Dear Schools,
In the month since we announced the next generation Maine Learning Technology Initiative solution, we’ve been busy working with the three vendors and your schools to ensure this initiative continues to best support your learning goals moving forward.
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Today I visited the Troy Howard Middle School in RSU 20 as one of the final stops this spring on my Promising Practices Tour. The Belfast school is undergoing a transformation, using data, strong leadership – most notably at the principal level – and customized learning to engage students and improve proficiency and progress.
In response to the call for a moratorium on accountability related to the Common Core State Standards by some in the education community, Chiefs for Change, a coalition of state school chiefs and leaders committed to education reform which Commissioner Bowen is a member of, released the following open letter to U.S. Department of Education Secretary Arne Duncan this week:
As you receive this, 1,000 students and 200 educators along with their Apple MacBooks are at the University of Maine showcasing how State-supplied technology is transforming learning and better preparing them for success in their classroom, career and civic life as part of the 10th Annual Maine Learning Technology Initiative Student Conference.
Dear Superintendents:
The Department provisionally adopted Chapter 180, the rules for implementing required teacher and principal evaluation systems, seven weeks ago today. A number of you have been asking me and other Department staff when you can expect the new rules on teacher effectiveness evaluations to go into effect. This is to update you on where that stands and why we have not been able to help you move forward with that work.
Teachers invited to participate in webinar
Last week, the Maine Department of Education rolled out A-F report cards for each school in the state as part of our new Maine School Performance Grading System.
It’s been over a week since Governor LePage and I released Maine’s School Performance Grading System. I continue to tour schools that are exemplifying promising practices, including several that have received grades on the lower end of the spectrum. Based on what I’ve seen, these schools are doing many of the right things to get their students invested in learning. It’s important that the Department be engaged with these schools to let them know they have support. That is why we’ll be hosting a webinar next Thursday to start a series of informative sessions for Maine educators. Continue reading
Eighth grader Ken Stump shows Commissioner Bowen a solar panel Oxford Hills Middle School students created to heat the indoor greenhouse at Roberts Farm in Norway.
I had the chance visit three Oxford County schools yesterday as part of my Promising Practices Tour, just a day after releasing the new A-F school grading system designed to improve transparency. As a state, we need to move beyond the one-size-fits-all models of teaching and embrace student-centered models like the ones many Maine schools, like the ones I visited in Oxford County, are doing. Governor LePage and I made reference to that Wednesday when we unveiled the new school report cards, which showed a majority of Maine’s elementary and high schools earned an A, B or C.
It’s been a busy week at Maine DOE as we released the first A-F report cards for each of the state’s schools as part of the new Maine School Performance Grading System. Now that we have a usable and understandable benchmark of where schools are, the real work begins!
Over the next few days you will start to receive information about the A-F school grading system, which will be released soon. I will be sharing some of the data with you, and more explanation of how the grading system works. We’ll also be scheduling webinars with superintendents to explain the system and how we plan to unveil it.
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