August Newsletter
ECE Assessment
This following section provides updates about approved early childhood instruments available for school system (school district or open-enrollment charter school) use and guidance for administration and reporting of instruments for prekindergarten, kindergarten and grades 1–2.
For all required early childhood instruments, the instrument administration windows are determined locally. It is strongly recommended that the BOY instruments be administered within the first 60 days of school so that the resulting data can be used for instructional purposes.
School systems should ensure they have systems in place to collect and report student data for students who may have missed the administration or enrolled after the designated window. This data is crucial for the accuracy of Texas Public Education Information Resource (TPEIR) and Public Education Information Management System (PEIMS) reporting.
Prekindergarten: In accordance with Texas Education Code (TEC) §29.169, school districts and open-enrollment charter schools must select prekindergarten progress monitoring instruments from the updated 2024-2025 through 2026-2027 Commissioner's List of Approved Prekindergarten Progress Monitoring Instruments when planning for school year 2024-25 and beyond.
The following progress monitoring instruments are on the new Commissioner’s List of Approved Prekindergarten Progress Monitoring Instruments to be used in the 2024-25 school year:
- Circle Progress Monitoring System
- COR Advantage
- CPALLS+STEM
- Frog Street Assessment
- GOLD
- LION for Prekindergarten
Note: Due to extenuating circumstances, Ready, Set, K! (RSK!) is no longer an approved progress monitoring instrument on the 2024-2025 through 2026-2027 Commissioner's List of Approved Prekindergarten Progress Monitoring Instruments. If you are a local educational agency that has implemented this instrument for the 2024–25 school year, please contact us through the Early Childhood Education Division Support Portal.
In the provision of high-quality, full-day prekindergarten for 4-year-old students, school systems must collect data regarding student progress in the following domains at the beginning-of-year (BOY), middle-of-year (MOY) and end-of-year (EOY) by using one of the instruments on the Commissioner's list. (19 Texas Administrative Code §102.1003(c)(1)):
- Health and wellness
- Emergent Literacy Language and Communication
- Emergent Literacy Reading
- Emergent Literacy Writing
- Mathematics
School systems should contact their chosen instrument vendor to confirm what measures must be given to meet reporting requirements.
For detailed information regarding implementation for 3-year-old prekindergarten students, visit the Requirements for 3-year-olds vs 4-year-old Pre-K Students section on the Early Childhood Data Collection Requirements webpage.
Kindergarten: In accordance with TEC §28.006(c-2), school systems must use either the Texas Kindergarten Entry Assessment (TX-KEA) or mCLASS Texas Edition as the required beginning-of-year reading instrument.
Families must be notified of the BOY results in writing within 60 days of administration (TEC §28.006(d)(2)).
Grades 1 and 2: In accordance with TEC §28.006(c), each school district must administer, at the first and second grade levels, a reading instrument on the list adopted by the commissioner or by the district-level committee. The district must administer the reading instrument in accordance with the commissioner's recommendations under Subsection (a)(1).
Instruments available for use include:
- mCLASS Texas
- TPRI/Tejas LEE
- Alternate selected by the district-level committee, as authorized under TEC §28.006(b)
Families must be notified of the BOY results in writing within 60 days of administration (TEC §28.006(d)(2)).
ECE Assessment Resources
For the most up-to-date required BOY assessment information for prekindergarten, kindergarten, and grades 1–2, visit the TEA Early Learning Assessments web page.
Amplify Resources
Timely Amplify ECDS Help Documents -
To help you better understand your 2024-25 Kindergarten ECDS submission, please refer to our comprehensive flipbook linked below. Inside, you will find:
- Information on how to set up your district’s Ed-Fi integration
- Information about using Ed-Fi integrations to manage Amplify mCLASS student data
- The ECDS Submission timeline for the 2024-25 school year
- Troubleshooting resources from both Amplify & TEA
View our new interactive flipbook: TSDS Upgrade to Ed-Fi: Amplify mCLASS Texas and ECDS.
A PDF version of this document is also available.
Helpful resources as you prepare to benchmark your Kindergarten students
Updating Student State IDs for ECDS Submission - Please review the documents below to ensure all Kindergarten State IDs are included in your district’s initial data share:
Children's Learning Institute (CLI) Resources
It’s that time of year for 2024-25 Teacher and Student Data Uploads!
Student data for the new school year can be added into CLI Engage beginning Friday, August 5. The database will be reset and ready for use on and after this date.
We strongly recommend waiting until class rosters are finalized (approximately 1-2 weeks before your progress monitoring window opens) before uploading student and class information.
Check Out the Assessment Toolkits!
Accessible from the Training & Support on CLI Engage, the Assessment Toolkits provide curated information to support a variety of educators and leaders. These “one-stop shops” offer users the ability to locate a variety of materials and resources, each tailored to support understanding and implementation of all our progress monitoring tools.
Beginning-of-Year Resources
The BOY Assessment Resources page is a collection of resources that are helpful to teachers and school leaders to kick off the school year.
High-Quality Prekindergarten
In June, the Texas Administrative Code, 19 TAC §102.1003, was updated to reflect technical edits for clarification as well as to reflect changes from House Bill 2729. These changes further align with PK Guidelines and current research. Changes include:
- Statute added to reflect requirements for teachers of prekindergarten classes provided by an entity with which a school district contracts to provide prekindergarten
- “2015” removed and language now states “prekindergarten guidelines”
- Family Engagement Plans shall include a primary point of contact and contact information
- Student progress monitoring includes middle of year assessments
Follow the link to read the updated Texas Administrative Code, which was adopted with changes since published as proposed.
PK Access and Enrollment
Exciting report updates for 2024!
Often when supporting local educational agencies (LEAs), the Early Childhood Education team will share Texas Public Education Information Resource (TPEIR) reports, where LEAs can access information about their prekindergarten programs. New this year, these reports have been moved to Power BI and integrate information on Prekindergarten Partnerships. The enhanced versions now feature a list of collaborating early learning providers, statistics on PreK school types, and enrollment figures categorized by school type.
You can view the new reports here:
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