Renaissance Star test explained: Star Reading, Star Math and Star Early Literacy, the Unified Scale (200 to 1400), the percentile categories (At/Above Benchmark, On Watch, Intervention, Urgent Intervention), the 2022 cut scores by grade adopted by Nebraska, how to read the report, and a printable chart

Star is the third of the three diagnostics American schools give two or three times a year, after i-Ready and MAP, and it is the one whose report looks simplest: a scaled score, a percentile rank, a category in colour. The simplicity hides two things parents trip on, the change of scale in 2021 and the fact that the colours are percentile bands, not grade-level standards. Everything below comes from Renaissance's own score documents, as published by the Nebraska and Wisconsin departments of education.

Download the Star score chart (PDF) (the Unified Scale, the percentile categories, the 2022 cut scores by grade and season, the fluency thresholds and a planner; two pages, free).

The tests

The adaptive tests choose each question from the last answer, so the child sees questions near their own level and the score is the level, not the number right.

The Unified Scale

Until 2021 Star Reading and Star Early Literacy used different scales, which made the move from one to the other hard to follow. Renaissance equated the two onto one Rasch scale and reports it as the Unified Scale: from 200 to 1400 in all, with Star Early Literacy scores from 200 to 1100 and Star Reading scores from 600 to 1400. It became the default for most districts in August 2021 (Florida and Mississippi in 2022-23 under state contracts). Renaissance's note on the change: benchmark categories, percentile ranks and growth norms stayed the same; only the scaled numbers changed. So a parent comparing a 2020 report with a 2023 one is comparing two scales, and should compare percentiles.

The percentile categories

The percentile rank (PR) compares the child with students in the same grade nationally at the same time of year, from 1 to 99. Renaissance's default benchmark categories, as the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction publishes them for its Star dashboards:

Districts and states may replace the default lines with their own, usually by linking the Star scale to the state test; the report says which benchmark it uses.

The 2022 cut scores by grade and season

Renaissance's threshold tables as adopted by the Nebraska Department of Education (February 2022): the minimum Unified scaled score for a child to be considered Progressing towards reading success, which is the 40th percentile, by season. Below these numbers the child is At Risk.

The same document gives the Star CBM reading thresholds in correct per minute (CPM): for kindergarten, letter naming 25 in fall, 38 in winter and 49 in spring, letter sounds 16, 30 and 42, phoneme segmentation 8, 15 and 20; for grade 1, passage oral reading 23, 35 and 49 words correct per minute; for grade 2, passage oral reading 81, 91 and 102 and expressive nonsense words 24, 28 and 33; for grade 3, passage oral reading 106, 112 and 118. A 2nd grader reading 70 correct words a minute in winter is below the line, whatever the comprehension test says, and fluency is where the work is.

Star Math reports on the same kind of scale with the same four categories; Renaissance has not published grade-by-grade math cut scores in the state documents used here, and the report's percentile rank is the reading to use.

How to read the report

1. Percentile first. It carries the category and it survives the change of scale. The scaled score is for growth within a year on the same test.
2. Then the student growth percentile (SGP). It compares the child's change with students who started at the same score. 35 to 65 is typical; a child At/Above Benchmark with an SGP of 20 is coasting, and a child in Intervention with an SGP of 80 is on the way out of it.
3. Then the skills. Star Reading reports the comprehension and vocabulary skills estimated to be mastered; Star Math reports the domains. That list is the teaching.
4. Know which benchmark the school uses. The default 40th percentile or a state-linked line; the report footer says.

Star, i-Ready and MAP disagree with each other by design: Star reports a percentile band, i-Ready a placement against a grade-level standard, MAP a RIT score against a mean. A child can be At/Above Benchmark on Star and One Grade Level Below on i-Ready in the same month, because the 41st percentile nationally sits below i-Ready's proficiency line in most grades.

Download the Star score chart (PDF) (the scale, the categories, the cut scores, the fluency thresholds and a planner; two pages, free).

Where to get help

A 1-on-1 online class with a tutor who holds a master's degree and teaches the US curriculum from Grade 1 number work to AP Calculus, chemistry and physics, at 7 am before school, after 4 pm and on weekend mornings, US time, for US$10 to $13 an hour: the report read together in the free 30-minute first class, the domain or the skill the score is really pointing at found, and the term spent on exactly that, with the method written out the way the school marks it. How online tutoring from India to the USA works, or the 1-on-1 online tutoring page.

Sources: Renaissance Learning, Threshold levels and cut scores for Star Early Literacy, Star Reading and Star CBM Reading, as published by the Nebraska Department of Education (February 2022): the 40th-percentile scaled scores by grade and season, the Unified Scale (200 to 1400; Early Literacy 200 to 1100; Reading 600 to 1400; default from August 2021; categories, percentile ranks and growth norms unchanged), the CBM correct-per-minute thresholds, the percentile rank and SGP definitions; Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction, WISEdash Star dashboards (the RtI categories by national percentile rank). Fetched 9 November 2026.

Questions parents ask

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