WVHS is first high school in
area to participate in "College and
Work Readiness Assessment"

March 2012 - This year, Warwick Valley High School freshmen and seniors are participating in the “College and Work Readiness Assessment” (CWRA).

This test asks students to construct written responses to hypothetical dilemmas. The CWRA is widely used by colleges to measure student ability in critical thinking, creative problem solving, and written response. A handful of competitive high schools across the country now use this assessment to collect data to inform instruction. Warwick Valley High School is proud to be the first high school in our area to offer this assessment to students.

The CWRA website states that the test “is…an assessment that tests high school students on their 21st Century skills of critical thinking, analytic reasoning, problem solving, and written communication; skills that are necessary in work and college environments in the 21st Century.”

The assessment is used to measure how well-prepared high school seniors are for college. Warwick’s seniors competed against other high-performing schools that took the CWRA, and in the first year of participation performed at the 70th percentile (scored better than 70 percent who took the test).

For Warwick’s administrators, the data show potential areas for improvement, both in what students are being taught and teachers are teaching. Analyzing the data and addressing possible areas for improvement, it is hoped, will help build a better school for Warwick students.

Members of The Council for Aid to Education (CAE), the nonprofit organization that created the CWRA, recently gave a presentation at a Board of Education meeting about the assessment and the results for WVHS.
Click here to view slides from the presentation. (pdf) (Warwick Valley High School's Fall 2011 CWRA Results begin on page 50 of the presentation.)

To learn more about this assessment, click here to visit the CWRA website.