A Message from Dr. McCormick 3/3/17

Indiana Department of Education
Friday, March 3, 2017

 

Dear Educators:

The first week of ISTEP+ Part 1 is almost complete.The testing window remains open until March 10. Several corporations assessed students online, with 125,000 tests completed so far online. On Tuesday, an outage occurred with Amazon Web Services, a provider for technology support to Pearson. The assessment continued for those students that were logged in due to the local storage of content and responses. However, new sessions were delayed until Wednesday morning. 

Just a reminder that you can always access the most up to date organizational chart on the DOE homepage

Thank you for your hard work and dedication. 

Sincerely,
Dr. Jennifer McCormick
State Superintendent of Public Instruction
Indiana Department of Education

Dr. Jennifer McCormick

Assessment 

The IREAD-3 opens March 13-17. The PowerPoint featured in the IREAD-3 Pre-Test Workshop recording is here. Materials arrived in corporations last week. Additional materials may be ordered by CTCs through the Pearson Help Desk.  

Title IV

The government is currently being funded by a continuing resolution (CR), passed in December 2016, through April 28, 2017. As such, IDOE has not received allocations for the new Title IV block grant or other federal grants under ESSA. Furthermore, we were told to expect cuts in federal funds in the SY 17-18 budget. IDOE will continue engaging with ED and will keep you updated. Questions regarding this information can be sent to Nathan Williamson at nwilliamson@doe.in.gov

ESSA

A series of meetings will be held around the state to gather input for the Department's ESSA plan. Please click here to find the one closest to you and share the date with your staff and school board. 

Safety Training Video

Early next week, a joint news release from the Department of Education along with the Indiana State Police and Department of Justice will be sent to the public announcing the rollout of a new, impactful safety training video to combat sexual predators in schools. Because the media may call you for comment when it is released, we want to share it with you now. We ask you to share this video with your staff in order to raise awareness of how to identify behaviors of sexual predators in schools. For questions or additional information, please contact David Woodward, dwoodward@doe.in.gov 

Customer Service Survey 

The Department of Education launched a customer satisfaction survey today to provide a standing opportunity to gather feedback. The survey will remain open indefinitely. We encourage everyone to fill out this survey each time they interact with the department. We will be monitoring these responses and establishing improvement targets based on the results. we thank you for your candid feedback. 

Perkins Grant Awareness

The Department of Education is pleased to announce the Area CTE Districts that have been awarded to a total of over $1.7 million in grants provided through federal Carl D. Perkins funding.

Teacher of the Year

Superintendents, please take a minute to complete the Indiana Teacher of the Year survey found at this link

Special Education 

The Office of Special Education publishes a biweekly newsletter filled with updates and information about special education.

Annual Performance Review  

As required by Indiana law, the Department of Education is preparing for the 2016 Annual Performance Reports (APR). The APR is required to include information regarding performance of schools and school corporations, as well as details on the progress being made to help students become college- and career-ready. Please click here for important information concerning the APR. 

Social Media

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Weekly Updates

Miss an update? View previous weekly updates here.

 
 

A message from Dr. McCormick will be sent every Friday.