MCAS Alternate Assessment (MCAS-Alt)

MCAS-Alt Update May 2026

This MCAS-Alt update includes important announcements regarding 2026 MCAS-Alt submissions.

1. Preliminary MCAS-Alt Results

The 2026 preliminary MCAS-Alt results will be reported in your school's Dropbox on DESE's Security Portal on Monday, June 8. The results are displayed as MCAS-Alt Feedback Forms (FFs) for your students and will be in PDF format. Principals and school leaders should review the FFs with the educators who compiled the MCAS-Alt portfolios. Together, principals and educators should compare copies of the students' portfolio strands (e.g., Mathematics — Number and Operations) to the scoring comments on the students' FFs, as the comments are essential for understanding why a specific strand earned the reported score.

See item #2 below for instructions on how to view, download, and print the FFs. The scored MCAS-Alt portfolios will be returned to schools in fall 2026.

2. Viewing, Downloading, and Printing MCAS-Alt Feedback Forms

To view the MCAS-Alt Feedback Forms, principals and administrators should do the following:

• Log into DESE's Security Portal (for assistance logging in, contact your district or organization Directory Administrator).
• Click on the Application List.
• Choose DropBox Central.
• Click on MCAS 2026 Data.
• Choose the school name (cannot be in the district view).
• Click on "MCASalt_FeedbackForms2026" and download the PDFs to distribute to teachers for review.

3. MCAS-Alt Score Appeals Window: June 8–18

If there are concerns regarding how a specific MCAS-Alt strand was scored, a principal or school leader may submit an MCAS-Alt score appeal only if the following criteria are met:

1. The school has retained a copy of the MCAS-Alt materials.
2. The school's materials provide evidence that an MCAS-Alt strand (e.g., ELA Writing) was scored incorrectly (e.g., a strand was scored as Incomplete, but the retained copy indicates that a complete strand was submitted).

Score appeals must be submitted by 5:00 p.m. on Thursday, June 18. Score appeals cannot be submitted after this deadline.

Principals must review the following materials when submitting a score appeal:

• the MCAS-Alt Feedback Form (FF) from the scored assessment, available in each school's DropBox the week of June 8
• a photocopy of the evidence, kept by the school, to support a claim that the score on the FF does not reflect an accurate score based on the scoring rubric

After submitting the score appeal, principals should print the on-screen confirmation for their records. Please see the frequently asked questions about MCAS-Alt score appeals. If a school plans to submit a score appeal, be aware that DESE will not accept the following:

• submission of additional portfolio evidence
• requests to alter information previously submitted
• claims that a clerical error was made by the educator in the original portfolio

Results of MCAS-Alt score appeals will be mailed to schools by the end of July. If you have any questions, please contact mcas@mass.gov or 781-338-3625.

4. Forms and Graphs Data Purge

All data stored in Cognia's Forms and Graphs web application will be cleared on July 1, 2026. For students being assessed in STE across two school years, schools should maintain a local record of all relevant data to ensure that no required information is lost when the system resets.

Thank you to all the educators, paraprofessionals, and school personnel who supported the assessment and the documentation of approximately 200,000 data points for over 6,000 students in Math, ELA, Science, and Civics. Amazing work!

The evidence collected reflects the commitment of Massachusetts special education teachers to ensuring that their students with the most significant cognitive disabilities can access academic content—a vital part of DESE's Educational Vision, where all students are valued.

Have a wonderful and safe summer!
Sarah Luz, M.Ed, Ed.S
Coordinator of the MCAS-Alt

Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education
MCAS Alternate Assessment (MCAS-Alt)