For immediate release: December 11, 2023
Contact: [email protected]
 

2023 in review: Making Arizona Department of Education a service agency a Horne priority

First act in office frees up $22 million in delayed payments to schools, educators

PHOENIX – A commitment to service is among the success stories of 2023 as state schools superintendent Tom Horne wraps up his first year back in office.

Horne previously served as superintendent between 2003 to 2011 and returned in 2023 to encourage academic excellence, empower parents and commit the department to a culture of service.

Horne noted, “Before my first term as state superintendent, I spent 24 years as a school board member of what was then the third-largest district in the state, and I was board president for 10 of those years. I also chaired the academic accountability committee when I was a member of the legislature. Serving others to improve Arizona’s education system is integral to increasing academic outcomes. That’s why I have undertaken multiple service initiatives.”

On the first day upon returning to office, Horne removed a bureaucratic delay dating to the prior administration and approved payments to schools and tutors who were owed a total of $22,234,151.48 from the second fiscal quarter of 2022. Horne also approved nearly 25,000 overdue requests from parents in the Empowerment Scholarship Account program.

The department also paid more than 1,500 tutors who had gone months without a paycheck and paid a small school that had explored getting a bank loan to cover expenses because their state payments had been delayed.

With the legislative session underway, Horne repeatedly expressed his support for a bill that would give Arizona teachers a $10,000 raise, putting Arizona in the top 10 of states for starting salaries.

Horne noted with some dismay that the National Education Association issued a statement about the importance of raising teacher salaries but the Arizona teacher’s union and a number of Democrats in the legislature opposed the bill. Horne believes these kinds of questions should be bipartisan.

Summer means no school session, but the work of the department continues with efforts to get rid of red tape in schools.

For example, each year, federal law requires schools to file a Comprehensive Needs Assessment explaining the tools and strategies needed to improve academic performance. Horne has directed that requirement to be reduced from a massive 168 questions to 20 questions.

The department is also implementing a significantly updated tool for the yearly Kindergarten Entry Assessment (KEA) pilot program. It reduces administration time by more than 80 percent, permitting rapid identification of critical student needs. Now teachers will be able to spend more time on classroom instruction.

This change aligns well with the department’s renewed emphasis on service by providing more on-site school improvement teams statewide.

Horne noted that prior to returning to office this year, the department merely judged the performance of schools, but did not send teams to the field to help schools get better. He immediately reinstated the School Improvement Teams. The department also delivers updated and practical training on leadership and discipline practices and offers technical assistance in multiple program areas.

With the Superintendent’s pledge to root out elements of Critical Race Theory, and serve educators who wish to spend valuable instruction time on academic as opposed to ideologies, Horne established the Empower Hotline.

This service discovered that a school district had a training program for teachers that clearly states that certain Americans are ‘living under a system of white supremacy.’ That program was eliminated.

Other concerns raised include a spreadsheet distributed in a district with a list of pronouns chosen by students. The email and attached file clearly show the school withholding information from parents.

In another district, a lunch time Gay-Straight Alliance Club included the distribution of emancipation paperwork, which a parent only knew about because parents found it in their student’s backpack. Both are examples of activity contrary to Arizona law.

In Tucson, the department restored in-person teacher certification assistance and work is underway to provide similar services in other Arizona counties.

Also in southern Arizona, Horne announced the completion of $3.6 million in broadband projects to bring Internet fiber connectivity to Santa Cruz County. The department has brought a total of approximately $160M in fiber construction projects to schools and libraries in rural areas through the federal E-Rate Program in the past six years.

Horne concluded, “Arizona’s educators and support staff do tremendous work to ensure excellence in the classroom. This department is ready to serve. I will always be committed to my promise to deliver excellent service.”

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Data capture for the January 23rd payment is 12/15/23 at 5 pm.

Reminder: Payment 7 will be based on data captured that is passing integrity and generating ADM in AzEDS. Actual data in AzEDS will be used to calculate ADM for Payment 7.

Please ensure data is reconciled and free of integrity errors prior to the data capture date. Review the following reports in AzEDS:

• INTEG15 – ensure data is free and clear of membership ADM Integrity errors
• STUD10 – validate all students are listed in AzEDS
• ADM15 – ensure all students expected to generate funding are indicated as fundable
• ADM20, SPED20, and EL20 – ensure ADM amounts for each ADM type

Important Note: FY24 Calendars need to be submitted, approved, and certified for ADM and funding to be generated. 

Please submit a School Finance HelpDesk ticket if data assistance is needed.

DATA MANAGEMENT ALERT

AzEDS Report and Integrity Rules Update

Effective December 01, 2023, the SPED10 report in the AzEDS Portal has been enhanced to include Resident School ID begin and end dates. Integrity -40079 validates that a Resident School ID is reported for all dates of a SPED LRE.

Also effective December 01, 2023, integrity rule -40070 has been updated. The rule has been updated to ensure that MDSSI and ED cannot be reported together. The Concurrent Need Matrix reflects this change.

For assistance with resolving integrity errors, please visit our AzEDS SPED Reporting web page for the one-sheet SPED Integrity Error Tools and additional resources. You may also visit our ESS Data Management web page.

If you have any questions, please email the ESS Data Management inbox.

For immediate release: December 4, 2023
Contact: [email protected]
 

2023 in review: Horne’s first year back in office shows renewed focus on academic outcomes

Classroom time must be dedicated to academics

PHOENIX – A renewed focus on academic excellence and eliminating ideological distractions that rob students and teachers of precious instruction time for core subjects are some of state schools chief Tom Horne’s academic successes in his first year back in office.

Horne explained, “When I took office, I began demolishing any program or initiative in this department that was related to ideologies such as Equity, Diversity and Inclusion, Critical Race Theory and excessive Social-Emotional Learning. Our focus will always be to ensure that teachers use precious classroom time to teach students academic subjects and not waste time on ideologies that don’t treat people as individuals but divide them through identity politics.”

Horne, who previously served as Superintendent from 2003 to 2011, immediately took on academic challenges upon returning in 2023, announcing in the spring that the department signed a $10 million contract with Project Momentum to ensure the program continues and expands to more Arizona schools after decision by the Governor’s Office to reevaluate its role in that program.

Project Momentum uses several basic principles for school improvement that include aligning classroom instruction with the teaching methods that get the best academic results.

Perhaps the most unique project undertaken in Horne’s first year is the creation of the Arizona Education Economic Commission where the department has joined forces with the private sector and representatives from the governments of Switzerland, Taiwan, and the Navajo Nation to create the Arizona Education Economic Commission, a collaboration between education and industry to encourage the development of workforce and economic opportunities for Arizona’s students.

The core mission of the Commission is to address the shortage of skilled workers in strategic industries and to give students and adults a pathway to valuable careers.

This year Horne also called on public schools that use “equitable,” or “standards-based” grading to abolish the practice.

In Arizona, several school districts use some form of equitable grading in which the baseline for a grade is not zero but begins at 50 percent. By that standard, what was a 20 percent grade on a 100-point scale would now be a 70 percent passing grade.

On the issue of using English in the classroom, Horne revealed a new data that conclusively demonstrates that structured English immersion is far superior for the academic success of students as opposed to dual language. The data compared five dual language schools with the best scores to the five structured English immersion schools with immersion showing far better results. He also warned that schools using the 50-50 language model are in violation of the law.

Noting that time is running out for states to fully utilize federal funding attached to COVID-related learning loss, in September Horne announced a $40 million tutoring program available to parents of elementary grade students to pay for free tutoring in reading, writing and math. The amount will pay for approximately 1.3 million hours of tutoring. As part of this project, participating public school teachers will earn added income as tutors. Private tutoring companies are also an option for parents.

Students in the Ganado Unified School District in the Navajo Nation received approximately 300 portable tablet devices at no cost as result of a public-private partnership between the on-profit organization My Life My Power and Smart Class Arizona founder Paola Tulliani Zen. The tablets are already loaded with the materials the students need to study reading and math without any need for an internet connection.

Horne concluded, “2023 has delivered many opportunities to focus on academic achievement. I am both grateful and impressed by the level of energy and commitment demonstrated by the 600 employees of this department, and the educators, administrators and support staff in Arizona’s public schools who are dedicated to academic excellence for our students.”

For more information; www.azed.gov

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New AzEDS Reports and Integrity Errors for Free and Reduced-Price Lunch (FRPL).

The new FRPL AzEDS Reports provide a summary of Average Daily Membership (ADM) determined by Income Eligibility needs and/or an Alternative method using Health and Nutrition Data with regular ADM. Report data is post-integrity and includes limiting.

• FRPL20 - Free and Reduced-Price Lunch Summary ADM Report
• FRPL30 - Free and Reduced-Price Lunch Site Summary ADM Report

New Integrity Rules 70XXX are based on one of two criteria: Income Eligibility Needs or an alternative process for schools that are part of ADE’s Health and Nutrition Services programs (CEP). Review the INTEG15 report to view any 70XXX errors.

New Integrity Rules on Income Eligibility 1 and 2 needs:

• Need Entry Date must be within a membership
• Need Exit Date must not extend beyond the membership
• Need Entry Date must be before the Need Exit Date
• Identical Needs may not be concurrent at the same school

For more information, please contact School Finance at [email protected].

Session: ADM15 and ADM20 Reports

Date: December 13, 2023, at 1:00 pm

This training session offers a closer look at the details of the ADM15. This session will look over every column on the ADM15 and how to use Excel features to get you the data that you need to reconcile your ADM.

Register for this Session

If you have any questions, please contact School Finance at [email protected].

Data Management Alert

New Integrity Rule: -40095

Effective October 31, 2023, a new integrity error has been implemented for SPED data validations in AzEDS. This new integrity error is part of an ongoing effort to ensure clean data during the fiscal year and to avoid corrections of data after the close of the fiscal year.

-40095 Duplicate Least Restrictive Environment records are reported.

This rule ensures that duplicate Least Restrictive Environments (LREs) are not reported. Duplicate LREs can cause issues with some ADE systems and reporting. The error notifies a PEA that their SIS has duplicated the LRE and to work with their SIS vendor to remove one of the duplicates.

The SPED Integrity Error Tool for this rule is linked below:

SPED Integrity Error Tool -40095

One sheet SPED Integrity Error Tools for all SPED integrity rules can be found on the ESS Data Management website.

If you have any questions, please email the ESS Data Management inbox.

BUDG-25 reports for all school districts have been posted to the School Finance website. FY 2024 November BUDG-25 reports have been calculated using the FY 2024 November BSA-55 information. The November Budg-25 report will include the updated budget balance carryforward values from the FY23 Budg-75 report, the estimated annual Prop 123 and One Time Supplemental $300M values, and estimated FRPL and Gifted add-on funding.

• District BUDG-25 reports are available to download from this School Finance website. For further instructions on how to navigate the website, please view this Hot Topic.

• District FY23 BUDG-75 reports are available to download from the School Finance website:
  • Select the “Start Fiscal Year” as 2023
  • Optionally, select the “Execution Date” as 11/21/2023
  • Click “Apply”

• District BSA-55 reports are available to download from the School Finance website:
  • First, select a school district and then click “View Reports”
  • Next, scroll down the page to the “School District Reports” section.
  • Finally, click the November “PDF” button. The November BSA-55 report will appear.

Please contact the Budget Team ([email protected]) if you have any questions.

Thank you!

For immediate release: November 28, 2023
Contact: [email protected]
 

Horne fires back at Save Our Schools for pattern of lying about ESA purchases

Also pushes back on criticism of him for fighting antisemitism in area high school

PHOENIX – State schools superintendent Tom Horne is refuting a series of lies being spread by Save Our Schools, saying the organization is using deceptive tactics to lie about Empowerment Scholarship Account reimbursements and Horne’s support for Jewish public school students.

Horne stated, “Contrary to a falsified document tweeted by Save Our Schools, no ESA parent has been reimbursed $500 to buy Legos. To be clear, district, charter and ESA students are allowed to use Legos. The issue here is a pattern of lying. Save Our Schools admitted they fabricated a document to make it look like a parent made a $500 purchase when she did not. By doing so they have misled both the Governor and a prominent newspaper columnist, both of whom have retweeted this lie.”

A screenshot from an X (formerly Twitter) post is attached and shows the communications person for Save Our Schools acknowledging the post was fabricated.

He continued, “This is a longstanding pattern by Save Our Schools. They continue to say that outlandish purchases such as trips to Disney parks, personal vacations, food items, ocean cruises and the like are being approved as ESA expenses when they are not. The interesting thing is that Save Our Schools not only lied and fabricated but turned the actual facts on their head. Approvals like those came during the prior superintendent’s administration led by a friend of the leader of Save Our Schools, and one of my first acts in office was to put an end to it.”

Horne added, “Just days ago when the communications manager for Save Our Schools spoke before a legislative committee regarding ESAs, he failed to identify himself as a paid employee of that group. He is entitled to speak, but omitting the fact he is paid to espouse views opposing the ESA program is another deception.”

He proceeded, “As bad as this is, Save Our Schools has gone even further by retweeting a heavily biased news article that characterizes my opposition to antisemitic material being disseminated at a high school club as a ‘lie’. To call that a lie you must demolish the truth to push a pro-Hamas one-sided antisemitic agenda, which is what the New Times reporter did.

Jewish parents came to me and said their students had experienced hatred and were afraid to go to school because a one-sided pro-Hamas presentation created antisemitic attitudes among some impressionable students. To call me a liar for standing up for their point of view is to call those Jewish students and their parents liars - a reprehensible slur. These are public school students and Save Our Schools should be thoroughly ashamed for not standing against hatred and antisemitism, especially in the classroom.”

Horne concluded, “Parents have the fundamental right to choose the school that best fits the needs of their children. Options such as charter schools, open enrollment and the ESA program are practical expressions of the value of school choice. Since the vast majority of Arizona parents (including myself) select to send their children to a neighborhood public school, lies and deception are obviously not needed to show support for public schools. Yet Save Our Schools continues to resort to shameful tactics again and again.”

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FY 2023 Prop 123 and One Time Supplemental Payment 1

The $75 million additional funding provided by Proposition 123 (Laws 2015, 1st Special Session, Chapter 1) for FY 2024 will be distributed in two payments: $37.5 million by November 30, 2023 and $37.5 million in May 2024. Individual school district and charter allocations are based on the share of statewide weighted attending Average Daily Membership (ADM). The first $37.5 million payment was calculated based on the same ADM that was used for the FY24 November Classroom Site Fund payment.

Additionally, the $300 million One Time State Aid Supplemental additional funding for FY 2024 will also be distributed in two payments: $150 million by November 30, 2023 and $150 million in May 2024. The calculation method is the same as for Prop 123 funding as individual school district and charter allocations are based on the share of statewide weighted attending Average Daily Membership (ADM). The first $150 million payment was calculated based on the same ADM that was used for the FY24 November Classroom Site Fund payment.

The file linked below will show the first payment amount and total estimated FY 2024 Prop 123 and One Time State Aid Supplemental amounts per LEA. Districts are listed first by county, followed by charters alphabetically.

District and Charter Prop 123 and One Time State Aid Supplement

Please contact the School Finance Payment Team at [email protected] if you have any questions about this payment.