Set Course Placement Scores

Each college or university should establish its own course placement scores to facilitate placement decisions based on factors and data unique to each school. ACCUPLACER doesn’t recommend course placement scores or in any way mandate the scores that any school or state system should use for college placement decisions.

There are several methods you can use to set placement scores. Here's an overview of two methods.

Method 1: Conduct a Standard Setting

This is the preferred score-setting method. Using this method, faculty define the proficiency level necessary for a student to succeed in the course and the placement score corresponding to that proficiency level.

One way to do this is the “bookmark” method, which is the College Board’s recommended approach. Here’s how the bookmark method works:

1. A panel of staff members—generally including faculty, administrators, testing staff, and institutional researchers—is selected and trained.
2. Panelists review a booklet of ACCUPLACER test items that are arranged in order from easiest to hardest.
3. The panelists place a bookmark after the most difficult item that represents the skills a student should have for success in each course in the sequence.
4. A facilitator gathers bookmark data from each panelist, then conducts a discussion to reach a consensus.

Method 2: Use the Skills Insight Statements

Another score-setting method is to use the Skills Insight™ statements available for each multiple-choice test. These statements describe the skills a student likely has when scoring in each of the five score bands, which are divided at the 25th, 50th, 75th, and 90th percentile ranges. Here’s how this method works: 

1. A panel of staff members—generally including faculty, administrators, testing staff, and institutional researchers—is selected and trained.
2. Panelists develop a list of prerequisite skills and abilities or performance level descriptors (PLDs) needed for success in each course.
3. Panelists then compare each PLD list with the Skills Insight statements available for that course to find the matching score band.
4. The lower number of that range is generally used as the initial placement score.