October 19, 2022: Texas Educator Preparation Programs Newsletter

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Texas Education Agency

October 19, 2022

Texas Educator Preparation Programs Newsletter

Three young students on the floor, sharing a book called Ovals, from Donna ISD

Welcome

This newsletter compiles the most up-to-date information concerning what EPPs need to know to best support their faculty/instructors, staff, and candidates. Please thoroughly read all the sections for reminders, upcoming events, To Dos, and FAQs.    

We encourage you to allow this week's quote to serve as a great reminder of one of the most important aspects of our profession (i.e., lifelong learning).   

 

“Education is the passport to the future, for tomorrow belongs to those who prepare for it today.” 

 

If you are not currently subscribed to the newsletter, please sign up at the link below.    Educator Preparation Program Listserv Registration   


Upcoming Deadlines

Topic   

Action Item   

Due Date   

EPF Statewide Survey 

Complete the EPF Statewide Survey 

October 26, 2022 

ELAR 4-8 Certification 

Last day to apply and recommend for certification using #117 

October 30, 2022 

Core Subjects EC-6 

Last day to apply and recommend for certification using #291 

December 30, 2022 

LOTE Spanish #613 

New Passing Standard 

January 9, 2023 

ELAR 4-8 #217 

(At committee recommendation) 

September 1, 2023 

Table Of Contents

EPP Points of Contact

Your best source for information and support at the TEA.   

As an Educator Preparation Program, your main point of contact is your Education Specialist.   

  • Or, EPPs (and candidates) may call (512) 936-8400 and select Option #5: Educator Preparation Programs. If an Education Specialist is not available to answer the call at that time, please leave a voicemail. An Education Specialist will promptly return the call.  

If EPPs (and candidates) would like to speak to a representative from another area(s), they may submit a Help Desk Ticket or contact (512) 936-8400 and select one of the options listed below. 

  • Option 2: Educator Certification  
  • Option 3: Fingerprinting  
  • Option 6: Investigations 
  • Option 8: General Office Information 

The Teal Account Access team and Educator Testing team are available through the Help Desk. Links to both teams are below. 

Educator Preparation Program Support

Educator Certification 

Updates related to Educator Preparation Program Management 

New: Insight to Impact Dashboard Update 

TEA has recorded and posted a new update webinar about the forthcoming Insight to Impact Dashboards. This webinar presents information about the content of these dashboards and the timeline for release. We encourage you to review this information for these EPP-facing dashboards that are coming next year! 

Stay tuned to the Insight to Impact webpage for further information. 

Reminder: Effective Preparation Framework Statewide Survey 

The SBEC’s current draft of the Effective Preparation Framework (EPF) aims to define the highest leverages practices effective Texas teacher preparation programs strive to implement daily. The EPF has been developed in response to a desire from the SBEC and the field to define a Texas vision for high-quality teacher preparation and support EPP continuous improvement. A wide range of stakeholders have worked to develop the current draft of the EPF over the past year.  

To further inform this development process, an EPF content validation survey has been shared with all EPP Legal Authorities, Back-Up Legal Authorities, and Primary Contacts for distribution to all EPP faculty and staff. The survey offers EPP faculty and staff the opportunity to examine and provide feedback on the EPF. We anticipate that the survey will take 30 minutes to complete. The deadline to submit responses is October 26, 2022.  

Reminder: EPP ASEP Fee Invoices 

On Monday, 10/17, TEA distributed invoices for the ASEP Technology Fee for 2021-2022 to EPPs. This fee is assessed for each candidate who was admitted to your educator preparation program during the 2021-2022 academic year. The number of candidates is taken from the number of individuals reported as admitted by your educator preparation program in ECOS. Additionally, as was the case last year, admissions for the prior year who were added this year via a data fix are included in the count. This is because they were not included in the prior year’s invoice. 

The invoice has payment information, including information about how to pay using ACH and how to submit a payment by mail. Credit cards are not accepted. Please note that ACH payment is encouraged. If programs would prefer to pay via a wire transfer, these instructions are available on request. 

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

Coming Soon: Opportunity: Texas Teacher Preparation Program Quality Review Grant  

We are pleased to announce that the TEA will soon launch a grant application to support selected Teacher Preparation Programs to participate in a quality review of their program.  The selected Texas Teacher Preparation Programs (TPP) will engage with a vetted technical assistance provider in a comprehensive review of program quality indicators with an approved provider in support of continuous improvement.  During this process, the TEA seeks to learn alongside the selected reviewers and the selected TPPs to better understand the best practices in measuring program quality for the designated high leverage areas.  An informal informational session/FAQ will be held on October 17 3pm CST zoom link.  If you would like to learn more about this opportunity ahead of the grant’s posting, please reach out to Ebony.Love@tea.texas.gov. 

 

Update: LBB Reporting – Thank you! 

A big THANK YOU to all the programs who have submitted their graduate data for LBB reporting. Please be sure to retrieve your numbers from ECOS and report them to the LBB via the ABEST system. 

As a reminder, LBB reporting is only for public colleges and universities.  

If you have not sent this information, please do so immediately. Follow the instructions below. 

  1. Construct your .csv file as described in the ASEP Manual. Please note that these are your undergraduate teacher education program graduates for 2020-2021. 
  1. Name your .csv file with your EPP name and CDN. 
  1. Create a Help Desk Ticket in the Data Reporting tab and attached your file. Please title your ticket “LBB Data for Upload (EPP Name)” 
  1. Once TEA has loaded the data, we will reply to the ticket informing you that you can now view your 2021-2022 LBB report. 

If you have any questions about this process, please do not hesitate to reach out via a Help Desk Ticket. If you are a public college or university and have not yet submitted this data, please do so as soon as possible. 

As a reminder, LBB reporting is only for public colleges and universities. 

Reminder: EPP Assignment Updates 

The EPP team is currently in the process of updating the EPP Education Specialist assignments. Please reach out to Lorrie Ayers (Lorrie.Ayers@tea.texas.gov) or Vanessa Alba (Vanessa.Alba@tea.texas.gov) while assignments are updated. 

Upcoming edTPA Supports

In this section, TEA will share updates, information, and support for programs choosing to utilize edTPA throughout the 2022-23 academic year. NOTE: edTPA remains to be an option for candidates to complete as their pedagogical exam in lieu of the Pedagogy and Professional Responsibilities (PPR) exam. 

Topic 

Description 

Event Date & Time 

Texas edTPA Implementation Series: 

Supporting the Change Process for Educator Preparation Programs 

 

 

In this webinar series, an edTPA National Academy Member (affiliated with a Texas Educator Preparation Program) will orient participants to the subject-specific, performance-based assessment edTPA, provide examples of best practices to effectively implement edTPA, identify strategies when supporting candidates during instruction and implementation, and describe methods for using and learning from edTPA evidence. 

3:Supporting Candidates during Instruction and Implementation

Wednesday October 26, 2022, 

1 p.m. – 2:30 p.m. 

Register HERE For 

Part 3 

 

4: Learning from edTPA Evidence 

Thursday November 10, 2022, 

1 p.m. – 2:30 p.m. 

Register HERE For 

Part 4

Academic Language in edTPA: 

Supporting Learning and Language Development 

This workshop is intended for faculty, instructors, supervisors, and school partners who support teacher candidates. In this workshop, a member of the edTPA National Academy (affiliated with a Texas Educator Preparation Program) will provide participants with an overview of academic language and demonstrate how academic language is an integral construct in edTPA through the lens of equitable instructional practices. 

Wednesday (Half Day) 

October 20, 2022, 

9 a.m. – 12 p.m. 

 

Register HERE 

Evaluating Candidate Performance 

This workshop is intended for faculty, instructors, supervisors, and school partners who support teacher candidates. In this workshop, a member of the edTPA National Academy (affiliated with a Texas Educator Preparation Program) will provide opportunities for participants to review the edTPA rubrics, introduce a process for identifying and evaluating evidence within an edTPA portfolio, and identify ways in which the performance evaluation process can be used for continuous improvement. 

Thursday (Half Day) 

November 11, 2022 

9 a.m. – 12 p.m. 

Register HERE 

Curriculum Inquiry 

This workshop is intended for faculty, instructors, and supervisors who support teacher candidates. In this collaborative workshop, a member of the edTPA National Academy (affiliated with a Texas Educator Preparation Program) will provide opportunities for participants to review their programs’ scope and sequence and course syllabi to identify areas in which the constructs, measured by edTPA, are already embedded and could naturally be embedded. 

Tuesday (Half Day) 

November 18, 2022, 

9a.m. – 12 p.m. 

Register HERE 

Tools for edTPA Data Analysis:

edReports and Results Analyzer 101 

This webinar is intended for edTPA Coordinators and edTPA Score Reporting Contacts. In this webinar, a Pearson representative will provide an overview and demonstration of Education Reports (edReports) and ResultsAnalyzer®(RA).  

Note: RA is an interactive 

reporting tool to review and analyze performance assessment data. 

Thursday 

November 8, 2022 

10:00 a.m. – 11:00 a.m. 

Register HERE 

*Please view the Fall 2022 edTPA Virtual Workshops and Webinars calendar linked here


Educator Standards and Testing 

Updates related to Educator Standards and Certification Testing   

Reminder: ELAR 4-8 (217) Interactive Practice Exam Now Available 

The ELAR 4-8 (217) Interactive Practice Exam is now available for purchase. More information can be found here. 

 

DID YOU KNOW? EPPs can track the number of times a candidate has taken a particular exam with data available within the ResultsAnalyzer® section of the edReports website. Administrators can review the data to determine if candidates are approaching or have reached the five-attempt limit. 

FAQs

Every newsletter we take this space to highlight questions that we have heard from EPPs. 

Q: I am the Legal Authority at my EPP. Must I request Primary Approver status?

A: Yes, you must request Primary Approver access. Many who request Legal Authority or Backup Legal Authority miss the important next step to request Primary or Alternate Approver access. It is through the Primary or Alternate Approver how your staff request ECOS for Entities access and if you forget to request Primary or Alternate Approver access, your staff has nobody at the EPP level to approve those accesses.

 

Resources at a Glance

Lesson Study Gateway Resources 

Practice based preparation resources for virtual field-based experience: Provides model lessons and video of instructional delivery.  

Texas Teach Like a Champion (TLAC)

Practice based preparation resources for virtual field-based experience:  Provides content neutral pedagogical skill building through observing a model of and practicing the same high leverage skill.    

Texas TLAC One Pager for EPPs   

PASL Videos

ETS and TEA have worked together to create instructional videos to orient faculty, staff, and candidates to the requirements of the PASL test. Video one provides a general overview of PASL, its content, and scoring/reporting procedures. Video two provides a more in-depth overview of the tasks associated with the assessment. Full requirements, descriptions, and resources may be found in the PASL Candidate and Educator handbook.   

PASL Video One: https://vimeo.com/user127014634/download/669946029/6aa375f585 

TEA Dyslexia Training 

TEALearn has a new dyslexia training, TEA Dyslexia, that has been made available (at no cost) to candidates who are seeking an initial certification for all certification classes. Information about the training and how to enroll can be found on the TEA Learn platform. NOTE: For candidates who have not yet been issued an intern, probationary, or standard certificate, please follow the steps noted on the webpage, Dyslexia Requirements for Educator Preparation Programs, to enroll in the course.   

If you need technical assistance please submit a TEALearn Help Desk ticket. For dyslexia course content questions, please send an email to specialeducation@tea.texas.gov. 

For More Information...

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

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.  

Information regarding the current Texas certification exams can be found on the 2021-2022 Required Test Chart for Texas Certification. 

Educator account setup instructions can be found on the TEA’s Educator Certification Online System website. 

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