What are the Keystone Exams?
About the Biology Exam at Agora
The Keystone Exams are end-of-course assessments designed to assess proficiency in various subjects. Biology is one of the courses in which all students in Pennsylvania will complete a Keystone Exam during their high school career. Your teachers will prepare you for this exam all year during live sessions and with Test Your Knowledge (TYK) Assessments. This website will provide you with numerous websites and interactive activities to enrich your knowledge of Biology.
Keystone Exam Design
Each Keystone Exam is composed of two modules (test sessions). Each module is designed to take 1 - 1.5 hours to complete. The exams will consist of multiple-choice questions and constructed-response, or open-ended questions designed to assess a students comprehension of Biology.
For a student to perform at an advanced level they must have mastered the following:
- Evaluate the application of scientific reasoning, inventions, tools, and new technologies in the study of biology.
- Apply the scientific concepts of hypothesis, inference, law, theory, principle, fact, and observation.
- Analyze structural and functional similarities and differences between prokaryotes and eukaryotes.
- Evaluate relationships between structure and functions at various levels of biological organization (cell, tissue, organ, organ system, organism)
- Analyze the unique properties of water and explain how they support life on Earth.
- Analyze and predict how enzymes can regulate biochemical reactions within a cell.
- Analyse cell structures (mitochondria and chloroplasts) and processes (cellular respiration and photosynthesis) that transform energy in living systems.
- Analyze and predict how cell structures transport materials into, out of, and within a cell.
- Analyze how organisms use feedback and response mechanisms to maintain homeostasis.
- Compare and analyze the three stages (Interphase, mitosis, and cytokinesis) and the outcomes of the cell cycle.
- Analyze and predict how genetic information is inherited, altered, and expressed.
- Analyse the processes (transcription and translation) associated with protein synthesis.
- Predict the impacts of genetic engineering of medicine, forensics, and agriculture.
- Evaluate the mechanisms and sources of evidence related to the theory of evolution.
- Compare ecological levels of organization in the biosphere (Individual, population, community, ecosystem).
- Analyze interactions and relationships in an ecosystem as they relate to energy flow (food webs), biotic components, biogeochemical cycles (water, carbon and nitrogen cycles), and limiting factors.
- Predict changes in an ecosystem in response to natural and human disturbances.
Taking the Biology Keystone Exam at Agora
Students who are currently enrolled in a Biology course will take the Keystone Exam.
Student taking the exam will receive instructions from your Biology teacher and Family coach as to where and when you will be required to complete the exam.
The Exam Time frame
Keystone exams will be completed in May for all students enrolled in Biology in the current school year.
Student who need to take the test and are not enrolled in Biology will take the exam in the semester of their current year science course. For instance, if a student is in chemistry in the spring semester they will take the test in the spring. The testing window is in January for the Fall Semester students.