New: EPP ASEP Fee Invoices 
On Friday, 10/15, TEA will be distributing invoices for the ASEP Technology Fee for 2020-2021 to EPPs. This fee is assessed for each candidate who was admitted to your educator preparation program during the 2020-2021 academic year. The number of candidates is taken from the number of individuals reported as admitted by your educator preparation program in ECOS.  

The invoice will include payment information, including information about how to pay using ACH or how to submit a payment by mail. Credit cards are not accepted.  

TEA will send invoices to the EPP Legal Authority. Payment is due 30 days after receipt. Additional information about the ASEP Technology Fee is located in the Texas Administrative Code at 19 TAC §229.9. 

New: EPP Insight to Impact Dashboards Update Webinar 
TEA will host a Zoom webinar on Wednesday, October 20 from 4:00-5:00 PM CST. During this webinar, we look forward to sharing updates about the Insight to Impact dashboard project, along with future plans. We value your input and feedback and encourage you to join us for this informational session. Click here to register.  

New: EPP Insight to Impact: Project Update At-a-Glance 
We recently completed our first proof of concept for the Insight to Impact Data Dashboards. Thanks to the hard work our EPP stakeholder focus group, we were able to create a first pass at visualizations for Insight to Impact. Click here to view a project update.  

Updated: Survey Data Distribution 
Last Monday, TEA distributed the principal survey, teacher survey, and student growth indicator data sets to EPPs. Some of the principal survey data sets contained duplicate entries for candidates. This was an artifact of our data processing to create individual data sets for EPPs. EPPs may disregard the duplicate rows. These duplicate rows are not included in the data used for dashboards or ASEP analysis. 

(1) Zip/compress the folders being uploaded  

(2) Use a short and concise naming scheme for all folders and documents, and  

(3) Try to avoid using more than 3 subfolders.  

If the names of files and documents are too long, or if there are too many subfolders, TEA may be unable to successfully download and unzip the submitted materials. If you have any questions about this, contact your assigned review specialist. 

Certification Officer Training – Thank You! 
Thank you to those that were able to attend the 2-day virtual Certification Officer training. There were 140 attendees! TEA hopes you found the training to be helpful and enjoyed talking with other EPP staff members. We appreciate the feedback we received from the training survey. It is useful when planning future training opportunities. TEA will provide the presentation slides and FAQ document to the attendees once it’s made available.

New: ETS Seeking Constructed Response Scorers for PASL
ETS invites school leaders and preparation faculty to participate in the online scoring of the ETS® Performance Assessment for School Leaders (PASL). This is an excellent opportunity for school leaders and preparation program faculty to become more familiar with this certification exam. Professionals who meet the criteria listed here are eligible to be scoring professionals (raters) for the PASL assessment.  

DID YOU KNOW?  
Candidates have until November 16, 2021, to register, reschedule, or cancel the PASL assessment. The deadline takes effect at 11:59 p.m. ET on the date indicated. 

Texas Covid Learning Acceleration Supports Grants:  
During late summer 2021, The Texas Education Agency launched the Texas COVID Learning Acceleration Supports (TCLAS) grant, a set of funding and targeted supports available to Local Education Agencies (LEAs) to accelerate student learning in the wake of COVID-19, utilizing state and federal funds. The TCLAS grant has provided LEAs the option to select up to ten unique decision points that support high leverage learning acceleration strategies:  

• Strategic Planning   
• High Quality Instructional Materials 
• Teacher Pipelines 
• Increased Student Learning Time 
• Innovative School Models 

Overall, well over 700 LEAs were awarded grant funding to address these strategies, totaling over 1 billion dollars in LEA support. Within those 700 LEAs, 90+ LEAs were awarded Decision 5: Residency Supports, a component of the overall teacher pipeline strategy.  

The Decision 5 TCLAS grant supports districts in building high-quality, sustainable teacher residencies in partnership with one or more of the fifteen approved Vetted Teacher Residency Programs. With the grant, LEAs receive funding to support residents’ living stipends and residency implementation over the course of the Fall 2021- Spring 2024 grant cycle. The grant also provides technical assistance to develop innovative staffing models that reallocate existing district funds to sustain resident stipends and program supports beyond the lifetime of the grant. 

Information regarding educator certification testing can be accessed at the Texas Educator Certification Exam website.   

Information regarding the Science of Teaching Reading Exam can be accessed at tea.texas.gov/str.   

Information regarding edTPA 2020-2021 information opportunities can be accessed here.   

Information and updates regarding the Performance Assessment for School Leaders (PASL) can be accessed at the Important Updates link.   

Updated information related to the COVID-19 response can be accessed here.   

To view previous editions of the weekly newsletter, please see the Texas Educator Preparation Program Weekly Newsletter webpage.