Accurate Scoring of Student Responses Demands Continued Growth

“It is not just a test booklet, it is a real live person we are trying to help by accurately assessing his or her strengths and weakness in a given area of learning,” says Armando “Dino” Anzures, Measured Progress director of scoring services. “So it is extremely important that we do a good job of scoring for every student.”

Anzures has led the Measured Progress scoring department since 2004. His experienced team, numbering 34 staff members, manages and trains thousands of temporary employees at locations across the country to accurately and consistently score student responses to open-response test items in state assessments. 

Anzures came to the assessment industry after a career with the U.S. Air Force. He joined CTB/McGraw-Hill as a scorer and soon was promoted to table leader and then supervisor. Eventually, as scoring manager, he was responsible for opening the Indiana scoring facilities in Indianapolis and Clarksville. He also directed the development and implementation of standard operating procedures. 

Anzures’s experience in setting up large operations stems from his international management background as a senior military officer responsible for the formulation, implementation, and application of communications computer systems worldwide. He managed professional staff that supported more than 500 unit organizations and approximately 120,000 military personnel. 

At Measured Progress, Anzures once again started with a small team and built an extensive operation. “The most exciting achievement during my time at Measured Progress has been the growth of our scoring capacity and our staffing. We currently have 1,175 computer scoring work stations that we use in two shifts at four sites in Dover, New Hampshire; Troy, New York; Longmont, Colorado; and Louisville, Kentucky.” 

Last year, Measured Progress opened the Colorado and Kentucky facilities to help accommodate the company’s growth and multi-year, multi-million dollar contracts such as the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System, the New England Common Assessment Program, and the Kentucky Commonwealth Accountability Testing System. Computer stations for 432 scorers are set up in the 30,000-square-feet Kentucky facility. The facility in Colorado provides 35,000 square feet of space for scoring operations, with 455 scoring workstations. During peak hours, each facility employs more than 800 test readers. 

The addition of these facilities has more than tripled test reader workstations. Anzures expects to fill all of these workstations to capacity, during both daytime and evening shifts. “In 2004, we scored around four million test questions,” he says. “We scored 25 million in 2006 and more than 31 million student responses in 2008.”  

“In addition, Measured Progress now has the option to add more workstations through our iScore Web-based scoring system,” says Anzures, using seasonal facilities such as the State University of New York, the Christian Brothers Academy in Sento, and others. “During our peak work period this year, we had 1,600 to 1,700 scorers working in two shifts, which in the course of the year accounts for more than 3,000 individual, temporary staffing assignments.” 

“In order to support our increased capacity and large number of temporary employees, it has been necessary to increase our full-time staffing,” Anzures adds. “I feel blessed to have a very talented, versatile, and dedicated group of team players that pull together to meet our mutual goals and objectives. It’s not a me thing, it’s a we thing!” 

While managing daily scoring activities, Anzures has been involved in the successful development and implementation of complex scoring technologies. During his first years in educational testing, “I started with paper-and-pencil systems, and went through the whole development of electronic scoring.” 

Clients continually ask for faster delivery of test results. Online testing can now provide instant results for multiple-choice test questions. Students will soon be able to type their responses to open-response questions into the online form, allowing for immediate delivery to a scorer’s computer and streamlining the scoring process. “We can start scoring immediately,” says Anzures. “And the digitized form of student responses will soon allow us to use artificial intelligence scoring. We are looking at various systems available on the market.” 

As Measured Progress scoring operations continue to grow and improve, Anzures can rely on an experienced scoring leadership team. “We are here to provide insight, improve processes, and make the workflow more efficient. I feel comfortable about the competence of our staff and the capacity of our systems,” he says. “Every student response we score accurately leads to correct test results and improved student learning.”