As the school year is well underway, I know that many of you are starting preparations for the 2025 ACT. As our shared students enrolled in the RVA from our consortium districts test within their resident districts for the ACT, we wanted to provide you with all of the information you will need to make sure they are ready to test with you.

Please be sure to share this information with anyone involved with organizing the ACT Testing in your district. And please don't hesitate to let the RVA know if you have any questions!

Consortium districts are responsible for initiating and maintaining communications with our shared students regarding state testing.  Districts have access to the list of students enrolled in the RVA in their Student Information System (Skyward, Infinite Campus, PowerSchool, etc). Consortium RVA student lists can also be accessed on our Partner Portal. Please review your list of students currently enrolled in the RVA. You can also see if any students have IEPs, 504 Accommodation Plans, or are identified as EL in the portal to determine if ACT Accommodation or English Learner requests need to be made for them.

Please be sure to contact all of the grade 11 students enrolled in the RVA from your district to notify them of the days, times and locations of the ACT meetings and tests. Also, please be sure to provide them with any other important ACT information pertaining to their district.

Consortium districts have access to their student's contact information within their Student Information System. Consortium district student rosters are also available on the Partner Portal. When in the enrollment portal, click on your district, then click on the Access View-Only Document button, then please scroll over to the tab titled "24/25 Full-time RVA Students."  

The RVA will be sending out an email to the families of our grade 11 students enrolled from our consortium districts letting them know that someone from their resident district will be contacting them prior to March with information regarding the ACT test.

The RVA will provide students with a variety of options for ACT Test Prep. All RVA students are provided with access to an Odysseyware ACT Prep course. Staff also offer numerous online informational meetings and ACT Practice Sessions to students and parents.

While the RVA does offer quite a bit of ACT test prep, if consortium districts have informational meetings or practice sessions that they feel would be appropriate for their RVA students to participate in, please be sure to invite them!

Consortium districts will need to request ACT-approved accommodations and/or supports for their RVA students through the ACT Test Accessibility and Accommodations system (TAA) for students with an IEP, 504, or are identied as an English Learner. The ACT Accommodations requests need to be submitted to ACT by January 24, 2025. 

CONSENT TO RELEASE INFORMATION TO ACT

Please make sure to obtain consent to release information to the ACT for requesting accommodations for all RVA students. This form needs to be completed stating permission was received that allows you to share information with ACT. It has to be submitted before accommodations are requested.

Each of the RVA's consortium districts holds their students' IEPs, 504s, and EL Plans. However, if you have questions regarding which accommodations and/or supports students need, please be sure to reach out to the RVA High School's Special Education Team.

Sam Penry - RVA Director of Special Education (sam.penry@ruralvirtual.org)
Nicole Wolf - RVA Assistant Director of Special Education (nicole.wolf@ruralvirtual.org)              Carrie LeMahieu - RVA School Psychologist (carrie.lemahieu@ruralvirtual.org)
Jill Chasteen - RVA Special Ed Student Services Coordinator (jill.chasteen@ruralvirtual.org)

RVA students should appear in your Pearson Access Next portal by the end of the verification window and should be coded correctly to the RVA ACT Reporting High School Code of 500003. Please make sure to confirm the RVA students are in your portal, have the correct ACT High School Code, and that the modality of testing (paper or online) is correct.  

State statute allows parents/guardians the right to opt their child out of state testing in grade 11. This request may come at any time during the testing window. While the RVA highly encourages all high school students to participate in state testing, there are RVA parents/guardians who do opt their child out of ACT testing. 

Please notify Kathy Alexander (kathy.alexander@ruralvirtual.org) of any students who opt out of testing. All students excused by parent opt-outs are marked as "not tested" students in school and district reporting.

Within two days of taking the ACT, all students testing need to complete the non-test portions of the ACT in their MyACT account. The RVA Student Services Team will work with all students to complete their MyACT required non-test information prior to the March 11th test date. If a student does not complete it by this date, please have the student complete it with you either before or after ACT testing.

RVA Students should take their ACT with the other students testing in their district. If a student is approved for ACT accommodations, consortium districts will need to provide them. However, there is an extended testing window for students with accommodations.

While the ACT results should be sent to the RVA, if they do get sent to the student 's consortium district, we'd appreciate if our partner districts could mail them to the RVA, as the RVA holds all student cumulative les.

Rural Virtual Academy
Attn: Kathy Alexander
624 College Street, Room 104
Medford, WI 54451

If you have any questions regarding RVA ACT Testing, please don't hesitate to contact us!

Sara Holewinski
Administrator of Teaching & Learning
✉️ sara.holewinski@ruralvirtual.org
📞 888-801-2666 ext 8825

Kathy Alexander 
High School Principal
✉️ kathy.alexander@ruralvirtual.org
📞 888-801-2666 ext 8827

Jill Chasteen
Special Education Student Services Coordinator
✉️ jill.chasteen@ruralvirtual.org
📞 888-801-2666 ext 8851