formed an alliance with Promethean, linking the Promethean ActivExpression Learner Response Devices ("clickers") to Acuity. The alliance allows educators to administer assessments using the wireless ActivExpressions instead of pencils and paper or computer terminals. Promethean joins eInstruction™ and Qwizdom® as a provider of clickers for Acuity UnWired™.

"CTB is continually improving and advancing Acuity as well as all of our assessments based on rigorous educational research as well as customer input and feedback," added Haley. "Throughout our history, CTB has consistently employed the latest ideas and introduced robust assessment solutions to empower educators to improve student achievement. We look forward to continuing this tradition in 2011 and into the future."

About CTB/McGraw-Hill

CTB/McGraw-Hill has an 85-year record of innovation and excellence in assessment, and serves more than 18 million students in all 50 states and in 46 countries. One of the first American publishers to introduce objective, standardized achievement tests to schools, today CTB/McGraw-Hill is a leader in testing with recognized products for online formative, adult, and language proficiency assessment. Dedicated to advancing the use of student performance data to inform instructional decision-making, CTB/McGraw-Hill's innovation continues today with technologies that include Web-based assessment and reporting, student response device (clicker) software, and artificial intelligence for automated scoring of student essays. CTB/McGraw-Hill is part of McGraw-Hill Education, a division of The McGraw-Hill Companies (NYSE: MHP). McGraw-Hill Education is a leading global provider of instructional, assessment and reference solutions that empower professionals and students of all ages. For more information, visit CTB.com.

SOURCE CTB/McGraw-Hill