About the Criterion® Service

The Criterion® Online Writing Evaluation service from ETS is a web-based instructional tool that teachers use with students to help them plan, write and revise essays guided by instant annotated diagnostic feedback and a holistic score.

The Criterion service gives teachers a tool to enhance writing instruction and provides students with unlimited opportunities to improve their writing skills through writing essays. Because it is offered online, teachers and students can access the Criterion service from school, home or anywhere with an Internet connection.

Because the improvement of writing skills is a concern not only of individual teachers but also at the school and district levels, the Criterion service enables school and district level administrators to create benchmark assignments to measure and evaluate student progress across school and district levels. Sophisticated reports allow administrators to view progress of the district as a whole as well as by individual school or even individual class. Administrators can even drill down to the level of individual student essays to help evaluate and measure progress.

Riverside Publishing, a division of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company, is the exclusive distributor of the Criterion service to K–12 institutions in the United States, Puerto Rico and U.S. territories and dependencies.

To order the Criterion service, request more information or to speak with a Criterion consultant, contact Houghton Mifflin Harcourt at 1-800-841-9938 or visit them online.

Take brief tour of the Criterion service (Flash).