NCVPS Community: E-lert for Aug. 27

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E-lert Subscription

Have you subscribed? If not, you can subscribe at the new e-lert site here. Look for the subscription service at the top of the sidebar. You will receive a confirmation email to activate your subscription. Each notice will have an unsubscribe option, too.

E-learning Success Stories

Submit your stories here: http://tiny.cc/d2oby Please tell us about student success stories and district success stories, such as increased virtual enrollment, fulltime DLA positions, teacher facilitators, and other virtual initiatives that have been started in your district. You may also forward to students and principals to complete!

Professional Networking

Join NCVPS on Facebook. Are you into networking and social media? Come join over 650 other educators here: http://www.facebook.com/ncvps

Follow the virtual learning consultants on Twitter at http://twitter.com/MyVLC

Tutorial

Here's a quick tutorial on how to change your contact information.

Admin Drop Reports - Monday, August 30 [E-lert for Aug. 27]

The Day 3 Admin Drop report will be posted Monday, August 30, by 9 a.m. The admin drops will target students who have not logged into their courses yet. The list will show your entire roster of students.

Scroll to the right of the spreadsheet to see if the student has been marked for an admin drop. If there are any mistakes on the list, you must contact the instructor directly to have the student removed from the admin drop list.

The instructor's contact information will be on the Admin Drop report, too. If you have any corrections, you must contact instructors by 5 p.m. on Tuesday, August 31st.

Follow this link to see how to access your Admin Drop Report and other reports.

Reminders [E-lert for Aug. 27]

1) Be sure to update your contact information in the registration system. Follow this link to see how to update your contact information.

2) Central Office Distance Learning Coordinator: Follow this link to watch a short video that shows how to check your district's enrollment, check grades, and enroll and drop students at the school level.

3) Central Office Distance Learning Coordinator: Follow this link to see how you can check the contact information for the distance learning advisors in your system:

4) Follow this link to the Student Checklist for Fall 2010.

5) Follow this link to the DLA Checklist for Fall 2010.

Credit Recovery Updates [E-lert for Aug. 27]

Welcome to the Fall 2010 semester! My name is Jennifer Nobles and I am one of the Credit Recovery/Modular Learning Specialists with the NC Virtual Public School. I've worked with most of you before and look forward to working with some of you for the first time. You are receiving this information because you have students enrolled in Credit Recovery courses. If you are not the current DLA, please let me know and forward this email to the correct person. You'll also want to make sure the information is updated in the registration system.

The NCVPS Credit Recovery staff works closely with the schools providing bi-weekly updates on Credit Recovery students to help keep you informed of their progress. To better serve you, we need some information on the Credit Recovery implementation at your school. I've created a survey to help gather the information. On this survey, you will be able to provide information about you and any other contacts such as lab facilitators that should receive the mastery charts and Credit Recovery updates. If you could take a few moments of your time to complete this survey, I would greatly appreciate it.

Link to survey: https://spreadsheets.google.com/a/ncpublicschools.gov/viewform?formkey=dHVKcjhlUHdFX1k5WGRicFNFbTRVQkE6MQ

Updates for August 27, 2010

1. Teacher contact
You will be receiving emails from our Credit Recovery teachers introducing themselves and thanking you for your support of these students this semester. If you are not the person the teacher should contact or if there is another person the teacher should include in the weekly emails, please let the teacher know. If you have completed the survey mentioned above, we have provided the information to our teachers so they will know the best person to contact. The majority of our teachers work in the f2f classroom during the school day so they will not be available to students one-on-one until the evening times. Every Credit Recovery teacher will be available to work with students at least once a week via our Wimba, our live classroom, or Pronto, our secured instant messaging system, for those students who have computer access at home. For those students with no computer access at home, teachers will call students at least once a week to work one-on-one.

2. Incorrect Contact Information for Students
Some teachers will ask for your help with a new contact number for a student. Our teachers are required to call the student and have come across some disconnected or incorrect numbers. It will be helpful for students to update their contact information in Blackboard as well.

3. Please provide the id and password to your students.
The Blackboard username and password for each student can be found in the registration system. You will need to provide that information to the student. Our teachers can not provide ids and passwords to students. Also, please make sure you have the students logon at http://ncvps.blackboard.com and complete the Getting Started Unit (mentioned below) right away.

4. Getting Started Unit Please note, all students must complete the "Getting Started" unit including the quiz at the end of the section. This unit is setup on Adaptive Release meaning they must master each component before the next will open. Unit 1 will not open until the Getting Started Unit has been mastered. This unit will explain how to move through the course and will help the student have a smooth start to the course.

5. Training We have created several training pieces for those of you that are new to our program. The training folder is located in Blackboard in the DLA Spa under the "Credit Recovery" Tab. Reviewing the information in the training folder will help you understand the foundation and procedures for our program.

LEO Update [E-lert for August 27]

Community Colleges classes are in their 2nd week. Before allowing students to register for new LEO courses please be aware how many classes/weeks they will have missed.

We know with certainty these course prefixes are eligible for LEO funding: AST, BIO, CHM, CIS, GEL, IMS, MAT, PHS, PHY, and SCI. A Community College offering any other course as a LEO course should be willing to assure you in an email or other document that your school/system will not be invoiced for tuition, fees, or textbooks.

Some Community College courses now eligible for LEO will NOT transfer to a 4-year college. Be aware before allowing a student to register.

iSchool spring course offerings will be available later in this semester.

Early and Middle College students are not limited to science, technology, and math LEO courses.

Please contact me if you have questions,
Deborah Pedersen
deborah.pedersen@ncpublicschools.gov

NCVPS Community [E-lert for Aug. 13]

Be Empowered

Homer: This browser is designed for those with visual impairments or who are blind and need voice capabilities for their browsers.

E-lert Subscription

Have you subscribed? If not, you can subscribe at the new e-lert site here. Look for the subscription service at the top of the sidebar. You will receive a confirmation email to activate your subscription. Each notice will have an unsubscribe option, too.

E-learning Success Stories

Submit your stories here: http://tiny.cc/d2oby Please tell us about student success stories and district success stories, such as increased virtual enrollment, fulltime DLA positions, teacher facilitators, and other virtual initiatives that have been started in your district. You may also forward to students and principals to complete!

Professional Networking

Join NCVPS on Facebook. Are you into networking and social media? Come join over 650 other educators here: http://www.facebook.com/ncvps

Follow the virtual learning consultants on Twitter at http://twitter.com/MyVLC

Tutorial

Here's a quick tutorial on how to change your contact information.

DLA Contact information

It is imperative for DLCs and DLAs to update their contact information in the registration system by clicking on the "MY INFO" tab.

Updates should be made as soon as possible to ensure we have correct contact information on file for each school and district.

NOTE: There are two email address fields that must be populated in order to successfully update this information.

Follow this link to see how to update your contact information: https://docs.google.com/document/pub?id=1KsA8ifDoEfJXOoFpA1xa_3B712QOD8PrPOOSUEFqdCI

Central Office Access to the Registration System [E-lert for Aug. 13]

If you are the central office distance learning coordinator, watch this short video to see how to check your district's enrollment, check grades, and enroll and drop students at the school level.

http://www.schooltube.com/video/4c68c43b2b58f101b765/Central-Office-Access

How to Check Your DLA Contact List in the System [E-lert for Aug. 13]

If you are the central office DLC, here is how you can check the contact information for the distance learning advisors in your system:

https://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dfwwcvfq_1725hbbsw3kt

It is very important for NCVPS instructors and staff that the school-level DLAs update their contact information in the registration system.

Latest on LEO Fall Courses [E-lert for Aug. 13]

iSchool courses have been cancelled for the fall, but iSchool will be registering students for spring semester. More information will be available later.

Oversight for Community College courses will be handled at the NC Community College System level. What this means for DLC/DLAs; if the Community College says it’s LEO you can take their word for it.

We know with certainty these course prefixes are eligible for LEO funding: AST, BIO, CHM, CIS, GEL, IMS, MAT, PHS, PHY, and SCI. A Community College offering any other course as a LEO course should be willing to assure you in an email or other document that your school/system will not be invoiced for tuition, fees, or textbooks.

Please contact me if you have questions,

Deborah Pedersen

deborah.pedersen@ncpublicschools.gov

NCVPS Community: E-lert for August 6

Be Empowered

Another Lens: This program allows users to get a magnified view of the content underneath their mouse pointer. It's great for students with visual disabilities!

E-lert Subscription

Have you subscribed? If not, you can subscribe at the new e-lert site here. Look for the subscription service at the top of the sidebar. You will receive a confirmation email to activate your subscription. Each notice will have an unsubscribe option, too.

E-learning Success Stories

Submit your stories here: http://tiny.cc/d2oby Please tell us about student success stories and district success stories, such as increased virtual enrollment, fulltime DLA positions, teacher facilitators, and other virtual initiatives that have been started in your district. You may also forward to students and principals to complete!

Professional Networking

Join NCVPS on Facebook. Are you into networking and social media? Come join over 650 other educators here: http://www.facebook.com/ncvps

Follow the virtual learning consultants on Twitter at http://twitter.com/MyVLC

Tutorial

Here's a quick tutorial on how to change your contact information.

DLA and Student Checklists for Fall 2010 [E-lert for August 6]

Student checklist: Follow this link. You can also download the Word document from the DLA Spa.

Schools and districts should use this as a guide and add their own expectations for the students to the checklist.

DLA Checklist: Follow this link. You can also download the pdf version from the DLA Spa.

DLA Contact Information [E-lert for Aug. 6]

It is imperative for DLCs and DLAs to update their contact information in the registration system by clicking on the "MY INFO" tab.

Updates should be made as soon as possible to ensure we have correct contact information on file for each school and district.

NOTE: There are two email address fields that must be populated in order to successfully update this information.

Follow this link to see how to update your contact information: https://docs.google.com/document/pub?id=1KsA8ifDoEfJXOoFpA1xa_3B712QOD8PrPOOSUEFqdCI

LEO Update [E-lert for Aug. 6]

Thanks for all the contacts in the past week with questions about the course prefixes. Many Community Colleges are telling schools that business courses, child care, and beauty/hair care courses qualify. Those courses are considered a part of vocational/technology at Community Colleges. At this time I have NOT received approval for those courses. If this changes you will be notified in upcoming E-Lerts.

Community College courses with the prefixes below will meet the new LEO requirements:

AST

BIO

CHM

CIS

GEL

IMS

MAT

PHS

PHY

SCI

If your Community College has offered to absorb tuition for students previously registered for courses not covered by LEO be aware that LEO funds may NOT be used for fees & textbooks.

High Schools students enrolled in LEO courses through iSchool received a letter last week stating, "On Friday, July 30, all of our current fall courses will be cancelled. This will affect 1553 students in 170 high schools, accounting for 2025 enrollments. The cancellation will take place from our end and no further action will be required of you or your students."

iSchool is working on courses to meet the new legislated requirement that all LEO courses must be in the areas of math, science, or technology.

LEO funding has not been changed, there is plenty of funding for science, technology, and math courses.

Early and Middle College high schools are exempt from this legislation.

Please contact me if you have questions,

Deborah Pedersen

deborah.pedersen@ncpublicschools.gov

LOCK Sessions Scheduled August [E-lert for Aug. 6]

Generally, LOCK sessions (Linked Online Connecting Knowledge) are scheduled the 1st and 3rd Tuesday of each month at 11:00 AM. However, summer LOCK session schedules have been altered. The scheduled July-August sessions are outlined below. Post these dates on your calendar and make it a priority for both DLAs and DLCs to engage in these professional development opportunities. (The sessions are hosted in the "Virtual Office" (tab) in the DLA Spa.)

NOTE: July 20, 27, Aug 3 Archive links are posted at www.thevlc.org.

Aug 03 - "Tips on Textbook Strategies and the Impact with NC WISE" -- presented by DLC Joe Baisley (Currituck) ***ARCHIVED*** http://www.thevlc.org/

Aug 10 - 9:00 - "Training for DLCs" -- presented by the NCVPS Division for School Services Support (Adam, Connie, Dave, J, & Melissa)

Aug 17 - "Tips on Grade Reporting & Closing out Summer Semester" -- presented by DLC, Steve McGrath (Guilford), and the NCVPS School Services Support Team.

Aug 24 - "An Overview of Training for 2010-2011 School Year DLAs and DLCs" -- presented by the NCVPS School Services Support Team.

The Why, What, & How of the NCVPS Funding Formula [E-lert for Aug. 6]

Recently, questions have stemmed from the outcome of the debate with the House, Senate and Governor with regard to the NCVPS funding formula. Dr. Bryan Setser, NCVPS Executive Director, met with superintendents on Friday, July 16 via webinar to provide key thoughts on "The Why, What, & How of the funding formula. The presentation was captured in an archive file; it is approximately 30 minutes in duration and is available here:

http://www.thevlc.org/2010/07/ncvps-funding-formula-why-what-and-how.html

Credit Recovery Updates [E-lert for Aug. 6]

1. Last Day to Submit Work:
The last day of the semester is almost here! We are encouraging our students to submit work in Credit Recovery courses by Friday, August 6th. August 9th is the final day of courses for NCVPS. Those students who are close to finishing on August 6th will be extended until August 9th. Please encourage students to work with their teacher on a plan for completing the course by the final date.

2. Final Grade Reports
This is just a reminder that final grades will be provided for those students who master the entire course on August 12th. This is the final grade report for all NCVPS courses, and will appear in the REPORTS section in the NCVPS registration system.

To recap previously stated information, only students who master the entire course will receive a final grade. NCVPS does not provide grades for students who do not master the entire course. We are a mastery learning model, and while we provide a final course grade to schools for students who master the course material, we cannot provide grades for students who do not finish the course. Since the course is self-paced, we do not have an accurate grade to provide unless the entire course is mastered. One assignment could equal a 100 while the student has done no more work. This would be misleading and inaccurate to all. This is why we will provide a NonMastery for those students who do not finish the course on the final grade report.

3. Students unable to move forward

If you have a Credit Recovery student that states he or she is unable to move forward in a course for any reason, please contact Jeff Page at jeffrey.page@ncpublicschools.gov. Jeff can help the DLA and/or lab facilitator to determine where or what the student can do next. Students should never be sitting with nothing to work on at any time! While Jeff is out today and tomorrow, contact the teacher first and if you cannot contact the teacher send your concerns to me.

4. Mastery Charts and Status Reports

As mentioned before, mastery charts are messaged to the students within Blackboard and emailed to parents and DLAs on Mondays. You will receive a mastery chart email this Monday, August 2nd. A status report will be available in the registration system on Wednesday, August 4th.

Calling all DLCs – that’s Central Office Distance Learning Coordinators [E-lert for Aug 6]

Training for you is scheduled for DLCs on Tuesday, August 10, 9:00AM. Please arrange to attend if possible.

The training will be hosted in the Virtual Office/Virtual Classrom of the DLA Spa. Access the DLA Spa from www.ncvps.org > scroll to the bottom blue tool bar, click on “User Login” > enter your ID and password, or the test ID: test-dla and password: pass4dla. Under the column on the right, you will see DLA Spa listed. Click on it. Note the tabs on the left, click on “Virtual Office”, then Virtual Classroom, and follow the screens or run the wizard if it’s your first time accessing.

School Services Support of NCVPS will need to rely more heavily on the DLCs in the 2010-2011 school year. Please make a strong effort to participate in this training on Tuessday, August 10, 9:00 AM.

IEP / 504 Prep for affected NCVPS Students [E-lert for Aug. 6]

The IEP data field on the student’s profile in the NCVPS Registration System is a data field to flag Y/N as whether the student has either an IEP or 504. If you have EC student(s) enrolled in NCVPS courses, be sure this data field is flagged accordingly; it’s also a data column on the Enrollment Report. Also, arrange to coordinate review of the student’s IEP or 504 with the NCVPS teachers ASAP. When your school has meetings about student’s IEP or 504 plan, please consider inviting NCVPS teacher to attend virtually. NCVPS teachers have interest to learn about a student’s exceptional needs as soon into the semester as possible to better serve the student.

NC WISE Roster Import Update [E-lert for Aug. 6]

A second NC WISE roster import took place on August 2, and any updates were to be posted to the individual school accounts. Another update will occur on August 24. If you are missing students, send the following information to your assigned Virtual Learning Consultant (VLC):

School

Student name

NC WISE ID#

Once the missing student transaction of information is added, the inquiring DLA will be notified so the enrollment can be made at the school.

DLA Relationship with School Data Coordinator [E-lert for August 6]

DLAs need to become acquainted with the school Data Manager (DM). Tasks that relate to NCVPS are starting to involve DMs more often. The NC WISE Training Team will be hosting a virtual training session in which NCVPS will be a part of, on Thursday, August 12. Check with your Data Manager to confirm the date and time, and try to attend the training. It will cover a thorough review of the NC WISE and NCVPS processes. NCVPS and NC WISE will be posting a Quick Reference Guide soon, in which will detail the collaborative processes between NCVPS and NC WISE.

Waitlisted Students [E-lert for August 6]

If students remain on the waitlist for Early Calendar, chances could be slim for getting enrolled at this point on the Early Calendar schedule. The Traditional Calendar Schedule may also experience limited enrollments. Schools need to have an alternate course enrollment plan if students do not get enrolled with NCVPS. The NCVPS Curriculum & Instruction Division Directors and Department Chairs are monitoring the waitlists and getting students enrolled as best possible based on course capacity and teacher availability. Students will have the chance of getting enrolled until last day to add. http://www.ncvps.org/courses/calendars/