PARCC APIP® Profile

The Partnership for Assessment of Readiness of College and Careers (PARCC) profile of the Accessible Portable Item Protocol® specification enables interoperability of the packaging and delivery of assessment tests and items, as well as the Personal Needs and Preferences instances related to accessibility content. The PARCC technical team, 1EdTech contributing members interested in the developoment of the profile, and the 1EdTech staff worked together to identify the requirements and elective features of the profile as documented here. The QTI Evolution and Certification Committee, an organization of 1EdTech members responsible for the development, maintanence and conformance certification cirteria, approved this profile in early 2016.

This page provides links to the PARCC APIP Profile documentation. Those interested in certifying their systems or content as conformant to the PARCC APIP Profile are required to be an 1EdTech Contributing, Affiliate, or eAssessment Alliance Member. A summary of membership details and benefits is available here: https://www.imsglobal.org/imsmembership.html

APIP Specification Documents

As an official profile or subset of APIP, we refer you to the APIP v1.0 specification as the starting point for implementing the PARCC requirements. The Best Practice and Implementation Guide and the APIP Technical Specification documents provide details and samples that will help you understand the APIP and QTI specifications.

PARCC XML Schema Documents (XSDs)

PARCC PNP XSDs

PARCC Specific Details

PARCC Schema Checklists

PARCC PNP Schema Checklists

PARCC APIP Profile Conformance Certification

The online instructions and test resources for PARCC APIP conformance certification are available to 1EdTech members, including eAssessment Alliance members. If you are interested in certifying your product agains the PARCC APIP profile, Information about Alliance membership is available here.

PARCC APIP Profile Features Matrix

The table below shows the required (R) and elective (e) features of the PARCC APIP Profile.

PARCC APIP CONFORMANCE STATEMENTS
Id	Feature	PARCC Content (Item/Test Bank)	PARCC Authoring System	PARCC Delivery System	PARCC PNP System
Tests
T1	Outcome Declaration	e	R	R	N/A
T2	Time Limits	e	e	e	N/A
T3	Stylesheet version (CSS2.1)	e	e	e	N/A
T4	Test Parts	e	R	R	N/A
T5	Item Session Control	e	R	R	N/A
T6	Time Limits	e	e	e	N/A
T7	Sections	e	R	R	N/A
T8	Test Feedback (Testpart-level) - HTML	e	e	e	N/A
T9a	Outcomes Processing-Full	e	e	e	N/A
T9b	Outcomes Processing-CC	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
T10	Test Feedback (Testpart-level) - HTML	e	e	e	N/A
T11	ARIA - HTML	e	e	e	N/A
Sections
S1	Item Session Control	X	X	X	N/A
S2	Time Limits	e	e	e	N/A
S3	Selection	e	e	e	N/A
S4	Ordering	e	e	e	N/A
S5	Rubric Block - HTML	e	e	e	N/A
S6	Include	e	e	e	N/A
S7	Items	e	R	R	N/A
S8	Sections	e	R	R	N/A
Interactions
Q1	Associate Interaction	e	e	e	N/A
Q2	Choice Interaction	R	R	R	N/A
Q3a	Custom Interaction (LTI)	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
Q3b	Custom Interaction (PCI)	R	R	R	N/A
Q4	Drawing Interaction	e	e	e	N/A
Q5	End Attempt Interaction	e	e	e	N/A
Q6	Extended Text Interaction	R	R	R	N/A
Q7	Gap Match Interaction	R	R	R	N/A
Q8	Graphic Associate Interaction	e	e	e	N/A
Q9	Graphic Gap Match Interaction	R	R	R	N/A
Q10	Graphic Order Interaction	e	e	e	N/A
Q11	Hot-spot Interaction	R	R	R	N/A
Q12	Hot-text Interaction	R	R	R	N/A
Q13	Inline Choice Interaction	R	R	R	N/A
Q14	Match Interaction	R	R	R	N/A
Q15	Media Interaction	e	e	e	N/A
Q16	Order Interaction	R	R	R	N/A
Q17	Position Object Interaction	e	e	e	N/A
Q18	Selection Point Interaction	e	e	e	N/A
Q19	Slider Interaction	e	e	e	N/A
Q20	Text Entry Interaction	R	R	R	N/A
Q21	Upload Interaction	e	e	e	N/A
Q22	Custom Interaction (proprietary)	e	e	e	N/A
Items
I1	responseDeclaration	R	R	R	N/A
I2	outcomeDeclaration	R	R	R	N/A
I3	templateDeclaration	R	R	R	N/A
I4	Shared Stimulus - HTML	R	R	R	N/A
I5	templateProcessing	e	e	e	N/A
I6	Stylesheet (CSS2.1)	R	R	R	N/A
I7	Item Body	R	R	R	N/A
I8a	HTML (Block)	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
I8b	HTML (Full)	R	R	R	N/A
I9a	Response Processing-Full	R	R	R	N/A
I9b	Response Processing-Fixed Template	R	R	R	N/A
I10	Modal Feedback - HTML	e	e	e	N/A
I11	ARIA	R	R	R	N/A
I12	SSML	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
I13	Internationalization	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
I14	APIP Accessibility	R	R	R	N/A
Accessibility
A1	Spoken, Text Only	R	R	R	R
A2	Spoken, Text & Graphics	R	R	R	R
A3	Spoken, Non-Visual	e	e	e	e
A4	Spoken, Graphics Only	e	e	e	e
A5	Spoken, Directions Only	e	e	e	e
A6	Spoken, user preferences, including recording speed (slow, medium, fast) and voice type (human or synthetic)	e	e	e	e
A7	Screen Reader preferences (usage, speech rate, pitch, etc., for synthetic text-to-speech)	e	e	e	e
A8	Braille	R	R	R	R
A9	Braille user preferences (grade, dots, cells, etc.)	e	e	e	e
A10	Tactile	e	e	e	e
A11	Signing: ASL	R	R	R	R
A12	Signing: Signed English	e	e	e	e
A13	Item Translation	R	R	R	R
A14	Keyword Translation	R	R	R	e
A15	Simplified Language	e	e	e	e
A16	Alternate Representation	R	R	R	R
B1	Magnification	N/A	N/A	R	R
B2	Magnification, Amount (user preference)	N/A	N/A	e	e
B3	Reverse Contrast	N/A	N/A	e	e
B4	Alternate Text and Background Colors	N/A	N/A	R	R
B5	Alternate Text and Background Colors, Color Preferences	N/A	N/A	R	R
B6	Color Overlay	N/A	N/A	e	e
B7	Color Overlay, Color Preferences	N/A	N/A	e	e
C1	Answer Masking	N/A	N/A	R	R
C2	Masking	N/A	N/A	R	e
C3	Auditory Calming (background music)	N/A	N/A	e	e
C4	Additional Testing Time (including time & additional testing time tags)	N/A	N/A	R	e
C5	Breaks	N/A	N/A	R	e
C6	Keyword Emphasis	R	R	R	e
C7	Line Reader	N/A	N/A	R	e
C8	Line Reader, Color Preferences	N/A	N/A	e	e
C9	Language Learner Guidance	e	e	e	e
C10	Cognitive Guidance	e	e	e	e
D1	Calculator Companion Material	R	R	R	N/A
D2	Rule Companion Material	R	R	R	N/A
D3	Protractor Companion Material	R	R	R	N/A
D4	Reading Passage Companion Material	R	R	R	N/A
D5	Digital Companion Material	R	R	R	N/A
D6	Physical Companion Material	R	R	R	N/A
Results
R1	Context	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
R2	Test result	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
R3	Item Result	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
QTI Metadata
M1	Item Template	e	e	e	N/A
M2	Time Dependent	e	e	e	N/A
M3	Composite	e	e	e	N/A
M4	Interaction Type	e	e	e	N/A
M5	Feedback Type	e	e	e	N/A
M6	Solutions Available	e	e	e	N/A
M7	Tool Name	e	e	e	N/A
M8	Tool Version	e	e	e	N/A
M9	Tool Vendor	e	e	e	N/A
Packaging
P1	Test Instances	R	e	R	N/A
P2	Section Instances	R	e	R	N/A
P3	Item Banks	R	e	e	N/A
P4	Item Instances	R	R	R	N/A
P5	Manifest Metadata (LOM)	R	R	R	N/A
P6	Resource Metadata (LOM)	R	R	R	N/A
P7	Resource Metadata (QTI)	R	R	R	N/A
P8	Curriculum Standards Metadata	R	R	R	N/A
P9	External Metadata	e	e	e	N/A
P10	Learning Tools Interop v1.1	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A


Definitions
'Item/Test Bank' - Collection of items and related assets (inlcuding tests); no specific functions related to this collection; R denotes that the bank must not reject this feature.
'Authoring System' - System that allows content to be authored and exported to other systems; must support all assets and items that are required in the Delivery System.
'Delivery System' - System used to deliver tests and items to external users; must support all functionality represented in the required interaction types from the authoring system.
'PNP System' - System used to create and/or exchange the presentation preferences of individual users for the delivery of their assessment.

Legend
‘X’ Denotes that this features is PROHIBITED in an instance (i.e., MUST NOT be included in the content).
‘R’ Denotes that an implementation MUST support the feature.
‘e’ Denotes that an implementation MAY ELECT to support the feature.
‘N/A’ Denotes that the feature is unavailable to this profile (i.e., it is covered by another established profile).