Congratulations to Dr. Rob Dietrich our New Digital Teaching and Learning Director

I am very honored and humbled to be serving in the role of Director of Digital Teaching and Learning for the NC Department of Public Instruction. Digital Teaching and Learning provides an opportunity to expand education beyond the four walls of the classroom. A student has an opportunity to visit places they have never seen in virtual reality, enhance collaboration among students, and experience high quality digital content based on the standard course of study. 

Digital Teaching and Learning will continue to work towards improving digital resources in the classroom. We are doing this through multiple avenues to include providing districts with Digital Learning Initiative Grants in order to integrate technology into educational practices. This year will include modernizing the Digital Learning Plan and Digital Learning and Media Inventory. The most important aspect we will provide to you is quality customer service with the Regional Consultants, Home Base Team, and Innovative Learning Catalysts ready to support you in meeting your goals and objectives.

In closing, I look forward to working with all of you to ensure that students receive a positive and engaging learning experience.  Thank you for all your hard work and dedication in providing all students with a quality education no matter the format.  

Sincerely,

Rob Dietrich, Ed.D. 

Director, Digital Teaching and Learning

Home Base Meet Ups - Thank You!

Thank you for attending and participating in this week's Home Base Meet Ups!  Your attendance and participation is what makes these meetings so valuable to us and your peers.  If you were unable to attend a session or would like a refresher, links to the slides and recordings are listed below.

Please note that the Schoolnet, Learning.com and PowerSchool recordings are currently not available.  The Schoolnet and Learning.com recordings will be made available next week; however, due to technical issues, the PowerSchool recording cannot be retrieved.  The PowerSchool slides for the November HBMU are provided below.

Home Base Meet Up Links

HBMU Opening Session November 2021 - https://bit.ly/hbmunov2122open

NCEES HBMU November Slides 2021 - https://bit.ly/hbmuncees112021

NCEES HBMU November Recording 2021 - https://youtu.be/Gmq30l7milI

Schoolnet HBMU November Slides 2021 - https://bit.ly/snHBMU1121 

PowerSchool HBMU November Slides 2021 - https://bit.ly/PSHBMU-NOV21

Learning.com HBMU November Slides 2021- https://bit.ly/3kBHAG9
Canvas HBMU November Slides 2021 - https://bit.ly/hbmucanvas112021

Canvas HBMU November Recording 2021 - https://youtu.be/2pXMSD75DrQ

#GoOpenNC HBMU November Slides 2021 - https://bit.ly/hbmugoopennc112021

#GoOpenNC HBMU November Recording 2021 - https://youtu.be/xkcN353CKM0

The next round of HBMUs will be held February 7-11, 2021.  Please see the calendar below for all future dates.

NOTE:  The Home Base Team will be hosting all 2021-2022 Home Base Meet Ups virtually.  This change in format is being made to alleviate safety concerns for those who plan to attend.  The dates have remained the same, only the format of the meetings (virtual vs. face-to-face) was amended. A new calendar of HBMU events has been provided below.  Please mark your calendars accordingly.

Home Base Maintenance Window - November 19, 2021

It was previously communicated that today's regularly scheduled maintenance would be canceled due to an earlier maintenance which took place during the November 5 weekend.  Due to unforeseen required patching and restarts by the vendor, PowerSchool will be taken offline tonight briefly between the hours of 9 p.m. and 7 a.m. tomorrow morning.  Once maintenance is complete, the application will be made available to users.

We apologize for the misinformation and any inconvenience this brief maintenance may cause, and thank you for your support.

New Technical Contact PowerSchool IPT Certification in March 2022

In collaboration with PowerSchool, the Home Base Team will be offering virtual IPT certification training for new technical contacts from March 7-11, 2022: 

• This training session does have limited capacity and seats are based on eligibility.
• This training will span five full days. 
• Participants will have 90 days to take and pass the certification test after training. 
• Each PSU is allowed a certain number of technical contacts based on their ADM. 

If you are unsure of your current technical contacts, please contact NC PowerSchool Support at 1-855-339-4790.
 

NCDPI has created an IPT FAQ document to help answer questions you may have. Please review this document for frequently asked questions about the training and certification.

Those eligible to attend the DPI offered IPT Training include: 

• Anyone who is replacing a certified technical contact for their PSU as of 7/1/2021.
• A local charter school employee, not employed by a third-party company and has not previously attended IPT training.

Those who cannot attend this training are: 

• Third-party Charter school SIS management company employees
• PSUs wanting additional technical contacts above their desired allocation
• Anyone who has attended training previously. 

Note: Anyone who is not eligible for this training will need to arrange training and certification through the vendor, PowerSchool, and cover the cost incurred. To do so, please reach out to the PowerSchool training team, training@powerschool.com. 
  

Those who are eligible for this training session, please fill out the registration form.
Registration Form: https://bit.ly/FebIPT2022 

**Registration will close COB Friday, February 18, 2022 or sooner if the max number of attendees is reached.

PowerSchool Extension

Dear Coordinators,

Please share with other staff as appropriate.

Note: PSUs which were not open in the school year 2020-2021 are not required to participate in this collection.

The PowerSchool Submission End Date will be Extended to December 17, 2021.

Two issues have been reported by the field. Below is important information about each:

Out of school suspension data is inaccurate.

The vendor is working on a fix. PSUs will be notified when the report is update.

Survey questions impacted:

School detail –DISC -11

School Aggregate –DISC-7c, DISC-7d, DISC-9c, DISC-9d

Course data is off.

This can be resolved by updating the course section code to 18 weeks for second semester.

The vendor will remove this requirement, however you can update the course section length and re-run the reports to see correct results to continue to review.

NCDPI will notify all PSUs when the update is complete.

Contact Terra Lynne Dominguez terra.dominguez@dpi.nc.gov with questions.

Reminder:  Official Fall Legislative Class Size Report

This is a reminder that the Fall Legislative Class Size (LCS) Collection window is now open for all PSUs. Pursuant to §GS115C-301 this data is collected two times a year and captures data from the end of October and end of February of each school year.  Each local board of education, through the superintendent, shall file a report, based on information provided by the principal, for each school within the local school administrative unit with the Superintendent of Public Instruction.  

The due date for the approval of the Fall LCS Report, affidavit, and waiver submissions is November 30, 2021. PSUs should begin running and reviewing their reports to allow ample time for cases to be submitted and reviewed if necessary.

NOTE: Please be aware that the current staff file that is loaded in production only includes staff members who were active as of September 30. There have been some problems with some of the PSU payroll systems this month so datafiles are running late. As soon as the October payroll file is available, DPI will have the staff data refreshed. Until then, any teacher who was scheduled to a section since October 1 will not be on the report. If you have teachers missing from the LCS reports, please wait to submit your reports until the new payroll file is loaded.

Also, because the K-8 School Report data is pulled from the K-8 Average Class Size by School report, ALL PSUs, including Charter Schools must run the Fall LCS Collection.

More information about the LCS Collection can be found in this presentation.

Reminder:  Unofficial Legislative Class Size Monthly Reports

While the official Legislative Class Size Collection is reported to the State Superintendent’s office twice a year, legislation requires districts to monitor local class enrollment totals throughout the year. Throughout the year, local boards of education shall report exceptions to the class size requirements set out for kindergarten through third grade and significant increases in class size at other grade levels to the State Board and shall request allotment adjustments at any grade level, waivers from the requirements for kindergarten through third grade, or both.

A new set of reports were placed into all PowerSchool instances this past weekend. New, Unofficial Legislative Class Size reports are available on the State Reporting page and these reports follow the exact same logic as the official reports. These reports are to be used as a monitoring tool and can be ran each month to help principals and data managers have quicker access to viewing class size totals. Schools are not required to submit the unofficial reports, but NCDPI does encourage you to run these monthly and report any class size exceptions to the State Board of Education.

Reminder:  Collecting Data for Headcount Transfers

There have been many questions as to the process in which DPI will be collecting the data for the Headcount Transfers. For FY 2021-22, we will use the same method as we have in previous years. A separate communication will be sent using the weekly newsletters. This communication will advise you as to when the HC Transfer System will open and the deadline that is being given to submit your transfers.

DPI has been working on a new method to collect this data using PowerSchool.  Although this method will not be used in FY 2021-22, we still ask that the report be run and approved no later than December 1, 2021. This process will be completed this year so that reports can be sent to DPI to ensure that the reports are working properly and can be used in FY 2022-23.

Reminder:  Years and Terms Setup for 2022-23

NCDPI has completed the Years and Terms setup at the state level so that PSUs can now begin creating their years and terms for next year. In addition, we expect to have all course codes for 2022-23 imported and available by December 1, 2021

Reminder:  ECATS Duplicate Student Numbers for Head Count

Please be reminded that the DPI EC Division has a federally required Active Child Count on December 1.  If you are asked by your EC division to log a ticket to PowerSchool for a duplicate student, please include the following in your subject “ECATS Duplicate Student Numbers for Head Count” and log as Priority 2.  Once the PowerSchool ticket is logged, please provide your EC division with the case number so they can log an ECATS ZenDesk ticket with the case number.  When DPI receives the ticket information from PowerSchool, DPI will complete the process.   When you receive a resolution to the case, you may also provide that to your EC division so they can add the resolution information to the ZenDesk ticket. 

If you have submitted a PowerSchool ticket for an EC duplicate student and did not include the proper subject of “ECATS Duplicate Student Number for Head Count”, please call the dedicated NC PowerSchool support line at 1-855-339-4790 with the case number and ask for the ticket subject to be updated. This allows the ticket to be given priority for December 1 Active Child Count.

Welcome to Home Base - A Quick Video of Who We Are

Each year, PSUs experience an influx of new staff.  The Home Base Team is aware of these changes and has created a short video to help acquaint and reacquaint users with Home Base. 

Please checkout the  "Welcome to Home Base" video which gives a quick overview of what Home Base is and how all its components work together. Feel free to share it with your peers and use it in your trainings. 

2021-22 NCEES Webinars

NCEES Webinars are held most Tuesdays from 4-5 PM.

Click on the Titles to Register. Navigate to Webinars 2021-22 to view webinar descriptions.

• Middle of Year Processes for Principals Tues. Nov. 30, 4-5 PM
• Middle of Year Teachers/Support Staff  Tues. Dec. 7, 4-5 PM
• Admin Reporting in NCEES  Tues. Dec. 14, 4-5 PM
• Understanding the Teacher Rubric - 2 hours  

RECORDING - PRESENTATION - FAQs

Follow Us on Social Media!

Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, and begin receiving "Did You Know" tips featuring each Home Base product. 

These messages will include upcoming changes, tips, and even hidden treasures within each product to make your job easier.  If you are not following us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, click on the links below and begin today!  Make sure you share this information with other staff within your school.

Instagram:  @nchomebase         Facebook:  @nchomebase       Twitter:  @nchomebase

NCDPI Technology Support Center

NCDPI's Technology Support Center continues to meet your support needs for:

• Schoolnet 
• NCEES/Unified Talent 
• Staff & Student UID (eScholar)

Support availability:

Web (NEW URL):  https://ncgov.servicenowservices.com/sp_dpi   -  24/7

Phone:  919-716-1840, Monday - Friday, 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. (excluding state holidays)

Technical support for SIS needs is handled directly by PowerSchool support using chat, phone, or by opening a case ticket.