Our highly regarded Degrees of Reading Power® (DRP®) Program provides a holistic, criterion-referenced measure of how well students process and understand increasingly more complex text.
DRP Core Comprehension Tests are designed to guide, monitor, and support students in their achievement of the grade-level Common Core State Standards (CCSS) for ELA and Literacy and, subsequently, to assist in their preparation for postsecondary education and career training. The tests gauge how students are advancing toward these goals; determine their functional reading complexity levels; and provide diagnostic information about their comprehension and the enabling skills that support comprehension. Test results help classroom teachers, literacy coaches, and reading specialists—as well as local-, district-, and state-level administrators—support the development of each student’s reading power.
In a recent independent research study, published as a supplement to Appendix A of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS), the DRP Program was named
as providing a highly reliable, valid, and accurate measure of text complexity, one of the cornerstones of the CCSS in English Language Arts.
Growth in reading ability occurs when students read materials at their appropriate reading level. To help students meet the reading challenges of the classroom,
and prepare them for the challenges they’ll face in college and the workplace, student reading gains must be accurately measured and supported by linking comprehension
ability with text complexity. The Common Core State Standards emphasize the importance of increasing the complexity of texts student read throughout their school years
as a key factor in improving reading comprehension.
The DRP Program offered the first (and still provides the only) criterion-referenced reading test specifically designed to place students and texts on the same scale.
DRP Core Comprehension tests are holistic measures of how well students understand the meaning of text. Test results are reported on the DRP Scale of Text
Complexity – the same scale that is used to measure the quantitative text complexity of printed material. By linking students’ DRP test scores with the text complexity
values of books and other classroom materials, teachers are able to locate, assign, or recommend textbooks, literature, popular titles, and articles of appropriate
difficulty to their students.
The DRP Program from Questar is the original, research-based, standards-driven reading program, featuring
- Both paper-and-pencil and Web-based assessments;
- DRP Online tests that provide immediate results;
- DRP Booklink software listing more than 38,000 titles to complement your curricula;
- On-demand readability analyses of textbooks and literature;
- An online DRP Analyzer that provides instant DRP text complexity and Common Core Grade Band levels;
- Flexible scoring and reporting services to meet your needs – including choice of score reports for parents, teachers, and school and district administrators;
- Ancillary publications that help you interpret and effectively use DRP scores.
Easy to order and administer, the program helps educators and administrators
- Set literacy goals;
- Identify and zero in on special populations – including struggling readers, gifted and talented students, and English language learners;
- Monitor student progress;
- Predict high-stakes state test results;
- Link students to appropriate books and compile reading lists;
- Evaluate instructional effectiveness.
DRP Scale of Text Complexity
The DRP Program reports student test results on the DRP Scale of Text Complexity, Questar’s custom scale used to assess the text complexity of written materials.
In a recent independent study, the findings of which were published as a supplement to Appendix A of the Common Core Standards, DRP text analyses were recognized as
valid, highly reliable, and accurate measures.
By linking students' DRP test scores with the text complexity levels of books, teachers are able to locate, assign, or recommend textbooks, literature, popular
titles, and articles of appropriate difficulty to their students – and help students make gains in real-life literacy.