Students Shatter Accelerated Reader Record Taking 3,581,992 AR Quizzes in One Day

WISCONSIN RAPIDS, Wis., March 5, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Students nationwide took part in "Read The Most From Coast to Coast" on March 2, shattering the record for the number of Accelerated Reader Quizzes taken in one day. The event challenged students to take more than 2,177,586 quizzes. More than 20,000 educators registered and students coast to coast took part, exceeding the national record at 12:15 p.m., CST, and taking a grand total of 3,581,992 quizzes.

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The Renaissance Learning event, which prompted students to "Succeed in Reading Together," was created to help  educators encourage students at all grade levels to engage in valuable reading practice and join in a shared challenge. Educators were able to track progress toward the national goal through a live online quiz counter.

Accelerated Reader, the most widely used K12 reading management software program, helps educators encourage reading practice and improve reading comprehension levels. Students read a book at the appropriate level and then take a quiz. Accelerated Reader scores the quiz, monitors results, and provides immediate feedback. In addition to being the world's most popular reading software, Accelerated Reader serves as the largest single database of student book-reading behavior. The database contains records for more than 7.6 million K12 students who read more than 240 million books during the 2010-2011 school year. Accelerated Reader tracks all aspects of student reading, such as titles of books read, quiz scores, and book readability levels.

"Accelerated Reader's capabilities have increased dramatically since the software was introduced to schools more than 25 years ago," said Renaissance Learning Chief Executive Officer Glenn James. "Five years ago, a web-based version of Accelerated Reader was introduced and the vast majority of schools using AR now use our hosted platform.  This event was just one example of advanced technology helping to encourage reading practice and provide instant feedback to educators about each student's reading progress."

Educators with the AR Enterprise hosted platform have access to more than 140,000 AR Quizzes. Accelerated Reader has Reading Practice and Recorded Voice Quizzes in English and Spanish, Vocabulary Practice, Literacy Skills, and Textbook Quizzes. Educators using the hosted version also have the ability to enable students to take AR Quizzes at their desks and receive results immediately on their iPhone®, iPad®, or iPod touch®. Parents can track their child's progress using Renaissance Home Connect. More information on AR can be found at www.renlearn.com/ar.

About Renaissance Learning, Inc.

Renaissance Learning, Inc. is a leading provider of technology-based school improvement and student assessment programs for K12 schools.  Renaissance Learning's tools provide daily formative assessment and periodic progress-monitoring technology to enhance core curriculum, support differentiated instruction, and personalize practice in reading, writing and math. Renaissance Learning products and school improvement programs help educators make the practice component of their existing curriculum more effective by providing tools to personalize practice and easily manage the daily activities for students of all levels. As a result, teachers using Renaissance Learning products and programs accelerate learning, get more satisfaction from teaching, and help students achieve higher test scores on state and national tests.

SOURCE Renaissance Learning, Inc.