Each report places a child at one of five levels that the State Board of Education set in September. The state says this year's results should not be compared directly with earlier years.
New Jersey school districts had until Monday to send families the first reports from the state's new English and math test, according to the New Jersey Department of Education.
The state Department of Education presented the results to the State Board of Education on Nov. 4, noting that "because multiple components changed for English Language Arts and Mathematics simultaneously, 2026 results establish a new baseline and should not be directly compared with prior years."
Under state law, the State Board of Education sets the department's policies and votes on its biggest decisions, including the score a student needs to reach each level. The Education Commissioner, Lily Laux as of Nov. 2026, runs the department day to day, tests included.
According to the department's presentation, the test measures the state's 2023 learning standards for English and math, adjusts its questions to each student and reports results in five redesigned levels.
Results took longer this year, according to the state Education Department's online FAQ on the new tests. The state had to set the new levels, and the score needed for each, after students took the test and before any score could go out. The department's July presentation to the State Board named a second reason: the hand scoring of a large volume of English writing responses.
The report places each child on a five-level bar
On a sample report the department posted, each subject shows the child's level and score on a bar marked with all five levels. The words "on track for next grade level" run under Levels 4 and 5, and "may need additional support" runs under Levels 1, 2 and 3.
The State Board's resolution names the five levels: Level 1, Did Not Yet Meet Expectations; Level 2, Partially Met Expectations; Level 3, Approaching Expectations; Level 4, Met Expectations; and Level 5, Exceeded Expectations.
Students at Level 4 or 5 should do well in the next grade, according to the department's score interpretation guide. Level 4 students may need some brief, focused help, and Level 5 students hardly any.
At Level 3, the guide expects a child to manage with some focused help. At Levels 1 and 2, the next grade is unlikely to go well without continuing help, and a Level 1 student needs a lot of it.
Every child also gets a number score, called a scale score, in each subject. In third-grade English, for example, scores on the sample report run from 1302 to 1586, and a student needs 1446 or higher to reach Level 4.
Each grade and subject has its own numbers. The State Board voted them in by resolution on Sept. 9, on the recommendation of Education Commissioner Laux.
The report also lists the score range for each level at the child's grade, along with the average scale score for the child's school, the district and the state. Below the overall level, the report breaks each subject into smaller skill areas. Reading, for example, splits into literary text, informational text and language, and the report spells out the skills a student needs to meet expectations in each one.
The report uses the scale score to break down subject proficiency into one of five levels, and further gives each area within a subject one of three marks: Above Expectations, Near or Within Expectations and Below Expectations. The middle mark covers a range "either slightly below or slightly above the level associated with meeting expectations," according to the FAQ. A Below mark means a student "may benefit from additional support," while an Above mark means the child showed skills above grade level and a strong grasp of that area.
A separate science test, given in grades 5, 8 and 11, reports four levels of its own, from Below Proficient to Advanced Proficiency.
The paper report carries an access code for the state's online Family Portal, which shows the results with a glossary and an explanation of each level. Districts can also provide the code. Future reports will add results from year to year so families can follow a child's progress, according to the sample.
New Jersey builds a test that federal law requires
A 2015 federal law, the Every Student Succeeds Act, requires states to test reading and math in each of grades 3 through 8 and at least once in high school. It also requires reports on each student that reach parents "in an understandable and uniform format."
The same law leaves academic standards to the states, barring the U.S. Secretary of Education from directing or controlling them.
State rules put New Jersey's education commissioner in charge of the statewide tests and let the State Board of Education decide the score a student needs to reach each level. The rules also require every student in a tested grade to take them.
New Jersey calls its version the New Jersey Student Learning Assessment-Adaptive. It covers English in grades 3 through 9 and math in grades 3 through 8, with end-of-course tests in Algebra I, Geometry and Algebra II, according to the department's overview. Students take the tests on computers their school district provides.
A student who does well on a group of questions gets a more difficult group next, and one who does not gets a less difficult group, according to the FAQ. Every student begins at medium difficulty, and the test shifts only between groups, never one question at a time.
Students see different questions, and the FAQ says the exam is fair because the same standards apply to every student. "The test difficulty adjusts, but the content does not," it says.
The writing section does not adapt. It is one long writing task, so there is no next group of questions to adjust. Math uses only questions a computer can score, and students can take it in English or Spanish.
Over the summer, panels of New Jersey educators recommended the scores for each level to the state Department of Education. The department told the State Board in July that each panel would spend two to three days with booklets of the spring test questions, ranked from easy to hard by how New Jersey students did. The educators would each judge where every level should begin, using the state's written description of each level, then talk it over as a group and look at students' scores, over several rounds. This analysis informed the scores that the State Board approved on Sept. 9.
Every district must present its results in public by Dec. 8
State rules require each school district to hold a public meeting to present its results to its board of education and the public.
The department set this year's deadline for those presentations at Dec. 8. It told districts that each one must include, among other things, the district's plans for helping students who need support.
The department has posted its own figures for schools and districts on its website, in a spreadsheet for each grade and subject, showing the percent of students at each level. Statewide, 51.1 percent of students reached Level 4 or 5 in English and 41.7 percent in math, according to the department's Nov. 4 presentation.
State rules bar the department from identifying any individual student in its public reports on schools and districts. Neither set of public numbers shows a child's own score. The department's September memo tells districts that any group in their own reports must have at least 10 students, to protect student privacy.
The department weighs the results with other measures in choosing which schools and districts get extra help from it, according to the department. The results also feed the state's public School Performance Reports.
A child's test record will move along to any new school or district, the department told the State Board in July. Districts will also be able to show teachers their incoming students' results, and how the class did as a group, as early as the summer.
The next round of testing runs April 19 to May 21, 2027, and the department expects districts to have those results by June 30, 2027.
Whatever the results, the Department of Education suggests that parents set goals with their child, praise what went well, talk about where to grow and keep up regular reading, writing and problem solving at home. For questions, it points families to the child's teacher, school counselor, case manager, school administrator or district test coordinator.
The FAQ calls the test "a one time 'snapshot' of student performance" that "may not be representative of their student's full ability." It advises reading the results alongside classroom assignments, projects, teacher observations and local tests.
Education Commissioner Laux echoed that guidance in a letter printed on the front of the report. "State assessments do not define a student," she wrote.
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Sources
New Jersey Department of Education, "2026 NJGPA-A and NJSLA-A Standard Setting," presentation to the State Board of Education by Jorden Schiff and John Boczany (July 6, 2026)
New Jersey Department of Education, broadcast memo, "Spring 2026 NJSLA-A and NJSLA-S Results and Reporting Statewide Assessments Results to Local Boards of Education," from Jorden Schiff, assistant commissioner (Sept. 16, 2026)
New Jersey Department of Education, Division of Academic Services, "New Jersey Assessment Results Spring 2026," presentation to the State Board of Education (Nov. 4, 2026)
New Jersey Department of Education, New Jersey Assessments Portal, "NJSLA Grade 3 Sample ISR" (Sept. 18, 2026)
New Jersey Department of Education, New Jersey Assessments Portal, "NJSLA Score Interpretation Guide," prepared by Cambium Assessment, Inc. (Sept. 18, 2026)
New Jersey Department of Education, N.J.A.C. 6A:8, "Standards and Assessment," subchapter 4, "Implementation of the Statewide Assessment System" (accessed Nov. 9, 2026)
New Jersey Department of Education, Office of Assessments, "Assessment" (Sept. 24, 2026)
New Jersey Department of Education, Office of Assessments, "NJSLA-Adaptive and NJGPA-Adaptive Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)" (Sept. 23, 2026)
New Jersey Department of Education, "Overview 2025-2026, New Jersey Student Learning Assessment-Adaptive (NJSLA-A)" (accessed Nov. 9, 2026)
New Jersey Department of Education, "School Year 2025-26 Assessment Reports" (Nov. 4, 2026)
New Jersey Department of Education, "Statewide Assessment Testing Schedule 2026-27" (July 16, 2026)
New Jersey State Board of Education, "A Resolution Establishing Proficient Level Cut Scores for the New Jersey Student Learning Assessments-Adaptive (NJSLA-A) for English Language Arts and Mathematics" (Sept. 9, 2026)
New Jersey State Board of Education, "Agenda" (Sept. 9, 2026)
United States Code, Title 20, Section 6311, "State plans," as amended by the Every Student Succeeds Act, 2024 edition (accessed Nov. 9, 2026)
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