Friday, April 16, 2010

2010-2011 Statewide Voluntary Preschool Program Application

The Iowa Department of Educations has posted the revised 2010-2011 Statewide Voluntary Preschool Program for Four-Year-Old Children Application and the revised 2010-2011 Technical Assistance Guidance Manual at http://www.iowa.gov/educate/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=940&Itemid=1279. The revised 2010-2011 application must be used in applying for funding in year 4 (2010-2011). Districts seeking to participate in the Statewide Voluntary Preschool Program must apply this year.

Please note these important dates:
· Application ICN broadcast April 21 from 3:00 to 5:00 p.m., and April 22, from 8:00 to 10:00 a.m.

· Application due May 14, 2010


The DE will conduct two ICN sessions addressing the application and program requirements. The sessions will be Wednesday, April 21, 3:00 to 5:00 p.m. with identical content Thursday, April 22 from 8:00 to 10:00 a.m. To register for this session, click on the link provided. Read through the description of the event, then click on "register here" and follow the step-by-step instructions at this link http://www.iptv.org/iowa_database/event-detail.cfm?ID=10463. You are welcome to request any room in Iowa. Watch your inbox for a confirmation/denial email. If you are denied, IPTV is happy to help you find a room that will work. Registration closes Monday, April 19 at 4:30 p.m.


The Statewide Voluntary Preschool Program for Four-Year-Old Children Grant Application awards will be based on the 2011 legislative appropriation. Additional application requirements may be included if legislatively mandated. Please direct questions to Judy Russell at Judy.Russell@iowa.gov or Penny Milburn at Penny.Milburn@iowa.gov.

Discover Reading Recovery at Heartland AEA

Reading Recovery is a highly effective short-term intervention of one-to-one instruction for the lowest-achieving first graders. Individual students receive a half-hour lesson each school day for 12 to 20 weeks with a specially trained Reading Recovery teacher.

Reading Recovery is not a packaged program for purchase. It is not scripted or based
on a single-factor solution. Instead, Reading Recovery is an investment in professional development for teachers who then design individual lessons for the lowest literacy achievers.

Reading Recovery’s one-to-one instruction delivers measurable results in weeks not years.
Click here to see the Heartland Reading Recovery Site Report.

For information on this shared-cost initiative click here.

To enroll a teacher in the Reading Recovery training, contact Sue Hayes at shayes@aea11.k12.ia.us by June 11, 2010.

Holocaust Workshop for Teachers

Click here for more information on a teacher workshop that explores the Holocaust with a special focus on liberation and aftermath, including the displaced persons camps, the creation of Israel and the Nuremberg Trials. Eyewitness accounts will bring the liberation of the camps alive and put a human face on the difficulty of life in the DP camps.

Following the workshop, participants are invited to engage in a week of primary research in the archives of the Eisenhower Presidential Library & Museum for the purpose of researching and developing a lesson plan or project, richly integrated with primary source material.


The workshop is presented by the Eisenhower Presidential Library & Museum, Abilene, Kansas and the Midwest Center for Holocaust Education, Overland Park, Kansas, in partnership with the Lowell Milken Center, Fort Scott, Kansas and the Harry S. Truman Library & Museum, Independence, Missouri.


Registration cost is $100. The deadline for enrollment is May 7, 2010. Enrollment is limited to the first 35 persons who apply. Up to six hours of graduate credit is available for participants who are interested.

Questions can be directed to Kim Barbieri at kim.barbieri@nara.gov.