Tuesday, February 5, 2019
Dear District Administrators and CESA Administrators,
Since the release of preliminary joint federal notification packets on December 6, staff at DPI have hosted over 80 technical assistance calls with school and district staff across the state. The aim of these calls was to provide districts with an understanding of the preliminary ESSA Accountability Reports; to answer any federal accountability questions (ESSA or IDEA); and to outline the statewide system of support and the continuous improvement resources available to all schools and districts, regardless of identifications.
As with any preliminary release, this process and the technical assistance calls in particular afforded an opportunity for close data reviews. This resulted in a small number of changes in identifications, which were directly communicated to the impacted districts.
The preliminary release is now concluded. Final joint federal notification packets for 2017-18 are available in SAFE today. These reports remain under embargo until the scheduled public release on March 5, 2019.
In preparation for the March 5 public release, and to support your continued school and district improvement work, we are creating a number of new resources. These draft resources will be available in SAFE, in the resources section of your district’s joint notification packet, by the end of the week:
Sample parent letter (template)
Key points about continuous improvement and federal accountability
Local stakeholder engagement guide
As a final reminder, all ESSA and IDEA accountability reports and identification status are considered embargoed until Tuesday, March 5. No information is to be shared with anyone in the public until that date. Should you be contacted, you may respond to media inquiries, provided the embargo is upheld. Please contact me if you have any questions related to the embargo.
As I said in December, we stand ready to assist you in the work of ensuring every student graduates college and career ready. As we have heard from you in the technical assistance calls, these federal identifications are indeed an opportunity to better understand your school’s and district’s performance, and to continue to improve outcomes for each and every student.
- For questions about ESSA accountability calculations, contact the Office of Educational Accountability.
- For questions about ESSA school improvement and supports available to your district, contact the Title I Team.
- For questions about IDEA LEA determinations, school improvement and supports for students with disabilities, contact the Special Education Team.
Finally, know that we will continue to update you in the coming weeks with information about and additional resources in support of your continued improvement work, and in preparation for the public release of ESSA reports on March 5.