Translating Your ARK Lexile Score to an AR Level
ARK Reading Reports show a Lexile Measure, the reading scale ARK uses. Some partner schools also use Accelerated Reader (AR), a separate program from Renaissance Learning that levels books using its own ATOS scale. This article explains how the two relate, and how to use your ARK Lexile score if your school runs AR.
What Is Accelerated Reader, and How Does It Relate to ARK?
Accelerated Reader isn't a test, it's a reading-practice and incentive system. Students choose a book from AR's leveled catalog, read it independently, and take a short comprehension quiz when they finish. Passing quizzes earns points that feed into goals, badges, and progress tracking that teachers and librarians use to monitor independent reading.
The actual reading-level assessment that normally feeds AR's goals is Star Reading, a separate Renaissance-administered test. Because Renaissance makes both products, Star's scores flow automatically into AR to set book-level goals.
ARK's Reading assessment does the same job as Star Reading: it's ARK's own periodic diagnostic that produces a Lexile score, growth data, percentile rank, and a state-performance prediction. A school can use ARK for that assessment role while separately running AR purely as its day-to-day reading-practice tool, without ever using Star Reading. In that case, AR simply defaults its reading-range goals to grade-level assumptions unless a teacher enters a more precise score by hand, which is exactly what this guide covers.
Reading-range goals in AR are a soft target shown to students and teachers to guide book selection; they do not restrict which books a student can quiz on (that's a separate Book Level Restriction setting). Running ARK and AR side by side is a normal, complete setup, not something that needs fixing.
Best Option: AR's Built-In Lexile Goals Preference
Accelerated Reader has a class-level "Lexile Goals" preference that lets a school display and use Lexile measures instead of ATOS book levels. Turn it on under Preferences > Class Preferences > Lexile Goals > "Use Lexile measures." Once enabled, AR uses the Lexile scale, not ATOS, for reading-range goals, quiz book-level restrictions, and AR reports. (This does not affect Star Reading reports, which use a separate school-level "Lexile Range" preference.)
Important: this preference does not import scores automatically. It only changes which scale AR displays and accepts. A teacher or admin still has to enter each student's Lexile score by hand, as described below.
How to Manually Enter an ARK Score in AR
- Open the student's ARK Reading Report and find the Reading Measure, a number ending in "L" (for example, 595L).
- In Accelerated Reader's Record Book, open Student Goals > Edit Goals for that student, with the class's Lexile Goals preference turned on.
- In the reading-range field, type the number without the "L" (enter 595, not 595L). Renaissance's own instructions specify entering Lexile goals as a whole number, or "BR" for Beginning Reader levels.
- Save. This has to be repeated for each student. Accelerated Reader does not currently support bulk-importing scores from an outside system like ARK.
For the Closest Book-Level Match
Renaissance's AR BookFinder and myON let you search their book catalog directly by Lexile score, because Renaissance licenses real Lexile measures for books alongside their own ATOS levels. Entering a student's exact Reading Measure there surfaces actual AR-leveled books at that Lexile score, more reliable than any static grade-band table.
If Your School Keeps AR on ATOS: Approximate Conversion Table
Renaissance and MetaMetrics do not publish an official student-score crosswalk between Lexile and AR/ATOS. The table below is ARK's own approximation, built by pairing Renaissance's own definition of an ATOS grade-equivalent (whole number = grade, decimal = month of a 10-month school year) with MetaMetrics' own published Lexile ranges by grade. Because these ranges naturally overlap between adjacent grades, treat this as a ballpark starting point for book selection, not an exact score.
| Grade | Approx. AR / ATOS Level | MetaMetrics' Official Lexile Range (BOY-EOY) |
|---|
| K | 0.0-0.9 | BR40L-230L |
| 1 | 1.0-1.9 | 190L-530L |
| 2 | 2.0-2.9 | 420L-650L |
| 3 | 3.0-3.9 | 520L-820L |
| 4 | 4.0-4.9 | 740L-940L |
| 5 | 5.0-5.9 | 830L-1010L |
| 6 | 6.0-6.9 | 925L-1070L |
| 7 | 7.0-7.9 | 970L-1120L |
| 8 | 8.0-8.9 | 1010L-1185L |
| 9 | 9.0-9.9 | 1050L-1260L |
| 10 | 10.0-10.9 | 1080L-1335L |
| 11 | 11.0-11.9 | 1185L-1385L* |
| 12 | 12.0+ | 1185L-1385L* |
*MetaMetrics publishes grades 11-12 as a single combined band. BR = "Beginning Reader" (below 0L).
Please note: even at the book level, where Renaissance and MetaMetrics do share real licensed data, books at the same ATOS level can vary by 100+ Lexile points. If your school needs a precise, official AR reading level (a "ZPD"), that has to come from Renaissance's own Star Reading assessment. This table is a starting point for book selection, not a certified AR substitute.
A Note on Math (Quantile) Scores
If your school also receives ARK Math results, those are reported on the Quantile scale (also from MetaMetrics), a completely separate framework for math readiness. Accelerated Reader is a reading-only program, so there is no "AR level" for math, and Quantile scores do not need, or have, a translation to AR.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can I bulk-upload ARK scores into Accelerated Reader?
Not currently. The only integrations Renaissance documents publicly are roster syncs (for example, with a school's student information system) that sync enrollment data, not test scores. Reading-range goals in AR come from Renaissance's own Star Reading test, a grade-level default, or manual entry, one student at a time.
Can I set one Lexile score for an entire class at once?
Not for reading-range goals. AR's multi-student goal editor applies things like average-percent-correct or daily reading time uniformly, but reading ranges are generated per student from that student's own Star Reading result, or entered manually per student. There is no single class-wide override for reading range.
Does ARK integrate directly with Accelerated Reader or Renaissance's systems?
No known integration exists today. ARK and Renaissance are separate companies with separate platforms; using both means manually bridging scores as described above.
Sources
- Renaissance Support, "More Information on the Lexile Goals Preference" (support.renaissance.com)
- Renaissance Support, "AR Student Goals for Grades 3-5 or 6+ (Record Book)" (support.renaissance.com)
- Renaissance Learning, "What is ATOS?" (renaissance.com/edword/atos)
- Renaissance Learning, "Text Complexity, ATOS, and Lexile Measures" (renaissance.com/resources/atos-analyzer)
- MetaMetrics/Lexile Hub, "Lexile & Quantile Measures: Supporting Student College and Career Readiness" (hub.lexile.com)
- MetaMetrics, "What is the difference between the Lexile and ATOS 2000 scales?" (cdn.lexile.com)
- MetaMetrics, "Frequently Asked Questions About the Quantile Framework" (metametricsinc.com)