STATE SUPERINTENDENT ANNOUNCEMENTS AND UPDATES
Superintendents’ Quarterly Meeting – March 19, 2013
Measures of Student
Learning: Common
Exams
Common exams, one of the elements of Measures of Student
Learning, are a partnership between the Department of Public
Instruction and school districts. The common exams are
designed to measure student growth in the core contents
between grades 4-12 in currently non-tested subjects. When
NC submitted our Race to the Top grant, we shared with
superintendents the requirement to measure teacher
effectiveness. At that meeting the superintendents
overwhelmingly requested that the state develop the Measures
of Student Learning rather than follow the same path of some
states that have required each school district to develop its
own.
The inclusion of student growth in teacher evaluation is a
requirement of Race to the Top as well as for the continuation
of the ESEA waiver. If the state is not compliant in both
grants, funding at the state and/or district level could be in
jeopardy.
Growth demonstrated on the common exams will be used to
determine the Standard 6 ratings for teachers who administer
the assessments. The SAS Institute will be calculating growth
on the common exams, just as they do with results of the Endof-Grade, End-of-Course, and Career and Technical Education
Post-Assessments. The team at the SAS Institute will study
the distribution of common exam results, as well as score
patterns within and across districts prior to the completion of
value-added analysis.
Prior to sending the data from the common exams to the SAS
Institute for value-added analysis, the Department's
Accountability Services staff will complete item analysis, as
well as other reliability checks on the data. The revisions that
have been made to the high school assessments are a result of
this type of quantitative analysis, as well as feedback from
teachers who administered the exams to their students during
first semester.
Common exams were administered by 39 LEAs, 2 Charter
Schools, and the NE Regional School of Biotechnology and
Agriscience at the end of fall semester. Following the exams,
Department staff closely reviewed teacher feedback. In the
face of quantitative and qualitative feedback that some of the
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Measures of Student
Learning: Common
Exams (continued)
exams were too long, we did decide that it was best for
students and teachers if we shortened some of the exams.
Before sending the results of the exams to the SAS Institute,
the Department's Accountability Services staff will compare
the results, reliability, etc. of the first semester results with the
second semester results. It is possible that the first semester
results will not be used in the determination of Standard 6
ratings if they do not hold up statistically in the same way as
the second semester scores. However, without second
semester data as a point of comparison, we cannot make a
decision about first semester scores at this point.
Results from first semester administration show that all but
one of the common exams demonstrates reliability of .8,
which is generally accepted to be the marker of a valid and
reliable assessment. This analysis confirms that the scoring on
the constructed response items has also been reliable and in
accordance with the rubrics. The Department has also held
best practice webinars featuring testing coordinators from two
districts that administered the exams. They both indicated that
scoring was completed in the course of an afternoon.
Between now and the end of the year school systems will be
receiving training on a Roster Verification System hosted
online by SAS that will allow teachers and principals to ensure
that they are being held accountable for the correct listing of
students. Pennsylvania, which uses the system, has found the
most appropriate time to do roster verification is at the end of
the school year. Superintendents will be receiving training
information in the near future.
NCDPI is currently partnering with some LEAs to pilot both
the K-2 reading pre-post assessment and the Student Growth
Portfolio process that, if successful, will become the Measures
of Student Learning for most of the teachers not covered by a
common exam or state test. We hope to be sharing
information with you from these pilots at the Summer
Superintendent’s Quarterly or at future regional meetings.
Summer Institute
Summer Institutes this year are held in Greenville, Durham,
Charlotte and Greensboro. Factors determining these locations
include space for break-outs (as requested by LEA teams last
year), technology needs for Home Base integration, and a
request by LEA teams to move locations this year. For the
last two years, we have held these institutes in the same
regions and it was requested we expand locations this year. It
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Summer Institute
(continued)
is our hope that next year, we can hold 8 institutes, in all
regions, including teacher leaders from your regions.
The NCDPI Summer Institutes 2013 webpage features the
most current information about Summer Institutes logistics
(i.e., dates, locations, registration, team information, and
more), for more information, visit
http://www.ncpublicschools.org/profdev/summerinstitutes/2013/ TALAS Conference
Call
If you have a school identified as low performing in the Race
to the Top grant, you have received an email inviting you to
participate in a brief conference call on Friday, March 22, at
2pm. Please join this call. We will review expectations so
that everyone is clear about this portion of the grant for next
year.
Virtual Public School
registration through
Home Base
North Carolina Virtual Public School (NCVPS), will transition
to PowerSchool for its registration process.
 Schools will continue to use our registration system for
summer 2013 course registration and grade delivery,
as usual.
 Fall 2013, Yearlong 13-14 and spring 2014 class
registration will be transitioned to the PowerSchool
system in June/July.

For these affected semesters, NCVPS will begin
enrollment in the current registration system on March
1, then all of its registration data will be imported into
PowerSchool during the Year-End-Transition (YET)
process.
 After July, schools will begin using PowerSchool to
enroll for NCVPS courses.
The PowerSchool system will include enrollment and
reporting features for NCVPS registration. NCVPS is
working closely with Power School administrators to assure
the initial NCVPS data requirements are met to make the
transition as seamless as possible.
We will send updates in the days ahead to include training
information from the PowerSchool team. NCVPS is excited
by this partnership and the enhanced registration processes
and data management of NCVPS enrollments.
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Small Group Regional
Meetings
Small Group Regional
Meetings (continued)
Roster Verification
Four dates in April have been identified to hold superintendent
small group regional meetings. Please make plans to attend
one of these meetings.

April 24, 2013 – Northeast & Southeast – 1:00-4:00pm
Washington Civic Center
110 Gladden Street
Washington, NC 27889

April 25, 2013 – Piedmont & Central – 1:00–4:00 pm
Durham Staff Development Center
2107 Hillandale Road
Durham, NC 27705

April 26, 2013 - Northwest & Western
10:00 am - 2:00 pm
Burke County Schools Staff Development Center
509 West Concord Street
Morganton, NC 28655

April 30, 2013 – Southwest & Sandhills
12:00 noon – 4:00 pm (lunch provided)
Richmond County Board of Education
118 Vance Street
Hamlet, NC 28345
The NCDPI is working with SAS to finalize the EVAAS
roster verification process for Educator Effectiveness. The
roster verification window, enabling teachers, principals, and
district-level administrators to verify students are correctly
assigned to teachers for the purpose of EVASS analysis, will
open in mid-April and conclude June 28.
NCWise data will pre-populate the SAS roster verification
system. Having accurate course information for students in
NCWise will minimize the need for corrections to the rosters,
thus requiring only 10-15 minutes per class roster (a class
roster is all of the students taught by one teacher per content
area). If there is misinformation in NCWise, the verification
process will take more time.
Information on the available training will be provided prior to
the opening of the roster verification window.
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China Opportunity
for Teachers
The Global Classroom Alliance is offering North Carolina
educators the opportunity to teach in English immersion
summer camps this summer in China. While the program
requires a deposit to participate, most or all of the money will
be refunded depending on whether teachers complete one
camp (partial refund) or two camps (full refund).
Teachers are needed for camps serving students ages 6-12
(elementary) and ages 14-17 (high school). Non-teaching
cultural travel opportunities for teachers are included as part
of the camp package. Please visit www.gcpaproject.org for
information.
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