January's data capture for the February 22^nd payment is 1/15/22 at 5pm. 

Although the data capture date falls on a weekend, it does not affect or change the date of the data capture.

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: FY23 Calendars need to be submitted, approved, and certified for ADM and funding to be generated.

The following videos provide general information related to the data reconciliation process:

• Introduction to Data Verification Reports: https://youtu.be/ou9Jst9qnsg
• Introduction to Data Verification Reports 2: https://youtu.be/_m3uEo3OGRI
• Introduction to Integrity: https://youtu.be/PYzBAEZmiSs

Prior payment reports can be found here: https://schoolfinancereports.azed.gov/.

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

School Finance will be testing a new system for processing budgets, financial reports and other files this spring and is seeking volunteers from districts and charters to test system functionality and provide feedback.

Beta test volunteers will be given access to log-in to a new Local Education Agency dashboard from which budgets and other files will be uploaded to the department. Volunteers will have the ability to interact with the new user interface, upload files and view budget reports. All volunteers will be given a brief training on the system and instructions to complete specific tests.

If you would be interested in volunteering to participate in the Budget System Beta Test on behalf of a district or charter, please send an email to SF[email protected] with the subject "Beta Test Participant" and the name of your district or charter. School Finance will select participants to ensure that districts and charters of various sizes and with various characteristics are represented. Selected test participants will be contacted during the first week of February.

DATA MANAGEMENT ALERT       

Special Education Data Updates Webinar Wednesday, January 11th 

   The Exceptional Student Services Data Management team will be hosting the next Special Education Data Updates live webinar on Wednesday, January 11th from 2pm – 3pm. This session will cover a variety of data topics that will include (subject to change):

• Reminders 

• October 1 Data Collection Phase II
• October 1 Data Collection Phase III
• Important Dates Document
• Discipline in AzEDS

• Trending topics 

• October 1 Data Collection Phase II
• Homebound/ Home-based/ Homeschooled
• Preschool LRE
• Review of AzEDS SPED Portal Reports
• Review Acronyms Document

• Topics Not in Scope

• Vouchers Data Management

• Top 3 Integrity Errors 

• Q&A    

Registration is required to attend: Register for Special Education Data Updates webinar.

For questions, please contact ESS Data Management via email at [email protected]. 

Special Education Directors,

Please see the following memo regarding preschool outcomes data in AzEDS for fiscal year 2024. In order to streamline the preschool outcome data collection process, the data collection and processing for these submissions will move into one single student accountability system (AzEDS) moving forward. The ESS Early Childhood Special Education and Operations teams will provide targeted technical assistance for this data collection process in March 2023.

If you have any additional technical questions, please email ESS Operations.

Special Education Directors,

Please see the following memo regarding the reporting of discipline data. This communication includes a reminder of discipline data submission elements and a new requirement to submit information for children reassigned to an alternative education program as an alternative to suspension or expulsion or placed into an alternative to a suspension program beginning in fiscal year 2024. This additional reporting requirement was developed in response to feedback provided to Arizona from the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP) and is designed to ensure that all eligible children with disabilities are served appropriately and equitably.

If you have any questions regarding this requirement, please email ESS Operations.

Special Education Directors,

The ADE/ESS Assistive Technology (AT) team is excited to announce the next 2022–23 national presenter, Mike Marotta, ATP. Mike’s workshop is designed for special educators and related service providers.

“Explore and Identify Google Tools That Can Be Incorporated Into Educational Experiences”

Date: Wednesday, January 18, 2023

Time: 8:00 a.m.−3:30 p.m.

Fee: $21 (breakfast and lunch included)

Where: Sunnyside Unified School District

Address: 2238 East Ginter Road, Tucson, AZ 85706

About Mike Marotta

Mike Marotta, ATP, is the owner of Inclusive Technology Solutions, LLC. Mike has been in the field of Assistive Technology for almost 30 years. His experience revolves around a vast array of accommodations for persons with disabilities and their family/support members. Mike is the Director of the Richard West Assistive Technology Advocacy Center @ Disability Rights New Jersey, is the Founder @EdcampAccessNJ @EdcampAccessInt Co-mod #atchat Wed 8PM ET @BookCreatorApp Ambassador, and is a Raspberry Pi Certified Educator
Mike believes that networking and information-sharing are essential for the successful evaluation, consideration, implementation, and application of technology to support individuals of all abilities.

Workshop Description:

From Chrome apps and extensions to Google tools, Google can support all learners in your classroom. This full-day, in-person workshop will focus on exploring Google tools and identifying ways to incorporate these powerful tools into educational experiences. We will explore the feature match process to ensure a clear rationale for using built-in Chrome OS accessibility features, G Suite tools, and third-party Chrome apps and extensions. You will explore tools to assist students in the areas of reading, writing, and math, as well as with executive functioning skills that include time management, organization, task completion, and focus, to effectively meet the needs of every learner in all environments (classroom, transition, community). 

Register for “Explore and Identify Google Tools That Can Be Incorporated Into Educational Experiences”

If you have questions regarding this training, please email our AT inbox.

BUDG-25 reports for all school districts have been posted to the School Finance website.  FY 2023 December BUDG-25 reports have been calculated using the FY 2023 December BSA 55-1 information. 

• District BUDG-25 reports are available to download from the School Finance website:
  • First, select a school district and then click “Go!”
  • Next, click “Switch to Budgets” from the top right corner of the menu bar and then click “Reports” from the middle of the menu bar.
  • Finally, select fiscal year 2023 and then click “Go!”. The BUDG-25 report will appear.

• District BSA 55-1 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 December “PDF” button. The December BSA 55-1 report will appear.

BUDG-25 reports will be available until the Budget Team performs the next update (typically after each State Aid distribution). Once the updating process has begun, all BUDG-25 reports will become unavailable at that time.  Please save a copy for future reference.

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

Thank you!

DATA MANAGEMENT ALERT

Discipline Data Submissions

Please review the following memo which outlines upcoming changes to discipline data submissions in FY24.

Memorandum of Discipline Data Submissions.

Beginning in the next fiscal year, ESS will require Public Education Agencies (PEAs) to report any instance in which a PEA removes a child with a disability from his/her educational placement for disciplinary purposes into AzEDS via their Student Information System.

NOTE: SPED discipline incidents will still be collected in the ESS Discipline Data Collection application for FY23.  Any discipline data submitted to AzEDS for FY23 will be used for testing purposes only and will not be used for ESS data collections.

For any questions related to special education discipline data submissions, please contact ESS Data Management.

FY 2023 Results-Based Funding has been calculated and the file is available below for review. School Level calculations can be seen on tab “FY23 RBF School Level Calc” and will show the annual total, as well as the expected breakout for payments 1 and 2. The LEA distribution level for payment 1 can be seen on tab “FY23 Pmt 1 LEA Level”; with Districts listed by county, followed by Charters listed alphabetically. Payment 1 is 60% of the annual amount and is expected to distribute late December 2022. For questions regarding your payment, please contact [email protected]

FY 2023 Results-Based Funding Calculations

District calculations are based on FY22 Statewide Recalculation student counts, and Charter calculations are based on the FY 2023 December payment student counts. Please find the test result and Free Reduced Lunch percentage in the following websites:

Spring 2021 Test Result

/accountability-research/data

School Year 2019 Free Reduced Lunch

/hns/frp

Please refer to HB 2866 Section 22:

Notwithstanding section 15-249.08, subsection B, paragraph 2, Arizona Revised Statutes, for fiscal year 2022-2023, the department of education shall distribute monies from the results-based funding fund established by section 15-249.08, Arizona Revised Statutes, as follows:

1. Each school operated by a school district or charter holder shall receive $225 per student count from the fund if both of the following apply:

(a) At the time the test prescribed in subdivision (b) of this paragraph was administered, fewer than sixty percent of the students who were enrolled in the school met the eligibility requirements established under the national school lunch and child nutrition acts (42 United States Code sections 1751 through 1793) for free or reduced-price lunches, or an equivalent measure recognized for participating in the federal free and reduced-price lunch program and other school programs dependent on a poverty measure, including the community eligibility provision for which free and reduced-price lunch data is not available.

(b) In results achieved during the spring of 2021, the school performed in the top thirteen percent of all schools statewide as demonstrated by the average percentage of students who obtained a passing score on the mathematics portions of the statewide assessment and the average percentage of students who obtained a passing score on the language arts portions of the statewide assessment.

2. Each school operated by a school district or charter holder shall receive $400 per student count from the fund if both of the following apply:

(a) At the time the test prescribed in subdivision (b) of this paragraph was administered, sixty percent or more of the students who were enrolled in the school met the eligibility requirements established under the national school lunch and child nutrition acts (42 United States Code sections 1751 through 1793) for free or reduced-price lunches, or an equivalent measure recognized for participating in the federal free and reduced-price lunch program and other school programs dependent on a poverty measure, including the community eligibility provision for which free and reduced-price lunch data is not available.

(b) In results achieved during the spring of 2021, the school performed in the top thirteen percent of schools pursuant to subdivision (a) of this paragraph, as demonstrated by the average percentage of those students who obtained a passing score on the mathematics portions of the statewide assessment and the average percentage of students who obtained a passing score on the language arts portions of the statewide assessment.

3. Each school operated by a school district or charter holder shall receive $225 per student count from the fund if both of the following apply:

(a) At the time the test prescribed in subdivision (b) of this paragraph was administered, sixty percent or more of the students who were enrolled in the school met the eligibility requirements established under the national school lunch and child nutrition acts (42 United States Code sections 1751 through 1793) for free or reduced-price lunches, or an equivalent measure recognized for participating in the federal free and reduced-price lunch program and other school programs dependent on a poverty measure, including the community eligibility provision for which free and reduced-price lunch data is not available.

(b) In results achieved during the spring of 2021, the school performed in the top twenty-seven percent but not in the top thirteen percent of schools pursuant to subdivision (a) of this paragraph, as demonstrated by the average percentage of those students who obtained a passing score on the mathematics portions of the statewide assessment and the average percentage of students who obtained a passing score on the language arts portions of the statewide assessment.

4. Each alternative high school shall receive $400 per student count from the fund if in the results achieved during testing conducted in the spring of 2021 the school performed in the top twenty-seven percent of schools identified pursuant to paragraph 3, subdivision (a) of this section, as demonstrated by the average percentage of those students who obtained a passing score on the mathematics portions of the statewide assessment and the average percentage of students who obtained a passing score on the language arts portions of the statewide assessment. An alternative high school is eligible for funding under this paragraph only if it reports the average percentage of students who obtained a passing score on both the mathematics portions of the statewide assessment and the language arts portions of the statewide assessment during testing conducted in the spring of 2021.

Result Based Funding Expenditure Reporting

Please refer to ARS 15-249.08:

C. Any monies received from the results-based funding fund by a school district or charter holder shall be separately accounted for in the school district's or charter holder's annual financial report and shall not supplant monies budgeted or received from any other source that are generally provided to that school.

D. The majority of the monies received from the fund by a school district or charter holder shall be used at the school that earned the results for teacher salaries, to hire teachers, for school leader salaries, for classroom supplies and for other strategies to sustain outcomes for students at that school. A portion of the monies received from the fund by a school district or charter holder may be used for expanding and replicating that school site as a quality school model.    For the purposes of this subsection, "expanding and replicating" means:

1. Providing for costs associated with adding seats and serving more students at the awarded school site, including students on a waiting list.

2. Mentoring school leaders and teachers from other sites to replicate the model and instructional practices that show results in closing the achievement gap.

3. Physically expanding the results-based funding model or strategies at another location to improve academic outcomes at that location and to accelerate academic growth.

E. Schools that are not results-based funded and that receive funding or support as described in subsection D, paragraphs 2 and 3 of this section are eligible to receive that funding or support for not more than three years.

F. On or before November 1 of each year, each school that received results-based funding in the prior fiscal year shall submit to the department of education a report that provides a brief description of how the dollars were allocated pursuant to subsections C and D of this section.  Each school that is not results-based funded but that received funding pursuant to subsection E of this section shall submit a report to the department that specifically indicates the number of years the school has received that funding. On or before December 1 of each year, the department of education shall compile the reports from each local education agency and provide that information to the joint legislative budget committee, the governor's office of strategic planning and budgeting and the chairpersons of the education committees of the house of representatives and the senate, or their successor committees.

G. For the purposes of this section, only students who are eligible to be included in a school's student count shall be considered in determining that school's percentages of free or reduced-price lunch students or other poverty indicators.

Greetings, school leaders!

As we close out the 2022 year, our ESSER team would like to thank our district, school, and community partners who dynamically invested in unprecedented federal funding to support students and their academic success. We are grateful for these life-changing partnerships.

As we enter the new year, the Arizona Department of Education will have newly elected leadership under State Superintendent-elect Tom Horne. As the Department undergoes this transition, there may be some alterations to this monthly communication. However, you may still use the following individuals and websites for up-to-date information:

• For LEAs using their allocation of ESSER I, II, and III monies, please continue utilizing the website: /esser-overview. You may reach any ESSER specialist at [email protected], or contact our ESSER Director at [email protected].
• For LEAs or community partners that received a portion of ADE’s ESSER set-aside funding, please continue communicating with [email protected]. You’ll continue to see our ESSER investments on our website: /esser-setaside.

We wish you a safe and healthy New Year – and appreciate your patience as we transition to a new administration.

ESSER Set Aside Opportunities

The following opportunities are funded and supported by the Arizona Department of Education’s ESSER I, II, and III (ARP) set-aside investments:

Free Math Mentoring and Tutoring

Are your students struggling with unfinished learning in mathematics? Did you know they can get one on one support from a dedicated math mentor? There is no registration necessary. As part of the ESSER-funded partnership with the UArizona Center for Recruitment and Retention of Mathematics Teachers and the UArizona STEMM AmeriCorps program, all AZ K 12 students can access math mentoring and tutoring Mon-Sun over Zoom. The schedule and links can be found at: https://crr.math.arizona.edu/zoom-tutors

Free Math Education Conference

Registration for the CRR’s 19th Annual MEAD Conference is now OPEN! The UArizona Center for Recruitment and Retention of Mathematics Teachers (CRR) is hosting this year's Mathematics Educator Appreciation Day Conference (MEAD) on Saturday, January 21, 2023. MEAD will be HYBRID with options to participate either in person or virtually. The keynote speaker will be Peg Smith, a national leader in mathematics education and recipient of NCTM’s Lifetime Achievement Award! 

This year’s event will be FREE for all Arizona educators and $125 for everyone else. Please help us spread the word about MEAD so that more teachers can benefit from this unique event. You can download and share the flyer from the conference webpage.

ESSER Set-Aside Spotlight: Million Dollar Teacher Project

At Million Dollar Teacher Project, the Recognition pillar programs include Take a Teacher to Lunch & One in a Million/Feel Like a Million Dollars initiatives. This pillar is about ensuring teachers feel recognized, appreciated & uplifted by their students, school community, community partners & sponsors & the MDTP Team.

One of the many ways the Million Dollar Teacher Project loves recognizing phenomenal teachers is through our One in A Million Program (OIAM)! Each month, we feature one extra-amazing teacher nominated by a member of their school community & highlight their achievements as an educator! Our OIAM Featured Teacher is interviewed by Priscilla & Joey of Mix 96.9 on air and receives an extensive gift package with a presentation at their campus & several other special perks so that they feel like a celebrity the whole month-long!

With Madrid Neighborhood School as our Focus School for this academic year, our OIAM winners will be chosen from this campus. The MDTP Recognition Team created an OIAM bulletin board in the teacher’s lounge at Madrid that features the winner’s photo & places for others to write congratulatory remarks to show their gratitude for their fantastic coworker! November’s One in A Million is 2nd-grade teacher Jenny Hansen!

On Mon, Nov. 14, the MDTP Recognition Team presented Ms. Hansen with a red-carpet OIAM certificate & gift presentation with all her students, her assistant principal, her nominator & many others present, cheering her on! We are honored to celebrate this extra-amazing teacher who provides the utmost dedication to her students, school & community!

Interested in donating or sponsoring an MDTP Recognition event? Just click on the link to learn more & donate!

Teacher Support Program Highlight

The support pillar at Million Dollar Teacher Project includes the Classroom Support Team (CST), the Million Dollar Teacher Tree Classroom Supply Drive, and Spruce the Lounge. The purpose of all of these is to lighten the load of teachers in and out of the classroom and allow them to exhale. Imagine being a teacher in 3rd classroom alone with 30-plus students. Now add that they haven't been in the classroom since they were in 1st grade due to a pandemic. Imagine having to work a side job to pay your bills and get the supplies you need to do your job. This is an issue that the CST Program addresses. We are always excited about the students and volunteers the join our team. This last year though, we were blown away by a young lady named Isabella. A Sophomore at ASU, she came to us wanting to work with children and get in the classroom. She loved we were focused on supporting the teacher. When she got started with us, she gave us two days a week. What made her different was she did not need this for school. She was here to give. Once she was in the classroom, she quickly saw how amazing her teacher was and how overloaded she was. Isabella spent her time grading and filing papers, running small groups or 1:1s, and being an extra set of ears, eyes, and hands. She contacted me a week in and asked if she could add a third day. She explained the teacher and students needed the support. We found out that her teacher worked a second job to make ends meet. Isabella's time in the classroom profoundly impacted our 3rd-grade teacher. She was taking less work home, was able to give more individualized attention to students, and was able to implement more lessons for students. Isabella was not an education major. She did, however, set up her Junior year to be online and has accepted a part-time Teaching assistant position with our school. She is still in school to be a counselor, but she is also determined to make a huge impact on our teachers, students, and in our community. This is just one of the many reasons we do what we do. 

Check us out and become a Teacher Fan Today and let's celebrate teachers. https://mdtproject.org/teacher-fan-club/