Commissioner applauds strong start of charter schools

Monitoring by the Maine Charter School Commission of the two charter schools that served students during the 2012-13 academic year show the state’s first charters are meeting their missions

AUGUSTA – The State’s Acting Education Commissioner is applauding the state’s first two public charters after their inaugural monitoring reports show the central Maine schools are engaging students and adapting quickly to meet emerging needs.

Cornville Regional Charter School in Cornville, which served approximately 60 grade K-6 students, and the Maine Academy of Natural Sciences (MeANS) in Hinckley, which served 52 students grades 9-12, opened in the fall of 2012 after Maine, under the leadership of Governor Paul R. LePage, became the 41st state to allow public charter schools.

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Math and reading proficiency rates rise, work continues

Last week, we released the statewide results from the 2012-13 Maine High School Assessment (MHSA).

The good news? Proficiency in math and reading is on the rise again in our high schools, suggesting students are better prepared for success in college and their careers.

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Maine students show improved proficiency in math, reading

Performance of third-year high school students increased in math and reading, but students showed concerning slippage in the content areas tested for which schools are not held accountable for achievement results

AUGUSTA – Proficiency in math and reading is on the rise again in Maine high schools according to the scores just in from last May’s SAT, suggesting students are better prepared for success in college and their careers.

Most notable was the nearly 2 percent increase in the number of tested students who achieved proficiency or above in critical reading, up from 47.2 percent in 2011-12 to 48.9 percent in 2012-13, with 8.6 percent of those students exceeding proficiency standards.

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Educators help develop formative assessment digital library

This summer, 71 Maine educators began helping to develop a formative assessment digital library to accompany Maine’s new assessments, which will be administered starting in the spring of 2015. The library is an online, interactive clearinghouse of resources, tools and professional learning opportunities for educators, students and families. It will include examples of instructional best practices at each grade level, strategies for cross-classroom collaboration and professional development resources related to the assessment system, such as scoring rubrics for performance tasks.

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ELA teachers to host colleagues for teacher-led discussion of next generation assessments

In partnership with the Maine DOE, the Maine Council of English Language Arts is hosting two informational Dine and Discuss sessions about Maine’s next generation assessments. Each session, one at Kennebunk High School and one in Rockland at Oceanside High School, will be facilitated by Maine teachers who participated in range finding on last year’s pilot test of the performance task full writes.

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New toolkit measures alignment of materials to standards

Trying to determine whether a lesson plan, textbook or other item aligns with Maine’s updated math and English language arts (ELA) standards? A free comprehensive toolkit for evaluating alignment to the Expectation of those standards is now available.

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Participate in NECAP science inquiry task field test

The Maine DOE is recruiting schools to serve as field testing sites to administer the New England Common Assessment Program (NECAP) Science Inquiry Tasks in grades 5, 8 and 11. These field tests give students the opportunity to engage with science content in a different way than traditional assessments and provide feedback about their experience.

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ACCESS for ELLs® to provide media-based listening test

Beginning this testing year, the listening test of Assessing Comprehension and Communications in English State to State for English Language Learners (ACCESS for ELLs®) will be media-based, meaning that all listening items for all tiers and grades 1-12 are prerecorded. Rather than listening to the test administrator read the scripted items as in the past, the students will listen to a recording. This allows for students to listen to more authentic language use, such as conversations involving more than one speaker.

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Maine’s 2013-14 ACCESS for ELLs® testing cycle available

As part of the federal Elementary and Secondary Education Act, all Maine schools annually assess the English language proficiency (ELP) of their English learners in kindergarten through grade 12 using Assessing Comprehension and Communications in English State to State for English Language Learners (ACCESS for ELLs®), a standards-based ELP assessment common throughout the state. The testing cycle for 2013-14 is as follows: Continue reading “Maine’s 2013-14 ACCESS for ELLs® testing cycle available” →

Test school network speed to help Maine prepare for computerized assessments

As the State of Maine continues to take action on the ConnectED initiative and be certain that we are prepared for the transition to computerized assessments starting next school year, we need to better understand what bandwidth is currently available in the classroom at our schools.

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