Highline adds three yearly language assessments for multilingual elementary students

What happened

Highline is expanding multilingual benchmark assessments to students in grades 2–5, adding three progress checks during the school year to its existing annual state assessment. The Flashlight assessment tracks speaking and writing so teachers can plan more targeted support for individual students.

Why it matters to families

More frequent information about students’ speaking and writing progress may help teachers identify needs and adjust language-development support sooner than relying on one annual measure.

The evidence

At the October 7, 2026 board meeting, district staff said they had shifted funding from materials they considered underused to Flashlight. Staff said every multilingual student in grades 2–5 would take the benchmark three times a year; after a pilot with students who had not made progress, the district was expanding the assessment, and the year's baseline testing was already underway (document 116229).

The source