Deemed “School Performance Awards,” the budget bill appropriates $30 million in the 2^nd year of the biennium to be distributed based upon graduation rates or 5% improvement in graduation rates, student passage rates on ISTEP and End of Course assessments or 5% growth in these assessment results.

Please click on the link to see a district-by-district printout of the awards.

http://www.in.gov/legislative/senate_republicans/images/photogallery/Documents/Performance%20Awards%20by%20School%20%20%237%20by%20corp.pdf

These grants are in addition to state tuition support under the formula. The distribution is to come before December 5 of a fiscal year and may be used only to pay cash awards to effective or highly effective teachers.

There is a 2^nd categorical grant of $2 million each year of the biennium that is earmarked for effective and highly effective teachers who teach in “focus” or “priority” school districts (presumably meaning “D” or “F” districts).  The Department of Education is charged with developing policies and procedures for administering this program but the allotment is made by the budget agency after approval by the State Board of Education (SBE) and review by the state budget committee.

For Immediate Release
6/10/13
For more information, contact: Kathleen Berry Graham
kberry@ista-in.org, 317-263-3321, 800-382-4037

 

INDIANAPOLIS-Today, Indiana Superintendent of Public Instruction Glenda Ritz announced that Dr. Richard Hill of the National Center for the Improvement of Educational Assessment has been hired to determine the impact of interruptions experienced by students taking the ISTEP+ test this spring.

“ISTA supports Superintendent Ritz’s recommendations,” said ISTA Pres. Nate Schnellenberger following the new conference. “Ritz understands that a thorough search needs to be conducted of the test results. Teachers from across the state say that their students experienced computer interruptions that lasted from a few seconds to much longer periods of time and those issues will have an impact on results.”

More than 78,000 students who took the test, conducted by CTB/McGraw-Hill, experienced interruptions with the CTB servers. “I think Superintendent Ritz wants to analyze the independent results before declaring too much judgment,” said Schnellenberger. “She does acknowledge that the results have a far-ranging impact not just for students but for teachers, schools and administrators.” Teacher compensation and evaluations are based on ISTEP+ results. “It’s extremely important in the areas of evaluation and compensation for teachers,” said Schnellenberger.

“Because the stakes of this test are so high, the results must be beyond reproach,” Ritz said.

For the news release from Superintendent Ritz, go to: http://www.doe.in.gov/news/indiana-department-education-hires-third-party-validate-high-stakes-istep-data.

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — An independent review of Indiana’s ISTEP test results is underway one month after computer troubles disrupted test-taking for thousands of students this spring.

State schools Superintendent Glenda Ritz said Monday she had hired the National Center for Improvement of Educational Assessment to assess the test results. The center is expected to take 4-5 weeks completing the review.

Ritz says she also has told schools they can reduce how much the tests factor into teacher assessments. She also said tainted test results will not be used to assess schools.

Problems with the online format affected roughly 70,000 tests and some school administrators want the results ruled invalid. School officials reported that computer screens froze and many students were forced to log back in repeatedly while taking the test.

Spencer Lloyd cleaned out his classroom and office last week, saying goodbye to Manual High School, five years of memories and the choir program that he has led so dynamically.

Five years might seem like a quick stop in the career of a teacher, but at a school like Manual it’s a lifetime. Days are filled with drama — students on the edge of dropping out and crises ranging from teen pregnancy to child neglect. Adding to that, the state took the dramatic step of seizing control of Manual last year and nearly every member of the staff has been replaced since then.

It’s been a momentous era for the school. For Lloyd, 29, it’s been a time filled with heartbreaks but also inspiration. He turned a nearly defunct choir program into the pride of Manual, a program that has become a fixture in the city. Hoosiers from Indianapolis and beyond saw how special and helpful the program was, repeatedly offering much-needed financial and moral support after reading about it in my series of columns on Manual High and later through The Star’s Our Children/Our City campaign. Star readers turned up by the thousands at at concerts and then generously financed the choir’s trip to New York last year, where they performed at Carnegie Hall.

And now it’s over. Lloyd is moving on, entering a doctoral program at Ball State University and accepting an adjunct teaching position at Indiana Wesleyan, his alma mater. He acknowledged that years at Manual can leave a teacher a bit burned out, but he is still inspired by his students.

“It sounds cliche, I know, but it’s definitely bittersweet,” he told me the other day. “The students at Manual had such an impact on me. I learned from them how to be more patient, more loving. I learned what some of them have to go through on a day-to-day basis just to get to school, let alone graduate. So many of them have so many obstacles in life but they don’t give up.”

I met Lloyd on the first day of the school year in 2009 as I was beginning my year-long exploration of life at one of the state’s most troubled schools. It was a school where I found apathy and dysfunction at every turn — until, that is, I walked into Lloyd’s classroom.

As I’ve written many times, Lloyd’s classroom provided me with the hope that failing schools could be saved with the right teachers, right policies and right expectations. He led his classroom with urgency, demanding that his students work hard and set higher goals. He became a quasi-parent, counseling students through personal traumas that no teenager should have to endure. But along with that compassion, and his energetic teaching style, came a rejection of excuses for failure. He insisted that his students were capable of achieving big things despite the crushing effects of poverty and the generational academic failure that gripped so many of their families. He understood that his job was about more than lecturing.

“Working at Manual is not just about teaching,” he said. “It’s also about being a compassionate person. It’s about helping students become better people, not just better musicians. I always say that I taught life and then when we had time I taught music.”

“The classroom,” he continued, “has to be based on a foundation of relationships. The students, at any school but especially here, want to know that you care about them as a person before they’ll care about what a C major chord is. They want to know that you understand they didn’t have dinner last night or that they don’t know if they’ll have a bed to sleep in this weekend. It’s about trust and showing you care.”

And, he said, “Once that falls into place everything is so much easier. That’s when teaching can happen.”

That strategy worked. Lloyd routinely filled his class with students with little or no formal music training and transformed them into better musicians. He revived the school’s defunct show choir, building it into a group that’s routinely invited to perform around the city, on stage at political events and has even backed the rock band Foreigner in front of thousands of fans. He took his students to New York and Chicago, hoping they would see both the world beyond their neighborhoods and the opportunities that exist in life.

But life often got in the way of Hollywood endings. Too often, students disappeared from school or made decisions that threatened their futures. Lloyd talked about one such student this week, a sweet and troubled young woman I’d met many times, a student whose family issues eventually ended her schooling. She was a gifted singer, he said, and with the right grades easily could have earned a college scholarship. He has many such stories of young people who walked away from an education they they desperately needed.

“It’s devastating when that happens,” he said.

But there also have been many triumphs. On Saturday he will walk into Manual one last time to watch its current class of seniors graduate. Among that group will be Lupe Rivera, the valedictorian, a young woman who arrived at Manual four years ago still struggling to master English. She worked hard, in choir and elsewhere, and dreams of working in politics or business.

“She was my political-talk buddy,” said Lloyd, a conservative with a deep interest in politics. “I’m so proud of her.”

For all of the changes in recent years at Manual High, Lloyd’s departure to me sits in its own category. It’s hard to imagine the school without him. His program provided a desperately needed boost of energy and optimism during the worst days of the school’s century-long history. His class gave students an oasis from the troubles found throughout the building, and elsewhere in their lives. He was a reminder of how many wonderful teachers give so much for so little pay every day.

But he’s now the father of two young children and his move is understandable. The life of a teacher at Manual is grueling and he has a great opportunity; he is looking forward to guiding the next generation of teachers at Wesleyan. Manual was fortunate to have him and the energy he brought to his classroom for five years. His students are better off because of him. But on his last day at the school, as he said goodbye, he told his students that he was the lucky one.

“You taught me how to be a better listener,” he said. “We teachers sometimes think we have all the answers. We sometimes think our job is just to teach you, and not to learn from you. It’s not true. As much as you were my students, I was yours.”

By Michele McNeil on May 28, 2013 4:06 PM

The Council of Chief State School Officers is rejecting calls for a moratorium on any high stakes tied to the Common Core State Standards, and is instead suggesting that states have almost all of the power they need to smooth the way for what could be a rocky transition.

What the chiefs do want, however, is some flexibility from the U.S. Department of Education and from U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan—from No Child Left Behind itself or the waivers already granted—during these next couple of tricky years as the common core is fully implemented and common tests come on line. In fact, about three-dozen chiefs or their representatives met with three high-level federal department officials last week in Chicago to talk about these issues. Specifically, they say they need some wiggle room in three areas, according to a document CCSSO has drafted:

Accountability: States want to be able to hold school-accountability designations steady for a couple of years after the 2012-13 school year during the transition to new tests, which are scheduled to debut in the spring of 2015. This flexibility could apply to states that may want to change their existing waiver plans, or for non-waiver states who need relief under NCLB. This means, for example, that a low-performing “priority” or “focus” school identified at the end of this school year would keep this designation through the transition. The chiefs say they will still publicly report data each year of the transition, and make accountability interventions in schools, but want to hold the labels steady. Or, a state could choose to emphasize other factors, such as graduation rates, during the transition years. Many states with NCLB waivers have already built this wiggle room into their plans by, for example, requiring schools identified as “priority” to remain there at least three years. So, it seems reasonable that the department would be open to other states that want to amend their plans to hold certain accountability designations steady.

Teacher evaluations: The chiefs say they want federal officials to be open to states’ requests for delaying the use of test scores in teacher evaluations. Chris Minnich, the executive director of CCSSO, said few states would likely need such a delay. This could potentially be the biggest area of contention between the feds and states. These timelines are very important to federal officials, who have embedded them into the waiver requirements. Federal officials have not approved Illinois’ waiver request, for example, because the state cannot meet these aggressive teacher-evaluation deadlines.

Tests: States should be able to choose which tests to administer for accountability purposes in 2013-14, the chiefs say. This is an issue for the states in one of the two consortia developing common tests, Smarter Balanced, which will give pilot tests to a significant number of students. These 25 states are worried about double testing students by giving them both the pilot and the regular state test. So CCSSO wants federal officials to be open to allowing those states to use the pilot test for accountability purposes. CCSSO doesn’t think this is a federal issue at all, and is just laying out the problem without a specific solution. Federal officials, however, may feel differently and may not want a test that’s just being piloted to be used for accountability purposes.

The chiefs are clearly staking out a formal position in the tug-of-war over how states should manage accountability in the run-up to new tests that reflect the common core. Idaho chief Tom Luna told my colleague Catherine Gewertz that it’s “absolutely critical that it’s known that we are moving to a higher level of accountability. Nobody is looking for a pause or relief from accountability.”

So far, American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten has called for a pause in using the tests for high-stakes decisions, and so has Montgomery County, Md., Schools Superintendent Joshua Starr. As has Kati Haycock, the president of the Education Trust, which advocates on behalf of disadvantaged children.

The Chiefs for Change, a small group of chiefs who push more-market-based reforms, responded in an open letter by rejecting such calls for a pause.

Hanna Skandera, the New Mexico schools’ chief and the chair of Chiefs for Change, says that at the highest levels Chiefs for Change and CCSSO are in complete lockstep: “Why wait to do the right things for kids? Accountability delayed isn’t real accountability.”

(One slight difference exists between the two groups, however: Chiefs for Change does not want to see states delay teacher-evaluation implementation, which was part of the federal NCLB waiver process. From the perspective of Skandera’s group, “if we ask for a waiver and make commitments we intend to keep them,” she said.)

Most of all, CCSSO says there is no single, one-size-fits-all solution on how to manage these messy transition years. June Atkinson, the North Carolina chief, told Catherine that every state is on a different timeline, with different rules, regulations, and state laws.

There’s no word yet on what federal officials think of CCSSO’s requests for more flexibility. For his part, Arne Duncan has been relatively quiet, with his office saying only that officials are “thinking through” the concerns.

Attending last week’s meeting, on behalf of Duncan, were Jim Shelton (acting deputy secretary), Deb Delisle, (assistant secretary of elementary and secondary education), and Jack Buckley (commissioner of the National Center for Education Statistics at the Institute of Education Sciences).

Indiana lawmakers last month approved a two-year budget that increases K-12 funding by 2 percent in the first year and 1 percent in the second.

But 121 school districts, or 42 percent of those in the state, won’t see any additional money, and some could lose funding, said Terry Spradlin of the Center for Evaluation and Education Policy at Indiana University.

Spradlin told the Tribune-Star (http://bit.ly/16OO9Ld ) that changes in the formula by which schools are funded are designed to make the system more equitable. Some districts traditionally received much more in per-pupil expenses than others under the old formula.

But he questioned whether lawmakers are providing enough money to meet educational objectives the state has outlined.

He noted that the funding increase will be below inflation in the second year of the budget. Districts “will have a hard time continuing what they are doing without having to make cuts,” he said.

Vigo County Superintendent Dan Tanoos agreed, noting that the additional funding doesn’t make up for the millions cut from education by former Gov. Mitch Daniels’ administration.

“It’s still very challenging to keep up with our ever-increasing costs,” he said.

Tanoos said his district hasn’t been able to give employees a raise for two years and is looking for ways to cut costs without laying off employees or cutting academic programs.

Donna Wilson, the Vigo County School Corp.’s chief financial officer, said the district is prepared to tighten its belt again.

“We’ll deal with the hand we’re dealt. We’re fortunate because we have been very responsible and have maintained a cash balance, although it’s not as healthy as it once was,” she said. “We have gone through several years of rough waters, and overall we’ve fared pretty well.”

Sarah Janssen

The Journal Gazette

FORT WAYNE – Fort Wayne Community Schools has refused to accept results – good or bad – from this year’s ISTEP+ exam and is calling on lawmakers to re-evaluate the state’s system of accountability centered on test scores.

The district will not use the data from the test in its evaluations and will not distribute the test results to parents or teachers “unless and until they can be validated by a legitimate, independent third party.”

“It is now time to pause sanctions related to this test – a test that was not designed to measure all aspects of educational achievement,” FWCS officials wrote in an overview.

The second round of online, multiple choice standardized testing was plagued with errors and other problems for students across the state. The server of the state’s testing vendor, CTB/McGraw Hill, experienced numerous issues in the first several days of testing, forcing the Department of Education to extend the testing window by about a week. Students were logged off the system or received error messages when trying to submit answers.

Some schools were still reporting problems into the second week of testing.

FWCS hopes to keep the problems and the consequences for schools and students at the forefront in hopes that laws passed tying the state assessment to district and school grades as well as teacher evaluation and compensation might be revoked.

“We are asking the community to join us in opening the dialogue of, ‘Is this how we want to operate, where one test is the basis for everything?’ ” district spokeswoman Krista Stockman said.

Officials in FWCS, the largest district in the state, called for an independent review of the test results shortly after the state experienced problems.

In Indiana, CTB/McGraw-Hill is in the third year of a four-year, $95 million contract. CTB/McGraw Hill officials have said the company was focused on ensuring the stability of the testing and regrets the “impact on these schools and students.”

The company ran simulations to prepare for the tests in Indiana but did not “fully anticipate the patterns of live student testing,” the company said.

In an overview of the completed test, FWCS officials called the test a waste of time and resources “that could have been better spent on real efforts to ensure academic achievement.”

To prepare for the test, FWCS spent more than $550,000 purchasing 711 computers for elementary schools to get the majority of its students testing online, at the state’s urging. Teachers spent hours practicing online testing procedures to ensure students were prepared and comfortable, district officials said.

The vendor also sent last-minute updates to the district’s 4,600 computers days before the exam started. The vendor also sent updates during the testing window when systems used to test special education students and English language learners were experiencing problems, officials said.

“We will not stand by and be victims of this broken system,” officials wrote.

The overview will be sent to lawmakers, community and business leaders, parents, staff and Parent Teacher Associations, with a letter containing a message tailored to the group outlining the effects of the testing problems.

Superintendent of Public Instruction Glenda Ritz has also suggested a third party review of the test results.

The Legislative Council convened this morning to adopt Resolution 13-01, which establishes interim study committees on specific topics. Findings and recommendations must be completed before November 1, 2013. Several study committees will focus on education issues.

The Interim Study Committee on Common Core Education Standards is charged with studying the following issues:

·         Compare existing Indiana standards with the Common Core standards and other national standards.

·         Consider best practices in developing and adopting the standards. Sources will include:

o   Subject area teachers

o   Subject area instructors

o   Experts on SAT and ACT

o   State Superintendent of Public Instruction

·         Evaluate the cost to school corporations of implementing the PARCC assessment or Smarter Balance assessment.

·         Evaluate the cost of implementing the Common Core.

The School Safety Study Committee is charged with studying how to improve school safety in Indiana and developing best practices for school resource officers.

Additionally, the Commission on Education will study a number of topics:

·         Private school vouchers (HEA 1003)

·         School absenteeism, school improvement plans (SEA 338)

·         Teacher preparation programs (SEA 409)

·         Performance-qualified school districts, length of school year (SEA 189)

The Commission on Education will conduct a special meeting in June to discuss the disruptions to the ISTEP test. McGraw-Hill will be required to explain the situation that occurred, why the company was not prepared to handle the disruptions and steps the company is taking to ensure that there are no further disruptions in the future. The State Superintendent will attend the meeting along with any superintendents from around the state who wish to testify. Members of the general public are also welcome to attend the meeting. Stay tuned for a specific date and time.

Posted on May 15, 2013 by stevehinnefeld

Indiana school officials remain cautious and conservative about asking voters to increase local property tax rates to fund schools – even though state funding for education continues to lag. Only seven school districts had school-funding referendums on the ballot last week, and five of them passed.

Terry Spradlin, director for education policy with the Center for Evaluation and Education Policy at Indiana University, said the numbers suggest district leaders have become strategic about asking for money. They’re learning when to ask and when not to ask.

Indiana’s current system of relying on voters for some school-funding decisions dates from 2008. School referendums come in two flavors: 1) general fund questions, which levy property taxes to supplement the state funding that’s supposed to pay for school operations; and 2) construction questions, which determine whether schools can borrow for construction or large-scale renovation projects.

Last week, there were four general fund referendums: Barr-Reeve, Munster and Union Township passed, and Boone Township failed (Union Township and Boone Township are small districts in Porter County). There were three construction referendums: Hamilton Southeastern and Noblesville passed and Knox schools in Starke County fell short.

The five-for-seven success beats the state’s historic average by a long shot. Since 2008, there have been 88 school funding referendums in Indiana. Forty-two have passed and 46 failed, according to the detailed scorecard on the CEEP website.

Affluent suburban districts have had some of the best success. Districts in Hamilton County, including Carmel, Hamilton Southeastern, Westfield-Washington, Sheridan and Noblesville, have gone 9-for-10 since 2008. Some of those districts are adding students, so they need voter approval for construction. And they have healthy tax bases, so they can raise a considerable amount of money with modest increases in the tax rate.

Spradlin adds that schools are a point of pride in Hamilton County. “Folks really do self-select to live there because of the schools,” he said. “Quality of life, including the quality of the schools, is very important to residents of those areas.”

Other than that, he said, success or failure of a referendum can depend on the unique circumstances of a school district. Strong leadership, effective communication of district needs and community trust for the local superintendent and school board can make the difference between success and failure.

For example, Barr-Reeve is a small, rural district in southern Indiana’s Daviess County – the sort of district where you might expect residents to vote against raising their own taxes. But voters there chose overwhelmingly – 83-17 percent – to increase taxes to support the local schools.

One concern about the growing reliance on referendum funding is that it will reinforce the sense that there are “winners and losers” in public education. Students in some districts will benefit from an adequately funded public education; others will be left behind.

Spradlin said a CEEP analysis found that state funding of public schools school has become more equitable in recent years, but adequacy is in question: Per-pupil “tuition support” — money provided by the state to local schools — declined by 11 percent between 2008-09 and 2011-12.

During the Great Recession, Gov. Mitch Daniels cut K-12 funding by $300 million to balance the state budget. As the Indiana Association of School Business Officials and the Indiana Coalition for Public Education have pointed out, the legislature could have restored school spending this year but opted to cut taxes instead. Schools face a “new normal” of constrained budgets.

“Even though the formula is more equitable, the dollars are down,” Spradlin said. “It’s a challenging time for schools.”

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — Indianapolis students trying to complete standardized tests that already have been delayed by technical issues have encountered more problems.

Indianapolis Public Schools spokesman John Althardt says the district experienced a disruption Monday and had to briefly suspend the exam until the system came back online.

Testing across the state was suspended for two days earlier this month after test administrator CTB/McGraw-Hill experienced disruptions.

McGraw-Hill Education spokesman Brian Belardi says Monday’s outage lasted about 10 minutes and was caused by a technical issue.

He didn’t know whether any other school districts were affected.

The disruptions have raised concerns about the validity of this year’s scores. Indiana Schools Superintendent Glenda Ritz says the state will meet with CTB/McGraw-Hill and may have a third party weigh in.

Testing is scheduled to end Friday.