These recommendations are intended as general guidelines. We recommend that schools and teachers be flexible and balance these scores with other knowledge about a student’s performance and the resources available for STARI classes. For example, when using Capti Assess scores to determine eligibility for STARI, schools may wish to vary the cutoff score for Reading Comprehension across grade levels. For example, a sixth or seventh grade student with a Reading Comprehension score of 248 may read on or close to grade level, particularly if he or she has strong scores across the other subtests or on other measures of reading skills. 

However, the minimum Word Recognition and Decoding score applies across grade levels. To access the STARI curriculum, students need to be able to read material at a second-grade level or higher (lexile 500, G.E. 2.5 or higher) with 95% or higher word reading accuracy (independent level). STARI is not appropriate for students who read at a first, or beginning second grade level or who have an Individualized Education Plan that specifies work with a rules-based phonics program. Students also need to have oral communication skills at an intermediate English language development (ELD) level. STARI is not appropriate for students who are English language learners at the lowest levels of ELD proficiency.

The score report makes it easy to quickly identify the students who do not need STARI. If a student has red scores across the board, s/he should be referred for further reading assessment to see if there is evidence of a language-based learning disability or other kind of profile where a rules-based phonics program would be more appropriate than STARI.

Some students will have profiles that are harder to decipher because the components are all over the spectrum. It is especially important that their teachers and their performance history play a role in their placement. A student who has a mixed profile, and who had been performing well in early grades but has been slipping in the middle grades, may have an unnoticed reading problem that could be addressed in the STARI course. No single assessment should be used to determine the placement of these mixed-profile students. Further exploration of their needs, and consideration of options available in addition to STARI, should contribute to the decision.