Provincial Testing Across Canada Compared: EQAO, FSA, Diploma Exams and the Rest

Does Canada have a national test?

No single test is written by every Canadian student. Education is run province by province, and so is testing.

Two programs report results for Canada as a whole, and both work by sample. The Pan-Canadian Assessment Program (PCAP), run by the Council of Ministers of Education, Canada, tests Grade 8 students (Secondary II in Quebec) in science, reading and math. In its 2023 cycle, about 31,500 students from more than 1,400 schools took part, and the results came out on 12 January 2026. CMEC states that "PCAP does not assess individual student achievement."

PISA, the OECD's international assessment, tests 15-year-olds. About 24,600 Canadian students wrote PISA 2025, and the results were released on 8 September 2026. Schools and students are chosen at random, and PISA also reports no individual results.

Ontario: EQAO and the OSSLT

Ontario's testing agency, the Education Quality and Accountability Office (EQAO), runs four student assessments, all offered online. The Grade 3 and Grade 6 pages add that an alternative version is available for students who cannot complete the assessment online.

• Grade 3 and Grade 6: reading, writing and math, from 4 May to 8 June 2027. These do not count toward report card marks.
• Grade 9 math: tied to the MTH1W course, in two windows: 12 January to 5 February 2027 and 8 to 30 June 2027.
• OSSLT, the literacy test: reading and writing, usually first written in Grade 10. The 2026-27 windows are 3 to 30 November 2026 and 30 March to 19 April 2027.

Two of these carry real consequences. Passing the OSSLT, or completing the Ontario Secondary School Literacy Course (OSSLC), is a requirement for the Ontario Secondary School Diploma. And the Grade 9 math assessment now has a fixed weight. The Ministry of Education's policy page says: "Starting in the 2026-27 school year, the EQAO assessment will be weighted for 20% of the final mark." In 2025-26, teachers could set it anywhere from 10% to 30%, so a page that says up to 30% describes last year.

Results come back on four levels, and Level 3 is the provincial standard. EQAO is explicit that the standard is not a pass mark: "The provincial standard is not used to determine if a student passes or fails." For the spring 2027 assessment, individual Grade 3 and 6 results are reported by the end of September 2027, in the following school year. Our guide to EQAO results explains what each level means on the report, and the EQAO practice hub gathers practice questions for every tested grade. For the literacy test, the OSSLT explained covers what happens if a student does not pass, and a 20-question OSSLT practice test shows the format.

Most Ontario high school courses also have a new final evaluation from 2026-27, separate from EQAO: 20% of the mark in Grades 9 and 10 and 25% in Grades 11 and 12. What it consists of depends on the subject. In English, mathematics and science it is a written exam, while in the arts it splits into a 10% written exam and a 10% culminating task in Grades 9 and 10, and some courses, including Grades 11 and 12 open courses, are exempt from mandatory written exams. In MTH1W, the EQAO Grade 9 assessment counts as the written exam for the course. Our guide to the new exam and attendance rules shows the full split.

British Columbia: the FSA and graduation assessments

British Columbia tests at two stages.

The Foundation Skills Assessment (FSA) checks literacy and numeracy in Grades 4 and 7. It has five parts, none longer than an hour, and the Ministry's guide for families says they can be spread over several days or weeks in the fall. The Ministry says all students are expected to take part, and the guide for families lists that it "Does not impact student marks or report cards". The Ministry's school administration window for 2026-27 runs from 28 September to 6 November 2026.

The three graduation assessments are a different matter. Grade 10 Numeracy, Grade 10 Literacy and Grade 12 Literacy are each described on the Ministry's own page as "a graduation requirement". A student in BC needs to write all three to graduate, alongside earning the credits.

Our guide to BC curriculum tutoring covers how the province's curriculum is organised.

EQAO vs FSA: what is actually different

If your family is moving between Ontario and BC, the two systems differ in concrete ways on the provinces' own pages.

The practical difference for a parent is timing. A BC child sits the FSA in the fall of Grade 4, early in the school year. An Ontario child sits the Grade 3 assessment in May or June, on what students are expected to have learned by the end of Grade 3.

Alberta: PATs and diploma exams

Provincial Achievement Tests (PATs) are written by all students in Grades 6 and 9, in language arts, math, science and social studies. In 2026-27, the Grade 6 tests are in June. The Grade 9 tests have two administrations, January (18 to 27 January 2027) and June, and the Alberta pages we read do not say which students write in which, so the school is the place to ask. Alberta has already moved its provincial achievement tests and diploma exams to a digital platform, so this year's changes are different. Grade 6 students will not write the Social Studies PAT, because a new curriculum starts in that subject. And schools that are optionally piloting the new Grade 9 Mathematics or Social Studies curriculum, or both, will not write the current PAT. The PAT pages from Alberta state no share of a report-card mark, and say that "PATs don't replace daily teacher assessments".

Diploma exams are where the weight sits. In all, 12 courses in Grade 12 have one, including English Language Arts 30-1 and 30-2, Mathematics 30-1 and 30-2, Biology 30, Chemistry 30 and Physics 30. Alberta's page says: "The weighting of diploma exams returned to 30% effective September 1, 2023." The other 70% is the school mark, and a student needs a combined 50% to pass. Its own worked example: a school mark of 68% and an exam mark of 60% give a final mark of 66%.

The 2026-27 diploma sessions run in November, January, April, June and August, starting with 29 October to 6 November 2026. Our Alberta diploma exam guide has the full schedule, rewrite rules and results dates.

Alberta also requires schools to screen literacy and numeracy for every child from Kindergarten to Grade 3, and from 2026-27 in Grades 4 and 5 as well. The province calls these screenings "formative sources of information", and they are separate from the PATs.

Saskatchewan: a new program, phasing in

For years Saskatchewan was the province with no regular provincial test, and some of its own 2026 documents still describe it that way. That is changing. The Saskatchewan Student Assessment program began with field tests in 2025-26.

In 2026-27, the Grade 5 and Grade 9 math assessments and the Grade 7 English language arts assessment move to full use, with results returned to students, parents and teachers. Grade 4 English language arts is field-tested this year, and the province plans full implementation of the program in 2028-29. The province's documents place them between the end of May and June 2027, and exact dates were not published on the pages we read.

On marks, the province leaves it to the classroom: "teachers may choose to use the assessments as part of students' grades". There is no fixed weight.

Manitoba: classroom assessments, then Grade 12 tests

Manitoba's early assessments are run by teachers in class rather than as a sit-down provincial exam. The Grade 3 assessment covers reading and numeracy (with a Grade 4 assessment in French Immersion), and the Middle Years assessment covers Grade 7 math and Grade 8 reading and writing. The province describes both as formative. Its page labels the dates as windows for collecting the results: 19 October to 27 November 2026 for Grades 3 and 4, and 18 January to 26 February 2027 for the Middle Years. The Grade 3 page says the classroom-based assessments take place early in the school year.

Grade 12 is different. Students write provincial tests in language arts and in Applied, Essential and Pre-Calculus Mathematics, and Manitoba states: "The percentage of the tests attributed to students' final course mark will be 20 per cent." The January 2027 tests start with English Language Arts from 12 to 15 January. The Français langue première and French Immersion language arts tests follow on 18 and 19 January, after preparatory activities in class on 13 January, and the three math tests run from 26 to 28 January.

Quebec: ministerial examinations

Quebec sets ministerial examinations in certain subjects at different points in a student's schooling, from elementary school to Secondary V.

In elementary school, students write ministerial exams in Grade 6 language arts and math, and the 2027 schedule also lists a Grade 4 exam in French as the language of instruction. The same schedule lists a Secondary II writing exam in French as the language of instruction on 12 May 2027. The Ministry says the elementary school and Secondary II exams "count for 20% of the final mark for the competency or competencies evaluated." The Grade 4 French exam sits in the schedule's elementary list, so it carries the same 20%. In every case the share is of the final mark for the competency or competencies the exam evaluates.

In high school, the Secondary IV and V exams cover subjects including language arts, second languages, Secondary IV math, science and the History of Québec and Canada. They "count for 50% of the final mark for the competency or competencies evaluated." One rule works in the student's favour: if the exam mark is higher than the moderated school mark, only the exam mark is kept. A student needs a final result of 60% or higher to earn the credits.

Sessions run every January, June and August.

Atlantic Canada: four different pictures

Nova Scotia tests literacy and math in Grades 3, 6 and 8, and those results are "not used to determine report card grades". Grade 10 students write provincial exams in English 10, Français 10 and Mathematics 10, and there "the exam counts for 20% of the final course mark". The Grade 6 assessment runs from 19 October to 10 November 2026, and moves online this year.

A warning about searching this one: a government page at novascotia.ca still says the province is "suspending all provincial student assessments until further notice". That page still shows 2016-17 dates, and the announcement behind it was made on 8 November 2016. The Department's current assessment site shows the program running in 2026-27.

New Brunswick runs provincial assessments in Grades 4 to 10 in its English-language schools, plus a French oral proficiency assessment in Grade 12. Its French-language schools assess in Grades 2 to 4, 6 to 8 and 10. The province released new education plans in June 2026, and says 2025-26 was the last year of assessments under the plans introduced in 2016. Its 2026-27 timetable and parent bulletins could not be opened when we checked on 2 October 2026, so this guide does not state New Brunswick's dates or whether results count. The school can confirm both.

Prince Edward Island had a Provincial Common Assessment Program when a government-commissioned review of it was published in December 2018, and the province's student assessment topic page still lists that review. The page also lists PCAP and PISA, but no grades, dates or weights for any current provincial assessment, so we are not stating them from older documents. Ask your child's school which assessments apply this year.

Newfoundland and Labrador runs the Provincial Reading and Mathematics Assessment for all students on the prescribed curriculum in Grades 3 and 6, alternating between reading and math from year to year, at the end of May and start of June. The province's guide says schools receive the provincial and school results, and it describes no individual mark. In high school, CBC reported in September 2026 that Grade 12 exams are returning in seven courses, including Math 3200 and 3201, English 3201 and Biology 3201, after none had been written since 2020, and that a department statement said students will take both mid-term and final exams, which together account for 15% of the final grade. We could not find that weight on a government page, so treat it as reported until the province confirms it. CBC also reported that the province is implementing new numeracy and literacy assessments for Grade 9 this year. Its report gives no dates or weights for them, and we found no government page describing them.

Which provincial tests count toward a mark

This is the question that matters most to a family. For the provinces we could check, these are the provincial tests with a fixed share of the final mark in 2026-27. Quebec's shares are of the final mark for the competency or competencies evaluated, and Newfoundland and Labrador's figure is from CBC:

• Quebec, Secondary IV and V ministerial exams: 50% of the final mark for the competency or competencies evaluated
• Alberta, Grade 12 diploma exams: 30%
• Ontario, Grade 9 EQAO math: 20%
• Manitoba, Grade 12 provincial tests: 20%
• Nova Scotia, Grade 10 exams: 20%
• Quebec, elementary and Secondary II ministerial exams (including the Grade 4 French exam): 20% of the final mark for the competency or competencies evaluated
• Newfoundland and Labrador, returning Grade 12 mid-term and final exams together: 15%, as reported by CBC

Of the provinces we could check, two require a separate test or assessment to graduate: Ontario's OSSLT (or the literacy course) and BC's three graduation assessments. Alberta's diploma courses are required for its high school diploma, and the exam is part of each course.

On the provinces' own pages, three groups do not count toward a report card: the Grade 3 and 6 assessments in Ontario, the FSA, and the Grade 3, 6 and 8 assessments in Nova Scotia. Saskatchewan leaves the choice to teachers.

What out-of-date pages get wrong

Provincial testing rules change, and some claims that were true once no longer hold. Four of them:

• "Nova Scotia has suspended its provincial assessments." The province announced that suspension on 8 November 2016. The program runs in 2026-27.
• "Saskatchewan has no provincial testing." True until recently. Its own program is now phasing in.
• Ontario teachers decide how much Grade 9 EQAO math counts. That was the 2025-26 rule, anywhere from 10% to 30%. From 2026-27 it is fixed at 20%.
• Newfoundland and Labrador exams are worth 50%. Their old weights were 50% in a 2018 release and 40% in 2019. CBC reports that students have not taken them since 2020, when final assessments were cancelled, and the reported return in 2026-27 puts mid-term and final exams together at 15%.

If a page gives a weight or a date without a school year beside it, check the province's own page before relying on it.

What parents can do

Find your province's row in the table, then check the date on its own page. Most provinces publish a calendar, and windows move each year.

Ask the school two questions: does this test count toward my child's mark, and when will we see the result? A Grade 3 result in Ontario arrives the following fall, so it cannot guide this year's work.

Spend preparation time where the weight is. For a test that counts, such as Alberta's diploma exams or Quebec's Secondary IV and V exams, it makes sense to practise in the real format. Alberta calls its screenings "formative sources of information", so ordinary school work is the preparation there, and Newfoundland and Labrador says plainly that the PRMA needs none.

Look at the course work, not only the test. Even the 50% exams in Quebec usually leave the other half of the mark for the competencies they evaluate to the school, and every other test we could check leaves 70% or more. A test result is one reading. The course mark is built every week.