Office of Assessment Weekly Update #1 August 4, 2017

Where did the summer go? I hope everyone had a relaxing summer with a chance to catch your breath before the start of the 17-18 school year.

The only constant is change and there are changes to DOE staff. Ben Morrison has gone back to the classroom as a special education teacher and Melissa Flor has returned to the Office of Special Education and will replace Ben.

The other change impacting assessment is that Mike Rickert is now back home in Tennessee getting ready to start the school year as a high school math teacher. Kelly Royer will be the new NAEP coordinator and Jan Martin will handle the details of home school testing.

Now for some general updates:

  • New Coordinator workshop is scheduled for August 30, 2017 in Pierre. To register, go to GoSignMeUp! The workshop is being held at the DOE office in the Library Commons.
  • MSAA student and school reports are available on the MSAA System.For assistance in accessing reports, contact Jan Martin, or Melissa Flor, . The individual student report is structured as a parent letter so there is no need for an additional parent letter.
  • WIDA On-Line Screener workshop is August 8 starting at 8:00 in Pierre at the DOE office. There is room for a few more attendees so please go to GoSignMeUp!to register. Further trainings for the new screen will be via webinar. For more information or assistance, please contact Yutzil Becker, .
  • Science reports will not be available until late fall. The initial round of standard setting will happen later this month.
  • Division of Accountability Systems fall workshops are scheduled for the week of September 25 at various locations across the state. The format and focus for the workshops has changed so stay tuned for more details.
  • Public school report card pre-release is scheduled for August 16, 2017. For questions regarding public school accountability, please contact Laura Scheibe, .
  • The 2017-18 test windows are posted on the DOE website on the assessment page.

Smarter Balanced detailed updates:

  • TIDE will be rolled over for the 2017-18 school year this weekend so is off-line at this time.
  • All current TIDE account holders will receive an email on August 14, 2017 with specific directions regarding the process to reset passwords. After that date, users will be unable to access the secure portal until the password is reset.
  • Please delete users no longer associated with your school district. Also, please think about eliminating accounts for some users. In the review of the account data, there are users with accounts for every school in a district and maybe a district account would be more appropriate. Teachers do not need both a TA and a TE account. The only time a TA account is needed is for a paraprofessional assisting with the proctoring of tests.
  • New district level accounts need to be sent to and the assessment team will set up the needed accounts.

As always, thanks for all you do for the students of South Dakota.