SOSCA Home Page

SOSCA:
Secondary On Screen Curriculum Assessments

SOSCA is a suite of curriculum-based assessments designed to measure pupil progress in Maths, Science and Reading at age 14 (Year 9*/S2). It offers an efficient and cost effective alternative to Key Stage 3 SATs and is administered via the computer during a pre-defined testing window in April/May each year. *In Northern Ireland this is Year 10.

Who can participate?

Any school that wants to know how their pupils are performing relative to the curriculum and against other pupils in the sample;
Schools that are interested in seeing how much progress (value-added) their pupils have made, both during the lower part of secondary school (from the MidYIS baseline test) and during the last two years of compulsory schooling (from SOSCA to external examinations).

Curriculum coverage

We have paid careful attention to the different curricula in different countries to make SOSCA suitable for schools following:

Scottish 5-14 Curriculum Guidelines
Independent schools' curricula
The National Curriculum in Wales
The Northern Ireland Curriculum
The English National Curriculum
International schools following any of the above

Particular care has been taken to cater for a wide range of abilities.

The tests themselves are adaptive, ensuring that pupils are presented with items suited to their ability, meaning a more pleasant testing experience for all.

SOSCA is one of the latest monitoring systems offered by the Curriculum, Evaluation and Management Centre at Durham University home of MidYIS, Yellis and Alis.

See the Introduction for a more detailed description of SOSCA.
See the SOSCA Site Map to see what web pages are available.

SOSCA's home page is www.soscaproject.org.

SOSCA Value Added Feedback available from 27 June 2008 (from MidYIS, where appropriate)

Schools have been notified by email and letter.

SOSCA Attainment and Predictions Feedback available from 30 May 2008

Schools have been notified by email and letter that their feedback is available from the SOSCA+ secure website.
Comments from schools: "...very impressed by the speed of getting the feedback".
"The software worked well and we had NO problems."

SOSCA Example Feedback updated for 2008

View or download the PDF file from the Downloads page.
New addition: SOSCA Attitudes to Science survey - example report. The survey itself is described on the Feedback page.

Registration deadline is now 21st April 2008.

We can accept registrations right up to the beginning of the testing window: 21^st April to 16^th May 2008.

SOSCA Coordinator Guide now available for 2008

This more compact Coordinator Guide replaces the Guides previously available. View or download the PDF file from the Downloads page.

CEM Centre conferences now include SOSCA

Our secondary conferences are now planned to include information about using SOSCA.
The next one is on the 4th & 5th June 2008 at The Novotel Hotel in London.

For full details see the Secondary Conferences web page.

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