The Texas Education Agency directed Educational Testing Service to spend more than $20 million in fines and investments after more than 14,000 students lost answers due to technical issues on the State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness in March, the TEA announced Tuesday.

ETS was fined $5.7 million in liquidated damages and directed to invest $15 million in online testing system enrollment, shipping, online testing, precoding, and scoring and reporting, according to the TEA. The 2015-16 school year was the first year the New Jersey-based vendor administrated the STAAR test.

“I believe this combination of liquidated damages with an additional financial commitment from ETS reflects the correct balance of accountability for the recent past and safeguards for the future,” Commissioner of Education Mike Morath said.

The tests lost during the 2015-16 school year mainly affected students who needed accommodations, such as those in Special Education or English Language Learners, TEA spokesperson Lauren Callahan said. However, some high school students were affected because districts were afforded the opportunity to test completely online for English I and II end-of-course exams, she said.

“ETS apologizes for the operational shortcomings during this year's STAAR program,” the company said in a statement. “Our most important goal is to deliver the high-quality program the students and educators of Texas deserve, and we will continue to improve programs and processes to achieve that objective.”

ETS was awarded a four-year contract for the administration of STAAR tests for grades 3–8 and high school STAAR End-of-Course exams in 2015. Callahan said the vendor would continue administering the test for the remainder of the contract for the foreseeable future, and no decisions have been made to replace ETS as the test administrator.

State officials have continued to debate the future of STAAR testing over the past month.