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Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

Kite Suite Basics

Kite Educator Portal is a web-based application, and you can reach it at https://educator.kiteaai.org.

Kite Educator Portal is used by educators and test coordinators to view student and roster information. Test coordinators can manage data, monitor tests, and print score reports using Educator Portal.

Kite Student Portal is the application that students use to take tests. The application must be downloaded and installed on testing machines before testing begins. Kite Student Portal installation guides can be found on the Resources page.

Power or Internet Interruptions

Once the power is back on and stabilized, power on the machine, open Kite Student Portal, and resume testing.

Often, Student Portal will resume normal behavior when the network returns. However, if the application stops responding, you may see a message that reads, “Do not close the test.” This indicates that Student Portal is trying to reconnect. If it cannot reconnect after several minutes, you may see a message that says connection was lost. If the test cannot be exited, you will need to restart the device. 

If there is no option to close Student Portal, please reboot the testing device. When the network returns to normal, the student can resume testing in Student Portal; all answers input prior to shutdown will be retained. Please contact Kite Support if you have questions about continuing testing. 

In most cases, test sessions time out after ninety (90) minutes of inactivity. If the students return to the machines before the tests time out, they can continue testing as usual. If the test machines have locked (i.e., hibernated, gone to sleep, etc.), the students should be able to continue testing within the 90-minute time period. Please contact Kite Support if you have questions about continuing testing.

Educator Portal

It is the test coordinator’s responsibility to make sure students and rosters have been added and created in Educator Portal prior to testing. Contact your test coordinator or whomever is responsible for creating and/or adjusting user and roster records if you do not see a student(s) available in Educator Portal. 

If you are the test administrator and you do not see any rosters created for you, have your coordinator verify the user account is correct and then resubmit the TASC record with correct information to have rosters created.  

If a TEST record is submitted, the student will not receive roster assignments as they are not required to be assigned a summative test. Please contact Kite Support if you have questions on this process. 

Test tickets are located under the Manage Tests menu in Test Coordination. Select the necessary drop downs, i.e. school then select search. Download and open the PDF under the “Tickets” column.  

More than one row can be selected by checking the box for the rows requested and clicking “View Tickets” above the table. 

Alternately, the Student Login Usernames/Passwords extract located in the Reports menu can provide users with login credentials. 

  1. Click on Data extracts and navigate to the Student Login Usernames/Passwords row.
  2. Click New File and select all required extract filters.
  3. Download file as a PDF or CSV document.
  4. When the file is ready, a PDF or CSV icon will appear in the File column in the appropriate row.
  5. Click the icon to open the document.

Daily access codes are generated in Educator Portal and can be accessed by clicking Manage Tests – Test Coordination – View Daily Access Codes.

For more information on DACs, see the Daily Access Codes section in the Kite Educator Portal Manual for Test Coordinators.

If your student is taking a high-stakes test and needs to have their test reactivated, perform the following steps:

Note: If the status is listed as “In Progress” in the test monitoring area of the Kite Educator Portal, the test can be re-entered using a Daily Access Code. If the student re-enters the test on the same day, then they will use the DAC for that day. If the student continues testing on a different day, a new DAC will need to be acquired.

  1. Log in to Kite Educator Portal.
  2. Click on the Manage Tests menu.
  3. Click on Test Coordination.
  4. Fill in any required drop downs and click search.
  5. Find and select the name of the test session in which the student needs to be reactivated.
  6. Click the Monitor tab.
  7. Status check: If the student’s test status is “In Progress,” the student’s test will not need to be reactivated and should be visible to the student when they login to Student Portal. If the test shows as “Complete,” it will need to be reactivated.
  8. Select the student by checking the box in front of the Student Record.
  9. Click the “Reactivate” button below the table and to the right side of the page.
  10. A message will confirm the reactivation, and the status of the test will change to “In Progress.” The student will now have to log back into the test using the Daily Access Code for the current day, moving through the sections in sequential order, starting with section 1, clicking the “End” button for each section. The answers previously entered by the student will be saved.

If a student is taking a math test which has calculator use/disuse requirements, and if the student has moved passed the no-calculator stage, they will enter the test after that section. Please contact Kite Support for more information.

Student Portal

If the student can generally understand the audio version but needs assistance with the pronunciation of a word in the text because they do not understand the computer-generated voice, you can read one or two words to the student from the screen.

Note: Teachers, test administrators, and proctors may not read anything aloud for a student from an ELA reading passage.

Teachers may assist by reading one or two words for students who can otherwise independently read the test.

Note: Teachers, test administrators, and proctors may not read anything aloud for a student from an ELA reading passage.

We expect administrators and teachers to abide by the Test Security and Administration guidelines in the Examiner’s Manual. Therefore, if a student questions the accuracy of an item, follow the procedure outlined below. 

First, to the student, repeat the information from the directions, teacher print directions, or Kite directions: “Choose the answer that you think is best. There is one correct or best answer to each question. Carefully read the question. Work the problem.” It may be appropriate in certain circumstances to tell the student or reader that their concern will be forwarded to KSDE and AAI for review and analysis. 

Second, collect the following information and forward the information to the District Test Coordinator, who will then forward the information to the Kite Service Desk and KSDE. 

  • 1. Student ID only – Do not include the name, building, or district.State Student ID only – Do not include the name, building, or district.
  • 2. Subject of the test, for example, ELA, math, science.
  • 3. Session number and the item number.
  • 4. Report the issue, not the item content (for example, no correct answer, multiple correct answers, A and C are both correct, a word is misspelled, the sentence is grammatically incorrect, etc.).
  • 5. Do not forward the item, the item stem, any answer choices, or narrative descriptions of the item via email (these are live, secure test items).
  • 6. Do not send pictures of the item.

In general, a student should complete the test before closing Kite Student Portal. However, if a student needs to exit the test during the testing period, they should use the save button at the bottom of the test to save the completed work prior to exiting the test. 

If there is no save button available, the student may exit the test without submitting the answers by rebooting the device. Answers input up to that point will be saved. Please contact Kite Support if you need assistance continuing testing. 

The student should exit the test. (See question above). The student should move to the new room or device as soon as possible and log back into Kite Student Portal. 

The student can resume testing once they are ready. Answers input up to that point will be saved. Please contact Kite Support if you need assistance continuing testing 

If students can log in to the system but individual items or images are not appearing during the test session, your network may be blocking access to the Kite servers. Please confer with your local technical staff to ensure that the updated whitelist settings (on ports 80 and 443) have been applied.

If you have any questions regarding whitelist settings, please reference the Kite Suite Whitelist Settings (pdf) resource or contact the Kite Service Desk.

Yes, practice tests are available for KAP and KELPA as well as Technology Practice Tests. Please see the Practice Test Guide for Educators (pdf) for more information.

KELPA

The KELPA Test Administration and Scoring materials can be found under the HELP tab inside Educator Portal. These secure materials are posted one to two weeks prior to the start of KELPA testing and can be accessed by district level users, building lever users, and teachers who are tied to KELPA. 

Interim

We conduct yearly maintenance on our system and our tests during the summer months. This allows for new tests to be added and any improvements to be made to existing tests. We always target a release date on or around September 15 to allow this work to be completed. 

Uploading TASC records is simple and necessary for us to predict how a student will perform on the KAP summative test. The best way to ensure accuracy of information is to have it uploaded from the KIDS system at KSDE. The process can take two to three hours for data to be finalized in the Kite Educator Portal. Please contact Kite Support or the KIDS help desk for questions on enrolling students.

Local Caching Server (LCS)

If students have started testing without an LCS in place, they should finish their tests without the LCS. Wait until a break in testing, and then start the LCS for the next group of students.

Student Portal Installation FAQs

Kite Student Portal can only be used on supported devices and platforms. To view the most updated list of supported devices, visit the Technology Coordinators page. 

Two Student Portal installers, an .exe and .msi, are available to download for Windows testing devices. You can install and run either one of the installers on your machine or a network administrator can push the installation to the devices that students will use for testing. The .msi package does not contain the dependencies that are required to run the Kite Student Portal, for that reason the .exe installation is suggested for first-time installs. 

Accessing Student Portal using a Chromebook or other ChromeOS device must be done using Kiosk mode. On newer, unmanaged Chrome devices, Kiosk mode is disabled. You may not be able to successfully install Kite Student Portal on an unmanaged device. You will need to install the application through Google Admin Console using the app ID found in the Chromebook installation manual. If you need assistance with an install please contact your technology coordinator or Kite Support. 

Users must verify the settings in the Google Admin Console and MDM software to ensure it allows apps to update automatically. If so, your device should update automatically to the new version of ChromeOS. Please see the Technology Coordinator page for current versions by platform and contact Kite Support if you have questions on installation. 

The Kite Technology team understands the importance of network security. To ensure smooth testing, you must add our application and corresponding URLs to your allowed list in your antivirus, firewall, content filter. This will allow the Student Portal application to successfully pass through any SSL decryption. Please see the Kite Suite Whitelist Settings document for the complete list of URLs to whitelist.