Florida School Boards Association
After breaking up nine years ago, the state reconciled with insurance giant Gallagher & Co. and is now offering $2 million professional liability insurance coverage for educators and instructional staff. Education Commissioner Pam Stewart says that the program offers full-time instructional personnel – which, under state statutes, includes teachers, learning resource specialists, education paraprofessionals and…
Much to the chagrin of local school district officials, the Department of Education decreed that the Florida State Assessment is a valid standardized test – despite an independent review finding discrepancies in exam questions and the testing environment. Statewide setbacks during exam time last school year – glitches resulting from server crashes, cyber attacks and…
The superintendent of Florida’s largest district says an outside review of the state’s new test shows that Florida students weren’t being tested on what they were expected to know. Miami-Dade Superintendent Alberto Carvalho says a review of the Florida Standards Assessments released today shows that on some exams as many as one in three questions…
In 2016, expect standardized testing reform to be front and center among the Legislature’s education deliberations yet again. After an effort in the 2015 session eliminated some tests students have to take that lawmakers said were duplicates, state Sen. Don Gaetz, R-Niceville, the education budget chairman and former Senate president, says he’s going after even…
BAY COUNTY– Bay District School officials are still working their way through a report handed down from the Department of Education. The department contracted a third party group, Alpine Testing Solutions, to examine the validity of the Florida Standards Assessments which students are required to take each year. The almost 200-page report states that the tests are…
Notice regarding next week’s FSBA’s Board of Directors’ Leadership Development and Training; Board of Directors’ Meeting: Please be aware that we are closely monitoring the path and conditions of Tropical Storm Erika. Florida is currently expecting heavy rains on Monday and Tuesday next week; Wednesday should see a clearing of the weather event. If these…
GAINESVILLE—Education commissioner Pam Stewart on Wednesday said she expects to receive the results of a third-party review of Florida’s new state assessments by next week but offered no detail as to what the department will do if the tests are invalidated. “We’re waiting on results of the validity study, and as soon as we have…
TALLAHASSEE — Some lawmakers hope to ditch Florida’s controversial new state exams by requiring the Department of Education to instead administer existing national exams, like the Iowa Tests of Basic Skills or the SAT college entrance exam. State education commissioner Pam Stewart rejected the idea when it was originally proposed by Seminole County Public Schools,…
The National School Lunch Program (NSLP) and the School Breakfast Program (SBP) nationwide include a new universal meal service option, the Community Eligibility Provision (CEP), which has been phased in by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) over the past several years. CEP was created through the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010, and allows…
Every year, many state and local public officers and employees receive automatic fines because they file their annual financial disclosure forms late or not at all. The fines are $25 a day, and continue to accrue until the official either files the form, or the fine reaches $1,500—whichever comes first. In addition, recent changes in…