Welcome Back

Dear area school administrators:

Welcome back to a new school year. A special welcome is extended to the new administrators starting their positions this fall; I hope that you find your partnership with Heartland AEA to be both supportive and effective.

During the summer, Heartland AEA staff has worked hard to assess and improve our services for the coming year. We have realigned our organizational structure in an effort to provide more intense services closer to our districts. We hope you will partner with us to create, grow and learn together as we improve our ability to provide quality services to teachers and students that result in improved student learning and achievement.

I encourage you to take interest in this Heartland AEA Administrator Connection blog. The Administrator Connection is updated every Friday (excluding holidays and summer vacation) to inform area superintendents, principals, curriculum directors and other school leaders of important announcements, agency news, professional development opportunities and other key information items.

We at Heartland AEA are as committed as ever to fostering strong, positive partnerships with the administrators, teachers and students in the schools we serve. Let us know how we can best help you extend your reach to serve your districts and increase student achievement. In the meantime, if you have questions or comments about Heartland AEA services, please contact your regional director or me.

Best regards,

Paula Vincent

Iowa Evaluator Approval Training Update from Iowa DE

The following message is from the Department of Education regarding the status of Evaluator Approval training.

For the last two years the Iowa Evaluator Approval Training Program state advisory committee has been working on the structure and focus of Level III renewal of the evaluator’s license. This work has been based on the experience and input from practicing administrators who have been involved with the training for Level I and Level II renewal and their experience in applying the previous training at the local school level. At this point, what is available to any person needing renewal at Level III is described as follows:

• Four credit hours are needed for renewal of the administrator license at Level III.
• Everyone will need to take the Assessing Academic Rigor course which is currently available in all of the AEAs. This option will count for two of the four credits needed.

In addition:

• In state Administrators may take another course for credit with researched based content which aligns with the work of their district or their own individual professional development. This course must be an AEA licensure renewal credit or a semester credit from a regionally accredited institution.
• They make take the Fierce Conversations course which is a two-credit course offered through each of the AEAs.

Furthermore:

• Out-of-state: Individuals coming from out-of-state will be required to take the I-Evaluate on-line class for full administrative licensure. Please contact Fred Kinne at (515) 281-3587 or fred.kinne@iowa.gov for further information.

Given new leadership at the Iowa Department of Education, the Iowa Evaluator Approval Training Program Advisory Committee and others will be working to review the direction and focus of the current plans beyond what is currently established as described above. This review will be conducted over the next six months to a year. Those who need to renew at Level III before July 2012 are advised to participate in the arrangement as described above. Any administrator who does not need to renew at Level III for another year or more may decide if they want to wait and determine if any changes in the training for evaluator approval Level III would be more appropriate for their work.

Click here for a FAQ sheet and here for a flowchart for decision making to help address more specific questions. Please submit any additional questions to: matt.ludwig@iowa.gov or connie.maxson@iowa.gov and those will be addressed in future updates and FAQ documents that will be shared with all administrators across the state.

HEART Training for New Administrators

Has a change of leadership left your school without a HEART administrator? We will be offering a session on HEART for new administrators on August 24 from 8:30-11:30 a.m. in the computer lab at the Johnston Regional Education Center (6500 Corporate Drive). The class is intended for the newly tapped school HEART administrators who will need to understand how to run HEART, get set up as users and retrieve data in the system.

To register for this class, please click on this link: https://prodev.aeapdonline.org/4DCGI/AS003792111201INV&*

If you have questions about HEART, contact Connor Hood at chood@aea11.k12.ia.us or (515) 270-0405 ext. 14506.

Autism Conference to Promote Independence for Students

Heartland AEA is pleased to announce it's first parent/educator autism conference entitled, “Building Partnerships to Promote Independence for Students with Autism.” The conference will focus on how strong partnerships between parents and educators can improve the independence of children and youth with autism and foster more positive transitions and better outcomes from early childhood through young adulthood.

Parents and educators of students with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ages 3-21 years) within the Heartland AEA area are encouraged to register for this free conference that will be held on September 9, 2011 in the new FFA Enrichment Center on the Ankeny DMACC campus. Registration opened earlier this week and seats are filling up fast. Register at https://prodev.aeapdonline.org/4DCGI/DR331699111201SIT

A limited number of substitute teacher reimbursement vouchers are available and must be requested in advance. To request substitute teacher reimbursement, please contact Mavis Hoogers at mhoogers@aea11.k12.ia.us or (515) 270-9030 ext. 14343.

Click here for the conference flyer which can be sent to interested educators and parents.

Alternate Assessment Teacher Listserv for 2011-2012

The alternate assessment process will continue with a few substantial changes this year. To ensure that teachers completing the alternate assessment for the 2011-2012 school year have up-to-date information regarding timelines and activities, please make sure that any teachers who did not complete an alternate assessment last year are subscribed to the Heartland IAA listserv. Teachers who DID complete one last year are on the state database and will receive messages from the state automatically. Teachers who did not complete an assessment last year will NOT receive state messages right away. To subscribe to the listserv, teachers can send a blank email to this address: alternateassessment-subscribe@aea11.k12.ia.us.

All teachers are encouraged to check the alternate assessment page on the Iowa DE’s website at http://educateiowa.gov/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=461&Itemid=1576

Please direct any questions to Pam Childers at pchilders@aea11.k12.ia.us or (515) 270-0405 ext. 14457.

Free All-Day Training Session for New School Nurses

Morning Session
This workshop will teach your new school nurse how to screen vision according to the University of Iowa guidelines. This hands-on experience screening real children is invaluable. CEU credit available for a fee. Click here for more information.

Afternoon Session
This gives an overview of laws, rules, regulations and policies that govern the practice of school nursing. We also discuss medication administration, delegation, Section 504 and general screening guidelines. Please have your new school nurse complete the registration found here. September 1 is the final day for registration to insure to receive a free resource packet.

Microsoft Settlement Updates ICN on September 7

ICN sessions have been set up that will contain information regarding vouchers and claims, external evaluation participation information and procedure for amending your application. A representative from the claims administrator will be part of the session to help answer questions. Registration for the sessions opened this Tuesday and is located at http://www.iptv.org/iowa_database/event-detail.cfm?ID=11186. Each session is limited to 65 participants and is set up for different regions. Heartland AEA’s area is scheduled for September 7, 2011 at 3:30-4:30 p.m. Registration closes Friday, September 2, 2011.

One important change regarding addendums to your application is that all succeeding school year changes can be made during the months of August, September and October of that year. Changes to the hardware, software and teaching strategies can be made each year of the program. It is important for districts and buildings to know what they are going to do for each upcoming school year and make the necessary changes as needed. The reason for this is to reduce administrative cost and to make the process as smooth as possible.

Lastly, please contact John O’Connell at john.oconnell@mchsi.com if you have changed any of your administration or your contact information for this program. You can check the contact information by going on the application site at www.edinfo.state.ia.us, login and select the district name to see if the contact information needs to be changed or if there has been an administrative change at any of the eligible schools in your district.

Students Can Take Advantage of Discounted Microsoft Software Titles

Please share the following message to your parents in your school/district. A letter is available for download here.

Thanks to your school, Microsoft, the Iowa Educators Consortium (IEC) and Iowa Area Education Agencies (AEAs), we are pleased to announce that all Iowa K-12 students are eligible to purchase select Microsoft software titles at substantial discounts (up to 85% off retail prices). The IEC and Iowa AEAs have made this possible by participating in the Microsoft Student Select K-12 program.

*Stated savings compare retail prices of Microsoft products to Microsoft Products through the IEC Student Select Program. Actual reseller prices may vary.

In addition to the Microsoft products, significant discounts are available on other popular software titles such as:

• Adobe Products (including-InDesign CS5 & Adobe PhotoShop)
• Dragon Naturally Speaking - You talk, it types. Fast, Easy, Accurate
• Inspiration & Kidspiration
• CorelDRAW Graphics Suite X5
• FileMaker Pro

These products are available for the purpose of being installed on a personal laptop or a home computer. Visit http://www.journeyed.com/select to apply for discounts and more complete information. To place an order, you will be asked to register and provide proof that your child is a student in an Iowa school.

If you have questions or need assistance, please contact Judy Cleveland, Heartland AEA Technology Specialist, at jcleveland@aea11.k12.ia.us or (515) 270-0405 ext. 14538.

Test-drive the New HEART 2.0 Before its Launch

We are very close to declaring the next version of HEART “done.” We hope to put this new version into production within the next few weeks if possible. There are just a few loose ends and bugs to attend to. If you want to take a test drive, you can log into the development server and try it out. Use your regular login information and the following address: https://heart2.aea11.k12.ia.us. The data in the system are up-to-date as of July 1.

You may also use the North Overshoe login to try this server:
District: North Overshoe
UserCode: Try HEART
Password: tryme

If you encounter any problems or bugs, we’d like to know about them. Please send contact Connor Hood at chood@aea11.k12.ia.us with specific information about what you saw, where, and what you expected to happen instead. (One known bug affects the login page. If it doesn’t draw completely, click the refresh button on your browser.)

Here are a few comments about the new system:

• A lot of the work is behind the scenes to make things faster and more consistent. Hopefully you'll notice the speed and not something odd.
• The look and feel has been standardized, and some things have been moved around.
• The lists are sortable in both directions. Click the column header to sort one way, click again to sort the other way. You can also download lists if needed.
• User setup should be similar to what you are used to.
• Class setup is changed fairly dramatically and we still look for ways to simplify and improve it. If any of you set up classes in the current system, your feedback would be appreciated.
• The management control panel has had a complete makeover to reduce confusion; there are some new features and some redeveloped ones.
• The cleanup interface has also been upgraded. You can try it out, but be aware that any work done will not be permanent as we are still in the development stages of the server. Upgraded features include the status column that helps spot new records that need attention, duplicate State ID search and sorting/cleanup enhancements.
• Additional data error search tools have been added. They are intended to help find and clean up some of the common errors in student records.
• Individual student reports should behave much like they always have.
• All the graphs have been recreated using newer graphing technology. One new feature is the return of a high-resolution graph version (made possible by making the graph shrinkable as needed) without the need for the GraphViewer application.
• Flexibility has been added to view data that are collected more than once a year (MAP, DIBELS, etc.). The default option will behave as you are used to in the current version of HEART.
• There are more options in the growth chart with one new feature that allows the selection of the student data to display in average and percentile ranks (names of these options might be reworked later). The average rank display shows the average for the selected group. The percentile rank display adds two lines which are calculated from the selected data based on the percentile ranks of the comparison lines. (For example, if 25-50-75 is selected, the 25th percentile, 50th percentile and 75th percentile for the selected group will be calculated and displayed along with the growth lines.
• Student scores now have a format selector. One can view scores by tests administered in a building and scores by students currently in a building.
• Behavior entry and analysis work a lot like they always have.
• Most other displays should work and appear familiar, but with slight tweaks to the layout and functioning.

Invitation to the Administrator Connection

If you are interested in having the Administrator Connection sent to other personnel in your district in addition to the superintendent, principal and curriculum coordinator, please contact the Heartland Communications Department at comms@aea11.k12.ia.us. Please include the name, title (assistant principal, curriculum director, etc.), email and building that each person serves.