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**Table of Contents**

**The entire equity action plan is provided for USDE review. However, in
order to differentiate between the sections submitted on July 7, 2006
all new and revised information is presented in *Arial bold and
italicized*.**

***Requirement 1: Peer Review Finding -- Requirement 1 has been
partially met***

1.  Oklahoma met this requirement 7

2.  ***Revised Information 13***

3.  Oklahoma met this requirement 15

4.  ***Revised Information 15***

5.  Oklahoma met this requirement 18

***Requirement 2: Peer Review Finding -- Requirement 2 has not been
met***

> ***2.1 Revised Information 18***
>
> ***2.2 Revised Information 19***
>
> ***2.3 Revised Information 19***

***Requirement 3: Peer Review Finding -- Requirement 3 has not been
met***

> ***3.1 Revised Information 24***
>
> ***3.2 Revised Information 28***
>
> ***3.3 Revised Information 30***
>
> ***3.4 Revised Information 30***
>
> ***3.5 Revised Information 33***
>
> ***3.6 Revised Information 34***

***Requirement 4: Peer Review Finding -- Requirement 4 has been
partially met***

> 4.1 Oklahoma met this requirement 35
>
> 4.2 Oklahoma met this requirement 36
>
> ***4.3 Revised Information 36***
>
> 4.4 Oklahoma met this requirement 37

***Requirement 5: Peer Review Finding -- Requirement 5 has been met***

1.  Oklahoma met this requirement 38

2.  Oklahoma met this requirement 39

***Requirement 6: Peer Review Finding -- Requirement 6 has been
partially met***

1.  Oklahoma met this requirement 42

> Oklahoma Equity Plan

A.  Data and Reporting Systems 43

B.  Teacher Preparation 44

C.  Out-of-Field Teaching 45

D.  Recruitment and Retention of Experienced Teachers 45

E.  Professional Development 49

F.  Specialized Knowledge and Skills 51

G.  Working Conditions 55

H.  Policy Coherence 58

    1.  ***Revised Information 59***

    2.  Oklahoma met this requirement 59

    3.  ***Revised Information 61***

    4.  ***Revised Information 61***

**Oklahoma Equity Plan Attachments**

Attachment A Special Education Letter, July 10, 2006

Attachment B Special Education Collaboration - Powerpoint

Attachment C Certification - Powerpoint

Attachment D Special Education Letter, September 15, 2006

Attachment E Special Education Highly Qualified (HQ) Frequently Asked
Questions

Attachment F School Improvement Sites and Schools Not Making AYP

Attachment G District Consolidated Plan

Attachment H Title I HQ Letter District and Teacher Plans

Attachment I District and Teacher Plan HQ Templates

Attachment J Monitoring Instrument HQ

Attachment K Nine Essential Elements

Attachment L HOUSSE Elementary Education

Attachment M HOUSSE Secondary Education

Attachment N HOUSSE Elementary Special Education

Attachment O HOUSSE Secondary Special Education

Attachment P 04-05 Report Card

Attachment Q 05-06 Report Card

Attachment R District and Site Minority Data

Attachment S District and Site HQ Data

**Oklahoma Revised State Equity Action Plan -- Title II, Part A**

**Highly Qualified Teachers**

**September 29, 2006 Submission**

**Overview**

Oklahoma has focused on Teacher Quality since it began teacher testing
in 1982. With the No Child Left Behind legislation requiring highly
qualified teachers in every classroom of core academic content areas,
Oklahoma is in a good position to meet the 100% goal of all classes
taught by highly qualified teachers. Oklahoma currently has 92.85% of
core classes taught by highly qualified teachers including special
education teachers. When we disaggregate the data, although we have not
closed the gap completely between our high-poverty schools (91.31%) and
our low poverty schools (92.72%), we are only 1.4% apart.

**Oklahoma Teacher Quality**

**Quality Counts -- Improving Teacher Quality**

Teacher quality has always been a focus for Oklahoma. Education Week's
*Quality Counts* tenth annual report card on state education systems
ranks Oklahoma among the top 10 states in each of their four major
reform categories and Oklahoma consistently is ranked in the top 10
states in "Improving Teacher Quality" (1^st^ nationally in 1998 with the
only "A" given). Education Week acknowledges the following efforts to
improve teacher quality in Oklahoma:

-   State requires a college major in the subject taught for initial
    teacher licensure at the high school level.

-   Teachers must pass a basic-skills test for initial licensure.

-   Teachers must pass a test of subject-matter knowledge for initial
    licensure.

-   Teachers must pass a test of subject-specific pedagogy for initial
    licensure.

-   State provides licensure incentives for teachers who earn
    certificates for the National Board for Professional Teaching
    Standards (NBPTS).

-   State provides financial incentives for teachers who pursue or earn
    certificates from the NBPTS.

-   State requires and finances mentoring for all novice teachers.

**National Board Certified Teachers**

Oklahoma had the 9^th^ highest number of National Board Certified
teachers in the U.S. in 2005 -- according to the National Board of
Professional Teaching Standards -- thanks to legislation and funding for
incentives and support. The Education Leadership Oklahoma Act, passed by
the state legislature in 1998, provides significant incentives for
teachers seeking National Board Certification. Oklahoma ranks 5^th^
nationally when the number of nationally board certified teachers is
figured as a percentage of all Oklahoma certified teachers (Dec. 2005).

**Elementary and Secondary Education Act Statutory Requirements**

Oklahoma's plan is designed to meet the ESEA statutory requirements,
that is, that each SEA must have a plan to ensure that all teachers
teaching in core academic subjects within the State are highly qualified
not later than the end of the 2005-2006 school year (1119(a)(2)).

The SEA plan must establish annual measurable objectives for each LEA
and school to ensure that annual increases occur:

-   In the percentage of highly qualified teachers at each LEA and
    school; and

-   In the percentage of teachers who are receiving high-quality
    professional development to enable such teachers to become highly
    qualified and successful classroom teachers (1119(a)(2)(a)(A)).

The SEA must have a plan with specific steps to ensure that poor and
minority children are not taught at higher rates than other children by
inexperienced, unqualified and out-of-field teachers. The plan must
include measures to evaluate and publicly report the progress of such
steps.

###### 

**Oklahoma Equity Action Plan**

The Oklahoma Equity Action Plan includes three focused initiatives to
ensure that all teachers, particularly those in high poverty, high
minority, and low-performing schools, are highly qualified. The equity
action plan is designed to ensure that poor or minority children are not
taught by inexperienced, unqualified, or out-of-field teachers at higher
rates than are other children. The equity action plan describes the
technical assistance that Oklahoma provides to school districts and
schools through the following initiatives:

-   **Initiative #1:** Publicly report progress of meeting annual
    measurable objectives in the percentage of highly qualified teachers
    at each LEA and school and in the percentage of teachers who are
    receiving high-quality professional development to enable such
    teachers to become highly qualified and highly effective classroom
    teachers.

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-   **Initiative #2:** Conduct effective high quality professional
    development activities.

-   **Initiative #3:** Recruit and hire highly qualified teachers,
    including those licensed or certified through alternative routes,
    and retain highly qualified teachers.

The table below indicates that for the 2005-2006 school-year Oklahoma
has 7.13% non-highly-qualified teachers. The lowest percentage of
classes in core academic subjects taught by highly qualified teachers is
in high-poverty secondary schools at 88.10%. There is a 4.43% difference
between the percentage of classes taught by highly qualified teachers in
secondary classes, in high poverty schools (88.10%) and low-poverty
schools (92.53%) based on 2005-2006 data collection.

###### **Number and percentage of classes in core academic subjects**

###### taught by highly qualified teachers

+-------------+----------+---------+-------+--------+-------+--------+
|             | *        |         | *     |        | **Low |        |
|             | *Classes |         | *High |        | -Pove |        |
|             | taught   |         | -Pove |        | rty** |        |
|             | by       |         | rty** |        |       |        |
|             | highly   |         |       |        |       |        |
|             | q        |         |       |        |       |        |
|             | ualified |         |       |        |       |        |
|             | te       |         |       |        |       |        |
|             | achers** |         |       |        |       |        |
+-------------+----------+---------+-------+--------+-------+--------+
| **2004-2005 | **       | **Pe    | **Num | ### P  | **Num | **Per  |
| Data**      | Number** | rcent** | ber** | ercent | ber** | cent** |
+-------------+----------+---------+-------+--------+-------+--------+
| **All       | **1      | **9     | **21, | **89   | **44, | **91   |
| C           | 21,514** | 1.64%** | 606** | .30%** | 817** | .85%** |
| lassrooms** |          |         |       |        |       |        |
+-------------+----------+---------+-------+--------+-------+--------+
| **E         | **       | **9     | **12, | **92   | **11, | **93   |
| lementary** | 44,813** | 2.54%** | 472** | .41%** | 048** | .01%** |
+-------------+----------+---------+-------+--------+-------+--------+
| **          | **       | **9     | **9,  | **85   | **33, | **91   |
| Secondary** | 76,701** | 1.11%** | 134** | .39%** | 769** | .48%** |
+-------------+----------+---------+-------+--------+-------+--------+
| **2005-2006 | **       | **Pe    | **Num | **Per  | **Num | **Per  |
| Data**      | Number** | rcent** | ber** | cent** | ber** | cent** |
+-------------+----------+---------+-------+--------+-------+--------+
| **All       | **1      | **9     | **    | **91   | **45, | **92   |
| C           | 22,844** | 2.85%** | 22,59 | .31%** | 686** | .72%** |
| lassrooms** |          |         | 2\`** |        |       |        |
+-------------+----------+---------+-------+--------+-------+--------+
| **E         | **       | **9     | **12, | **94   | **10, | **93   |
| lementary** | 44,928** | 3.83%** | 085** | .29%** | 677** | .38%** |
+-------------+----------+---------+-------+--------+-------+--------+
| **          | **       | **9     | **10, | **88   | **35, | **92   |
| Secondary** | 77,916** | 2.30%** | 507** | .10%** | 009** | .53%** |
+-------------+----------+---------+-------+--------+-------+--------+

**Initiative #1: Oklahoma Activities to Publicly Report Information**

**Related to Highly Qualified Teachers**

Oklahoma publicly reports progress of meeting annual measurable
objectives (AMO) by reporting the percentage of classes taught by highly
qualified teachers in each district and by reporting the professional
qualifications of core content teachers for each district on the State
Report Card site.

**Baseline Data and Performance Targets for Goal 3, Performance
Indicator 3.1**: The percentage of classes being taught by "highly
qualified" teachers (as the term is defined in section 9101(23) of the
ESEA), in the aggregate and in "high-poverty" schools (as the term is
defined in section 1111(h)(1)(C)(viii) of the ESEA).

The table below provides the 2002-2003 baseline data for the percentage
of classes taught by highly qualified teachers and the targets from
2003-2004 through 2006-2007 and disaggregated for high poverty schools.
The 100% target was extended to 2006-2007 school year.

+-------------------+------------------------+------------------------+
|                   | **Percentage of        | **Percentage of        |
|                   | Classes Taught by      | Classes Taught by      |
|                   | Highly Qualified       | Highly Qualified       |
|                   | Teachers**             | Teachers**             |
|                   |                        |                        |
|                   | **State Aggregate      | **High-Poverty         |
|                   | Target**               | Schools**              |
+-------------------+------------------------+------------------------+
| 2002-2003         | **\*64**               | **\*57**               |
| Baseline\*        |                        |                        |
+-------------------+------------------------+------------------------+
| 2003-2004 Target  | **72**                 | **65**                 |
+-------------------+------------------------+------------------------+
| 2004-2005 Target  | **86**                 | **75**                 |
+-------------------+------------------------+------------------------+
| 2005-2006 Target  | **\*\*90**             | **\*\*90**             |
+-------------------+------------------------+------------------------+
| 2006-2007 Target  | **\*\*100**            | **\*\*100**            |
+-------------------+------------------------+------------------------+

\* This number includes only teachers who have completed subject testing
(which began in 1982) and does not include the number of teachers that
will qualify under the Oklahoma High Objective Uniform State Standard of
Evaluation (HOUSSE) provision currently in draft status.

\*\* These are revised targets to include all teachers including special
education teachers.

**The table below reports the baseline data and actual percentage of
classes taught by highly qualified teachers in the aggregate and in high
poverty schools from 2002-2003 through 2005-2006.**

+----------------------------+--------------------+--------------------+
| **Baseline Data and        | **Percentage of    | **Percentage of    |
| Progress**                 | Classes Taught by  | Classes Taught by  |
|                            | Highly Qualified   | Highly Qualified   |
|                            | Teachers**         | Teachers**         |
|                            |                    |                    |
|                            | **State            | **High-Poverty     |
|                            | Aggregate**        | Schools**          |
+----------------------------+--------------------+--------------------+
| 2002-2003 Baseline\*       | **64**             | **57**             |
+----------------------------+--------------------+--------------------+
| 2003-2004 Actual           | ** \*98**          | **\*97.4**         |
| Performance                |                    |                    |
+----------------------------+--------------------+--------------------+
| 2004-2005 Actual           | **\*\*91.64%**     | **\*\*89.30%**     |
| Performance                |                    |                    |
+----------------------------+--------------------+--------------------+
| 2005-2006 Actual           | **\*\*92.81%**     | **\*\*91.28%**     |
| Performance                |                    |                    |
+----------------------------+--------------------+--------------------+

**\*** All teachers except special education teachers

\*\* All teachers including special education teachers

**Requirement 1: The revised plan must provide a detailed analysis of
the core academic subject classes in the State that are currently not
being taught by highly qualified teachers. The analysis must, in
particular, address schools that are not making adequate yearly progress
and whether or not these schools have more acute needs than do other
schools in attracting highly qualified teachers. The analysis must also
identify the districts and schools around the State where significant
numbers of teachers do not meet HQT standards, and examine whether or
not there are particular hard-to-staff courses frequently taught by
non-highly qualified teachers.**

***1.1 Does the revised plan include an analysis of classes taught by
teachers who are not highly qualified? Is the analysis based on accurate
classroom level data?***

The table on page 5 indicates that for 2005-2006, Oklahoma has 7.13% of
classes taught by non-highly-qualified teachers. The lowest percentage
of classes in core academic subjects taught by highly qualified teachers
is in high-poverty secondary schools at 88.10%. There is a 4.43%
difference between the percentage of classes taught by highly qualified
teachers in secondary classes in high poverty schools (88.10%) and
low-poverty schools (92.53%) based on 2005-2006 data collection.

On the chart on page 8, Oklahoma has 7.13% of classes taught by
non-highly-qualified teachers. In high poverty schools, the number of
classes not taught by non-highly qualified teachers is 9, 432 (646 in
general education classes and 8, 786 in special education classes). The
teachers for these classes will be a priority for technical assistance
and professional development.

  -------------- -------------- -------------- ------------------ -------------- ------------------
  ***Revised                                                                     
  data:                                                                          
  September 29,                                                                  
  2006***                                                                        

  Number and                                                                     
  Percentage of                                                                  
  Classes, with                                                                  
  breakdowns for                                                                 
  General                                                                        
  Education and                                                                  
  Special                                                                        
  Education                                                                      

  **NOTE: In                                                                     
  this document,                                                                 
  \'classes\'                                                                    
  refers to                                                                      
  \'core                                                                         
  academic                                                                       
  content                                                                        
  classes\'**                                                                    

  **School       **ALL          **Classes      **Percentage of    **Classes      **Percentage of
  Type**         classes**      taught by      ALL classes taught taught by      ALL classes taught
                                Highly         by Highly          teachers that  by teachers that
                                Qualified      Qualified          ARE NOT Highly ARE NOT Highly
                                Teachers**     Teachers**         Qualified**    Qualified**

  ** **          ***Number***   ***Number***   ***Percentage***   ***Number***   ***Percentage***

  **All Schools  **132,298**    **122,844**    **92.85%**         **9,432**      **7.13%**
  in State**                                                                     

  ***Breakdown                                                                   
  of All Classes                                                                 
  for Elementary                                                                 
  and Secondary                                                                  
  Level                                                                          
  Classes:***                                                                    

  **General      **114,068**    **113,400**    **85.72%**         **646**        **0.49%**
  Education**                                                                    

  High-Poverty   **20,552**     **20,435**     **15.45%**         **112**        **0.08%**
  Schools                                                                        

  Low-Poverty    **43,030**     **42,791**     **32.34%**         **228**        **0.17%**
  Schools                                                                        

  **Special      **18,230**     **9,444**      **7.14%**          **8,786**      **6.64%**
  Education**                                                                    

  High-Poverty   **4,191**      **2,157**      **1.63%**          **2,034**      **1.54%**
  Schools                                                                        

  Low-Poverty    **6,241**      **2,895**      **2.19%**          **3,346**      **2.53%**
  Schools                                                                        
  -------------- -------------- -------------- ------------------ -------------- ------------------

Prepared by Karen Coe-Ross, 9/29/2006

(HQT_CSPR_Part1_1_5_0506_Sept06_Word.doc)

**Oklahoma Accreditation Reporting Site**

For the 2004-2005 and 2005-2006 school years, the Oklahoma State
Department of Education had a state-level data system to collect,
verify, and determine the number of classes taught by highly qualified
teachers at the time of state accreditation reporting. The system merged
information from data sources within the OSDE including teacher testing;
teacher class assignments; and teacher certification. The data system
extracted the core content subject classes that require a highly
qualified teacher. In addition to establishing district and school
percentages of highly qualified teachers, the data was disaggregated by
elementary and secondary level (including content area), poverty level,
Adequate Yearly Progress determination, and school improvement status.
Principals attest to the accuracy of the highly qualified teacher
information and the Superintendent provides an assurance of the data
submission accuracy with the certification of the online data.

**Regional Accreditation Officers (RAO) Monitor Data**

Oklahoma field-based Regional Accreditation Officers, employed by the
OSDE, make onsite visits to every district and site to verify teacher
credentials and class assignments. Verification of all district and site
data is reviewed throughout the year by the 13 full-time RAOs. The RAOs
monitor local schools to determine if they meet state standards and to
conduct regular accreditation reviews for each district and school site
statewide. Theses reviews focus on physical facilities, properly
certified and assigned teachers, curriculum, attendance, budgets, class
size and other legal and regulatory policies. Each RAO serves
approximately 8 out of 77 counties. The RAOs have frequent training for
updates related to state and federal legislation. The RAOs participate
on School Support Teams to assist school sites that have not made
Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) that are in Years 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 of
School Improvement status.

**2005-06** **Data Entry Including Special Education Teachers**

The number of classes taught by highly qualified teachers in core
academic subjects was collected by State Department of Education Data
Division when the Accreditation Report was entered. Principals attested
to the highly qualified teacher information provided, and District
Superintendents certified the information as accurate as part of online
data collection. Data collected included Special Education information
and HOUSSE. Oklahoma State Department of Education -- Special Education
Services (OSDE-SES) provided technical assistance over the telephone and
through contact submissions. OSDE-SES developed and disseminated a
memorandum on service delivery options (co-teaching, collaborative
teaching). Videoconferences were scheduled to provide technical
assistance to school districts related to submission of information for
highly qualified teacher requirements and high quality professional
development in March and April, 2006. Ongoing technical assistance was
provided through e-mail and phone contact as well as through on-site
monitoring.

  ----------------- -------------- ------------- ---------------- ---------------- ----------- -------------- ------------- -------------- ---------------
                    ***Classes                                                                                                             
                    Taught by                                                                                                              
                    Teachers that                                                                                                          
                    ARE NOT Highly                                                                                                         
                    Qualified***                                                                                                           

  **Assignment      **Number of    **Number of   **Number of      **Number of      **Number of **Number of    **Number of   **(From        **(From
  Area**            Classes        Classes       Classes          Classes          Classes     Classes in     Classes in    2004-2005      2004-2005 file)
                    (Total)**      (Charter)**   (Elementary)**   (Middle/Junior   (High       High-Poverty   Low-Poverty   file) Number   Number of SITES
                                                                  High)**          School)**   Schools**      Schools**     of SITES that  that are in
                                                                                                                            have NOT made  School
                                                                                                                            Adequate       Improvement**
                                                                                                                            Yearly         
                                                                                                                            Progress**     

  **Elementary      117            3             114                                           31             13                           4
  Education                                                                                                                                
  (Self-Contained                                                                                                                          
  Grades, e.g.                                                                                                                             
  \"First                                                                                                                                  
  Grade\")**                                                                                                                               

  **Elementary and                                                                                                                         
  Secondary                                                                                                                                
  Education:**                                                                                                                             

  **Fine Arts       18                                            1                17                         4             1              1
  (Art)**                                                                                                                                  

  **Fine Arts       54             11                             15               28          5              35            1              1
  (Music)**                                                                                                                                

  **Language Arts** 124            2             16               83               23          22             59            3              2

  **Languages**     56             4             8                15               29          4              26            2              2

  **Mathematics**   88             2             11               42               33          30             16            3              3

  **Reading**       7                            7                                             2                                           1

  **Science**       77             1             7                38               31          9              35                           1

  **Social          105            8             24               40               33          9              40                           1
  Studies**                                                                                                                                

  **Special         8,786          33            2,758            2,731            3,264       2,034          3,346         39             77
  Education**                                                                                                                              

  **Total**         **9,432**      **64**        **2,945**        **2,965**        **3,458**   **2,146**      **3,574**     ***39***       ***82***

                                                                                                                            ***This is an  ***This is an
                                                                                                                            UNDUPLICATED   UNDUPLICATED
                                                                                                                            site count (a  site count (a
                                                                                                                            site may be    site may be
                                                                                                                            included in    included in
                                                                                                                            more than one  more than one
                                                                                                                            \"area\", but  \"area\", but
                                                                                                                            this is the    this is the
                                                                                                                            actual number  actual number
                                                                                                                            of sites)***   of sites)***
  ----------------- -------------- ------------- ---------------- ---------------- ----------- -------------- ------------- -------------- ---------------

**Special Education Revised Data Collection**

Forty-eight percent of Special Education teachers are included in the
7.1% of classes not taught by a highly qualified teacher. In 2005-2006,
data was collected for the first time to determine if core content
classes for special education students were taught by highly qualified
teachers. The data collected used a multi-subject HOUSSE for special
education teachers. The USDE monitoring of Oklahoma in March, 2006
determined that Oklahoma's multi-subject HOUSSE for special education
teachers was not acceptable. Therefore, the fall data collection 2005
was not usable. The OSDE then took teacher testing data and
certification data to determine which teachers had dual certification in
special education and elementary education and/or early childhood
education that matched their teaching assignment. This data analysis
indicated that approximately 50% of special education teachers met the
highly qualified requirement using the dual certification data. OSDE
recognized that in addition to this 50%, future data collection would
exclude special education teachers not providing direct instruction and
**this would increase** **the number of classes taught by highly
qualified teachers**. In addition, the future data collection would
include special education teachers that use the revised HOUSSE approved
by USDE in 6-22-06 response. This would also increase the number of
classes taught by highly qualified teachers**.**

**Next Steps for More Accurate Data Collection of Highly Qualified
Teachers**

**Revision of Accreditation Application System to Eliminate Special
Education as a Subject**

The Teacher Assignments component of the Accreditation Application
builds the source database for identifying core content classes and the
teachers who teach them. The major flaw in that database, that prevented
the OSDE from doing adequate analysis on the special education teachers,
was that "Special Education" had been reported as a subject, regardless
of the content of the class. To remedy that problem, the Teacher
Assignments component of the Accreditation Application has been revised
to prohibit reporting of Special Education as a subject, and to more
clearly collect the subject matter taught by teachers providing direct
content instruction. Separate forms for Special Education and
Alternative Education teachers will supplement that information. The
teacher assignments for core subject areas will serve as the assignment
source for the new Highly Qualified Teacher System.

**Oklahoma Web-based Educator Credentialing System (OECS)**

A contract issued in June 2006, for the 2006-07 development of an
Oklahoma Web-based Educator Credentialing System (OECS), will provide
essential data on teachers (areas of certification, subject test
results, degree, major, and National Board Certification), in a
relational database than can be easily linked with other teacher systems
that provide key information affecting equality: systems such as School
Personnel Records, (location and type of school), Accreditation
demographics of student population and Teacher Assignments (subject and
number of students taught) and Student Assessment System (Adequate
Yearly Progress and School Improvement status). Oklahoma's improved
capacity to accurately assess the highly qualified status of teachers in
each school will provide a solid foundation for the future
identification, analyses and plan for correction, of the distribution
inequity of quality teachers between high-poverty and high-minority
schools vs. low-poverty and low-minority schools.

**OECS To Add Highly Qualified Teacher System Component -- January 5,
2007**

Based on the analysis of the self-reported data by school districts,
Oklahoma recognizes that we need a more reliable data reporting
solution. By January 5, 2007, the contractor for the OECS is scheduled
to develop a new Highly Qualified Teacher (HQT) System Component that
will initially be a stand alone system, but will be fully integrated
with the OECS once it is in production. The new highly qualified teacher
system will be able to display an educator's highly qualified
credentials for core subject areas, Oklahoma certificate areas and
classes an educator can teach. This system will be able to automatically
highly qualify teachers where existing electronic data allows. There are
currently two areas where it will be possible to electronically highly
qualify teachers, that is, subject area tests that have been passed and
National Board Certification in a content area. A third area, degree
majors, will be added as part of the new HQT system. In addition, the
system will provide the capability to map the highly qualified
credential to multiple classes. For example, if the teacher has a
certificate, including testing in Advanced Mathematics, the teacher
would automatically be highly qualified to teach Calculus, Trigonometry,
Statistics, etc. Appropriate mappings will be determined by the
Professional Standards and Certification Division.

**OECS/Highly Qualified Teacher (HQT) - Improved Principal Review
Process**

The new HQT system will support Oklahoma's position that once a teacher
is highly qualified in an area, he/she remains highly qualified, thereby
eliminating the need to review and accept all HQT data from the prior
year. Returning principals will be required to process the subset of
teachers that are new or reassigned and those that the system has not
yet recognized as highly qualified in an assigned subject area.
Principals new to a school site will also have reduced review
responsibilities, because of the large numbers of teachers automatically
highly qualified without the use of HOUSSE. In addition, individual
teachers will have the opportunity to enter the data. The teacher's
principal will still approve or deny the entry.

**OECS/HQT -- Increased Reliability of the Data**

The combination of features mentioned will collectively increase the
reliability of the data because the less data entry that is required the
fewer errors will be introduced. Additionally, the contract indicates
that the vendor will ensure that any entry that is required will not be
free form entered. All data will be validated for accuracy before being
saved to the database. Certain data will be pre-populated into the
system and therefore, questions will not be necessary. For example, it
will not be necessary to ask what area the teacher has certification
because the certification system database will be part of the OECS.

Once the system is in production, it will be clear how educators have
documented that they are highly qualified. If they use HOUSSE, there
will be a step-by-step entry of all the HOUSSE data. For example, if
they choose to include college courses completed, the system will
request the college and course description. The college will be chosen
from a list.

**OECS -- Empowering Principals With Planning Tools**

By building a HQT database by teacher and HQ credential areas, the
system will provide new tools to the site principals. There will be a
site search utility that allows principals to locate educators and
determine what classes they are considered highly qualified to teach.
The screen will show the core subject area, the HQ credential area and
the list of classes that apply to that HQ credential area. This tool
will assist principals as they are considering new hires for employment.
Included on the screen will be the criteria used to determine highly
qualified status; that is, the screen will display the content test(s),
HOUSSE, major, etc., depending on how the highly qualified status was
achieved.

**Oklahoma Credential**

Oklahoma is considering a way to provide an official document that can
be printed and distributed to Oklahoma teachers stating how the teacher
met the highly qualified requirement core subject areas, certificate
areas and classes. The majority of Oklahoma teachers have tested in core
subject areas due to teacher testing since 1982 and therefore, meet the
highly qualified requirement of demonstrating content knowledge in the
core content areas, in addition to having a bachelor's degree and
Oklahoma teaching certificate.

**Information to districts for special education teachers**

-   July, 2006 letter from Assistant State Superintendent for Special
    Education and Assistant State Superintendent for Professional
    Standards and Certification explaining the single subject HOUSSE for
    special education teachers and information about co-teaching
    strategies and professional development (Attachment A).

**Information to districts about appropriate co-teaching strategies**

-   July, 2006 letter sent to superintendents and special education
    directors

-   July, 2006 State Superintendent's Leadership Conference
    presentations (Attachments B and C

-   Assistant State Superintendent for Special Education met with all
    Special Education directors August 4, 2006

-   Special Education Frequently Asked Questions letter sent 9-14-06 and
    provided to Superintendent's Advisory on 9-14-06 (Attachments D and
    E)

-   Dr. Marilyn Friend presentation, *Co-Teaching: Principles,
    Practices, and Pragmatics,* for two days for 2,000 regular education
    and special education teachers and administrators on September 6^th^
    and 7^th^, 2006

-   State Superintendent's Special Education Conference with sessions
    specific to co-teaching strategies 9-21-06 and 9-22-06

***1.2 Does the analysis focus on the staffing needs of schools that are
not making AYP? Do these schools have high percentages of classes taught
by teachers who are not highly qualified?***

***REVISED INFORMATION***

***The state percentage of classes not taught by HQ teachers is 7.13%.
The percentage of classes not taught by highly qualified teachers in
schools that did not make Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) is 12.67%, a
difference of 5.54%. Further disaggregation of data indicates that
schools that are high poverty and not making AYP have 10.18% of classes
not taught by highly qualified teachers which compares to 6.52% of all
classes in high poverty schools not taught by highly qualified teachers.
This will be an area to address.***

**NOTE: Bitmap image inserted. If image is not visible either print or
go to print preview.**

![](media/image2.png){width="7.854861111111111in"
height="5.997222222222222in"}

***For schools not making AYP 12.67% of the classes are not taught by
highly qualified teachers. Further disaggregation indicates that most of
the 12.67% are special education classes taught by teachers (12%) that
do not meet the highly qualified requirements. This 12% includes veteran
teachers who have not had the opportunity to use the revised special
education HOUSSE as required by USDE and also includes special education
teachers who do not provide direct instruction in core academic classes.
Assisting the special education teachers with meeting the highly
qualified requirements is a high priority for Oklahoma.***

***1.3 Does the analysis identify particular groups of teachers to which
the State's plan must pay particular attention, such as special
education teachers, mathematics or science teachers, or multi-subject
teachers in rural schools?***

The analysis of particular groups of teachers indicates that OSDE should
provide technical assistance and professional development targeted to
special education teachers who did not pass a subject-knowledge test or
have not demonstrated subject-matter competency through HOUSSE. The
number of classes taught by special education teachers currently
reported as not highly qualified is almost half of the total 7.13% of
classes not taught by highly qualified teachers. However, with our new
data collection system, we predict that there are some special education
teachers who are not providing direct instruction but are co-teaching or
collaboratively teaching and should not be in the count of non-highly
qualified teachers.

In addition, middle school mathematics and language arts teachers are a
priority. However, the number of classes for middle school mathematics
and language arts not taught by highly qualified teachers is less than
1%.

The table on page 9 verifies that special education teachers and middle
school language arts and mathematics teachers are the non-highly
qualified teachers that are priority for technical assistance and
professional development.

Each of the teachers not highly qualified must submit a plan of how to
become highly qualified by November 1, 2006. Middle school language arts
teachers not highly qualified will also be targeted for professional
development. Teachers from school improvement schools, schools not
making AYP, and schools with greater than 10% of classes taught by
non-highly-qualified teachers will be given registration priority. Many
of these teachers have elementary certification and not secondary
certification. Based on past data, we know that adolescent literacy is
an area of need. Ongoing systematic professional development includes
having Dr. Melvina Phillips, author of *Developing a Culture of
Literacy*, provided professional development for school support teams
last June, 2006 and will present October 4^th^ to secondary teams.
Through threaded discussion with study groups established with school
improvement sites follow-up will occur with SDE Curriculum Directors
facilitating the process.

Due to requirements of Oklahoma law that teachers must be certified in
each content area whether rural, suburban or urban, Oklahoma does not
have a large percentage of rural schools with multi-subject teachers
that are not highly qualified. In addition, Oklahoma's recruitment for
shortage areas includes the Alternative Certification Program that
provides highly qualified teachers in the core content areas including
mathematics and science.

***1.4 Does the analysis identify districts and schools around the State
where significant numbers of teachers do not meet HQ standards?***

***REVISED INFORMATION***

***Districts***

***The analysis identifies that out of Oklahoma's 540 districts, 107
districts had non-highly qualified (HQ) class occurrence higher than 10
percent. Districts with significant numbers of non-highly qualified
classes include those that have an occurrence higher than 20%.
Priorities for schools are identified by the following:***

> ***Priority 1 includes 5 districts where percent of teachers who are
> not HQ is***
>
> ***21% or higher.***
>
> ***Priority 2 includes 22 districts where percent of teachers who are
> not HQ is***
>
> ***greater than or equal to 16% and less than 21%***
>
> ***Priority 3 includes 80 districts where percent of teachers who are
> not HQ is***
>
> ***greater than or equal to 10% and less than 16%***

  -------------- ------------- -------------------- ------------------ -------------
  ***Revised                                                           
  Table:                                                               
  September 29,                                                        
  2006***                                                              

  ***Districts                                                         
  where                                                                
  percentage of                                                        
  classes taught                                                       
  by teachers                                                          
  that ARE NOT                                                         
  Highly                                                               
  Qualified is                                                         
  \< 90%***                                                            

  ***Totals by                                                         
  Priority***                                                          

                 ***Priority   ***Priority 2***     ***Priority 3***   ***Total***
                 1***                                                  

                 ***\>= 21%*** ***\>= 16% and \<    ***\> 10% and \<   
                               21%***               16%***             

  ***Number of   ***5***       ***22***             ***80***           ***107***
  Districts***                                                         
  -------------- ------------- -------------------- ------------------ -------------

***The table below provides number of districts, by percent of classes
taught by highly qualified teachers for 2005-2006 and 2004-2005.***

***There are 183 Districts that have met the Annual Measurable Objective
(AMO) of 100% by 2005-06 school year. There are 357 Districts that have
not met 100% AMO of 2005-06 school year and 107 of those districts have
less than 90% of their teachers meeting the highly qualified
requirement.***

+----------------+----------------------+-----------------------------+
| ***Revised     |                      |                             |
| Table:         |                      |                             |
| September 29,  |                      |                             |
| 2006***        |                      |                             |
+----------------+----------------------+-----------------------------+
| ***OKLAHOMA    |                      |                             |
| NUMBER OF      |                      |                             |
| DISTRICTS, by  |                      |                             |
| percent of     |                      |                             |
| CLASSES TAUGHT |                      |                             |
| by Highly      |                      |                             |
| Qualified      |                      |                             |
| Teachers***    |                      |                             |
+----------------+----------------------+-----------------------------+
| ***            | ***Number of         | ***Number of Districts      |
| Percentages*** | Districts            | 2004-2005***                |
|                | 2005-2006***         |                             |
|                |                      | ***(Revised 7/5/2006 to     |
|                |                      | Include Special             |
|                |                      | Education)***               |
+----------------+----------------------+-----------------------------+
| ***100%***     | ***183***            | ***154***                   |
+----------------+----------------------+-----------------------------+
| ***\>= 90% and | ***250***            | ***247***                   |
| \< 100%***     |                      |                             |
+----------------+----------------------+-----------------------------+
| ***less than   | ***107***            | ***139***                   |
| 90%***         |                      |                             |
+----------------+----------------------+-----------------------------+
| ***TOTAL       | ***540***            | ***540***                   |
| DISTRICTS***   |                      |                             |
+----------------+----------------------+-----------------------------+

***Attachment F identifies the 2005-2006 districts with less than 90% of
classes taught by highly qualified teachers. Oklahoma data shows that a
very high percentage of classes are taught by highly qualified teachers.
We have 183 districts that have 100%; 250 that have 99-90% of classes
taught by highly qualified teachers and 107 districts that have less
than 90% classes taught by highly qualified.***

***Schools***

***The analysis identifies that the schools with the most significant
number of classes taught by teachers who do not meet the highly
qualified requirements are located within the above listed districts
and/or are schools identified for school improvement under Title I.***

***Approximately 5% (82 out of 1783 schools) of Oklahoma's schools meet
these criteria for the most significant number of non-highly-qualified
classes. The identified schools with a designation for priority for
technical assistance and monitoring are provided in the following
table.***

***Schools with Significant Numbers of Non-Highly-Qualified Classes***

***Schools within districts identified with significant number of
classes taught by non-highly-qualified teachers are identified.
Oklahoma's two largest urban school districts with approximately 40,000+
students each have multiple school sites that are a priority. These
districts are high-poverty and high-minority.***

***Priorities for schools are set using the following scale and will be
used***

***to determine Title II onsite or desk monitoring.***

***Priority 1 includes sites where the percent of teachers who are not
highly qualified is 21% or higher.***

***Priority 2 includes sites where the percent of teachers who are not
highly qualified is greater than or equal to 16% and less than 21%***

***Priority 3 includes sites where the percent of teachers who are not
highly qualified is greater than or equal to 10% and less than 16%***

***Priority 1 = 82 sites out of 1,783 sites***

> ***Of these 82 sites, 5 failed to make AYP for 2005-2006; of these
> sites, 5 are identified in school improvement status***

***Priority 2 = 110 sites out of 1,783 sites***

> ***Of these 110 sites, 7 failed to make AYP for 2005-2006; of these
> sites, 8 are identified in school improvement status***

***Priority 3 = 251 sites out of 1,783 sites***

> ***Of these 251 sites, 8 failed to make AYP for 2005-2006; of these
> sites, 6 are identified in school improvement status***

  ------------------------- ------------- --------------- ------------- -------------
  ***New Table: September                                               
  29, 2006***                                                           

  ***Schools with                                                       
  Significant Numbers of                                                
  Non-HQ Classes***                                                     

  *** ***                   *** ***       ***(Priority                  
                                          based on the                  
                                          percent of                    
                                          classes taught                
                                          by teachers                   
                                          that ARE NOT                  
                                          Highly                        
                                          Qualified)***                 

  *** ***                   *** ***       ***Priority     ***Priority   ***Priority
                                          1***            2***          3***

  ***Schools***             ***Total***   ***\>= 21%***   ***\>= 16%    ***\> 10% and
                                                          and \< 21%*** \<16%***

  ***Total Number of        ***1,783***   *** ***         *** ***       *** ***
  Schools***                                                            

  ***Number of schools      ***443\****   ***82***        ***110***     ***251***
  where percent of classes                                              
  taught by teachers that                                               
  ARE NOT HQ***                                                         

  ***Of the 443 Priority    ***20***      ***5***         ***7***       ***8***
  schools, number that                                                  
  failed to make AYP                                                    
  (preliminary data                                                     
  2005-2006)***                                                         

  ***Of the 443 Priority    ***19***      ***5***         ***8***       ***6***
  schools, number that are                                              
  identified in school                                                  
  improvement status                                                    
  (preliminary data                                                     
  2005-2006)***                                                         

  ***\*NOTE: The 443 total                                              
  sites are found in 219                                                
  different districts.***                                               
  ------------------------- ------------- --------------- ------------- -------------

***1.5 Does the analysis identify particular courses that are often
taught by non-highly qualified teachers?***

The Table on page 9 identifies that most significant percentages of
classes taught by teachers who are not highly qualified are in secondary
special education teachers (almost half of the 7.13% are classes taught
by special education teachers). The percentage for all other classes
taught by non-highly--qualified teachers **IS LESS THAN 1%.** The next
greatest number of classes not taught by non-highly-qualified teachers
is 83 classes out of 8,381 middle school language arts classes and 42
classes out of 5,660 middle school mathematics classes.

**Requirement 2: The revised plan must provide information on HQT status
in each LEA and the steps the SEA will take to ensure that each LEA has
plans in place to assist teachers who are not highly qualified to attain
HQT status as quickly as possible.**

***2.1 Does the plan identify LEAs that have not met annual measurable
objectives (AMO) for HQT?***

***REVISED INFORMATION***

***OSDE identifies districts that have not met annual measurable
objectives (AMO) for highly qualified teachers through the Oklahoma
Consolidated Federal Reporting. Oklahoma's Consolidated State Plan
submitted in September 2003 to USDE identified target goals for
percentage of highly qualified teachers (See table below). All districts
in the Oklahoma met the annual measurable objectives for the 2003-2004
and 2004-2005 school years. For the 2005-2006 school year, the annual
measurable objective for all districts was consistent with the State's
goal to have 100 percent of core academic classes taught by highly
qualified teachers. Out of the 540 school districts in Oklahoma, 183 met
the 100% annual measurable objective. Of the districts that did not meet
the 100% AMO, 107 were less than a 90% AMO, 250 districts were at 90% -
99% of classes taught by highly qualified teachers.***

***Baseline Data and Performance Targets for Goal 3, Performance
Indicator 3.1: The percentage of classes being taught by "highly
qualified" teachers (as the term is defined in section 9101(23) of the
ESEA), in the aggregate and in "high-poverty" schools (as the term is
defined in section 1111(h)(1)(C)(viii) of the ESEA).***

+-------------------+------------------------+------------------------+
|                   | ***Percentage of       | ***Percentage of       |
|                   | Classes Taught by      | Classes Taught by      |
|                   | Highly Qualified       | Highly Qualified       |
|                   | Teachers***            | Teachers***            |
|                   |                        |                        |
|                   | ***State Aggregate***  | ***High-Poverty        |
|                   |                        | Schools***             |
|                   | ***Target***           |                        |
+-------------------+------------------------+------------------------+
| ***2002-2003      | ***\*64***             | ***\*57***             |
| Baseline\****     |                        |                        |
+-------------------+------------------------+------------------------+
| ***2003-2004      | ***72***               | ***65***               |
| Target***         |                        |                        |
+-------------------+------------------------+------------------------+
| ***2004-2005      | ***86***               | ***75***               |
| Target***         |                        |                        |
+-------------------+------------------------+------------------------+
| ***2005-2006      | ***\*\*90***           | ***\*\*90***           |
| Target***         |                        |                        |
+-------------------+------------------------+------------------------+
| ***2006-2007      | ***\*\*100***          | ***\*\*100***          |
| Target***         |                        |                        |
+-------------------+------------------------+------------------------+

*\* **This number includes only teachers who have completed subject
testing (which began in 1982) and does not include the number of
teachers that will qualify under the Oklahoma High Objective Uniform
State Standard of Evaluation (HOUSSE) provision currently in draft
status.***

***\*\* These are revised targets to include all teachers including
special education teachers***

***2.2 Does the plan include specific steps that will be taken by LEAS
that have not met annual measurable objectives?***

***REVISED INFORMATION***

***Each district is required to present a plan and timeframe to
accomplish the goal of having 100 percent of core academic classes
taught by highly qualified teachers in its Consolidated State
Application. The plan requires districts to identify the percent of core
classes taught, percent of teachers receiving high quality professional
development; the programs, strategies, activities to achieve objectives
and to indicate the Title Program Funding Source(s) for each program or
activity (Attachment G). This data is required annually. Districts must
identify methods available to teachers to become highly qualified and
must provide opportunities that will provide for teachers who have not
met highly qualified requirements. District Title II, Part A
applications are reviewed by OSDE personnel in Office of Grants
Management and Office of Planning and Monitoring to ensure that those
districts that are not at 100% highly qualified for core content
academic classes use available resources, including Title II Part A
allocations to ensure that teachers for core content academic classes
who have not met requirements become highly qualified as quickly as
possible.***

***Districts have identified the following as strategies that support
teachers becoming highly qualified with an emphasis on special education
teachers providing direct instruction in core content areas.***

***Strategy 1: Reimbursing special education teachers and middle school
teachers in language arts and mathematics for courses needed for
certification or demonstration of content knowledge mastery.***

***Strategy 2: Reimbursing teachers for tests in content areas***

***Strategy 3: Providing study sessions for teacher content exam
preparation.***

***Strategy 4: Providing support and stipends for teachers pursuing
National Board Certification. (Currently Oklahoma has 1289 NBCT)***

***Strategy 5: Districts reevaluate how teacher assignments are made in
order to ensure that teachers are assigned to classes for which they are
highly qualified.***

***Because Oklahoma only has 7.13% of classes taught by
non-highly-qualified teachers and the majority of that percentage of
classes not taught by highly qualified teachers are core content classes
for special education students, special education division is funding
technical assistance and professional development in addition to
targeted Title II, Part A funds.***

3.  ***Does the plan delineate specific steps the SEA will take to
    ensure that all LEAs have plans in place to assist all non-HQ
    teachers to become HQ as quickly as possible?***

***REVISED INFORMATION***

***The OSDE will ensure that all districts have a plan in place to
assist all non-highly-qualified teachers become highly qualified.
Oklahoma State Department of Education will monitor districts for the
individual plans for non-highly qualified teachers to become highly
qualified as quickly as possible.***

***District Plans***

***In August, 2006 all districts were notified that they would be
required to submit a plan to the OSDE by November 1, 2006. The OSDE
requires and will monitor the district plan for providing funding
support, technical assistance and professional development for targeted
groups of teachers that need assistance in meeting highly qualified
requirements.***

***Districts that do not have all teachers highly qualified or "on
track" to be highly qualified before the beginning of the 2006-2007
school year are required to do the following:***

1.  ***Develop a plan by November 17, 2006 for the district that
    describes actions that will be taken and uses of federal and/or
    state funds and resources to assist teachers in meeting the highly
    qualified teacher requirement.***

2.  ***Develop a plan by November 17, 2006, for each teacher who has not
    yet met the NCLB highly qualified requirements. This plan must
    include:***

> ***a. specific activities that will be completed by the teacher to
> reach highly qualified status by the most efficient means;***
>
> ***b. specific actions to be taken by the district to facilitate the
> process; and***
>
> ***c. specific financial assistance and or other support that will be
> provided by the district.***

***Attachment H is a letter to districts outlines the specific
requirements for a plan to assist all non-highly-qualified teachers to
become highly qualified and templates for District Plan and Individual
Teacher Plan(s). A template for the district and individual teacher
plans (Attachment I) was sent to districts as well as a sample letter to
notify parents if a class was taught by a non-highly-qualified
teacher.***

***All plans will be reviewed in a timely manner by OSDE staff and
feedback to districts will occur prior to second semester, so that the
districts can implement strategies outlined in their plan at the
beginning of second semester.***

***Consolidated Application for Federal Programs***

***Through the Consolidated Application approval process of the OSDE,
highly qualified teacher data is examined. For districts that have not
yet met the 100% highly qualified goal, Office of Grants Management and
Office of Grants Planning which includes Title I, II, V and VI
consultants, verify evidence that plans provide strategies to assist
teachers in becoming highly qualified using Title II, Part A funds.***

***Consolidated Application Approval Process***

1.  ***Title II, Part A applications, budgets and budget justifications
    are submitted online by September 29, 2006.***

2.  ***Office of Grants Management and Office of Grants Planning
    Consultants determine whether districts have met the 100% AMO goal
    or that the budget submitted provides for support of
    non-highly-qualified teachers becoming highly qualified.***

3.  ***The consultants determine if the Title II, Part A applications
    and budgets support the highly-qualified teacher district and
    individual plans, particularly special education teachers and middle
    school language arts and mathematics teachers.***

***District Monitoring of Highly Qualified Plans***

***In monitoring districts, priority is given to districts that have a
significant number of schools that have not met their 100% AMO. While
on-site, individual teacher plans to become highly qualified are
monitored to determine implementation progress, particularly special
education teachers and middle school language arts and mathematics
teachers. Monitoring will focus on the 7.13% of classes taught by
non-highly qualified teachers which includes classes taught by special
education teachers and middle school language arts and mathematics
teachers.***

***Monitoring occurs through the Office of Grants Planning and through
the Accreditation Office which employs 13 Regional Accreditation
Officers who review teacher credentials and teacher assignments at every
Oklahoma school site.***

***The Oklahoma monitoring instrument for Title II, Part A requires
documentation to ensure that federal funds are used to ensure that all
districts have plans in place to assist all non-highly-qualified
teachers to become highly qualified by as quickly as possible. Some
examples from the Consolidated Federal Program monitoring instrument
(Attachment J) include:***

-   ***Has the LEA targeted funds to schools that have the lowest
    proportion of highly qualified teachers; are identified for school
    improvement? Section 2122(b)(3)***

-   ***Are program funds used to develop and implement initiatives to
    assist in recruiting highly qualified teachers, and hiring highly
    qualified teachers, who will be assigned teaching positions within
    their fields? Section 2123(a)(2)(C)***

-   ***Has the LEA developed and implemented initiatives to promote
    retention of highly qualified teachers and principals, particularly
    within schools with a high percentage of low-achieving students?
    Section 2123 (a)(2)(A)(i)***

***Monitoring will determine the progress district has made related to
plans submitted for districts and teachers to meet highly qualified
requirements.***

***Timeline for Technical Assistance to Districts and Teachers to***

***Meet HQ Requirements***

***July, 2006 -- Initiated focus on 2006-2007***

-   ***Letters to district superintendents, special education directors
    and principals were sent describing collaborative teaching,
    co-teaching and requirements for direct instruction in core academic
    subject areas by special education teachers.***

-   ***In addition, two sessions related to instruction by special
    education teachers and requirements for highly qualified status for
    all teachers were presented at the State Superintendent's Leadership
    Conference for approximately 3,000 superintendents, principals,
    special education directors, counselors July 6^th^ and 7^th^
    (Attachments B and C).***

***August, 2006***

-   ***Letter was sent to each district superintendent and principal
    identifying the requirements for all core academic content classes
    to be taught by a highly qualified teacher.***

> ***An attachment to the letter includes the plan that is required for
> all that do not have 100% of their teachers identified as highly
> qualified. A plan for the district and a plan for each individual
> teacher is to be completed and submitted to the OSDE for review by
> November 17, 2006.***

***September, 2006 -- March, 2007***

-   ***Review of Title II, Part A plans occurs to determine use of funds
    to be focused on strategies and activities to ensure all teachers
    are highly qualified***

-   ***Frequently asked questions for special education teachers sent to
    Superintendents and Special Education directors September 14, 2006
    and is available on the OSDE Web site.***

-   ***On-site monitoring of Oklahoma's two urban districts (high
    poverty, high minority) to review district Title II plans and to
    ensure that all teachers meet the highly qualified requirement by
    the end of 2006-2007 school year will occur in October, 2006.
    Attached is a table that provides Adequate Yearly Progress status,
    school improvement status and percent of highly qualified teachers
    for these two urban districts which serve approximately 44,400
    students each.***

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-   ***Priority monitoring of additional districts will occur.***

-   ***Videoconferences are planned for October, 2006 for all districts
    to provide technical assistance in preparing plans that include
    research-based strategies and initiatives in order to support
    teachers in becoming highly qualified***

-   ***Regional Accreditation Officers visit schools and monitor teacher
    class assignments for all teachers. RAOs particularly check for new
    personnel and reassigned personnel to determine if they meet the
    highly qualified teacher requirements.***

-   ***Professional development for special education teachers, teachers
    in middle school language arts and mathematics teachers are a
    focus.***

**Initiative #2: Conduct effective high quality**

**professional development activities.**

**Oklahoma State Department of Education**

**Title II, Part A Plan**

**High Quality Professional Development**

**Performance Goal 3:** By 2005-2006, all students will be taught by
highly qualified teachers.

**Performance Indicator 3.2:** The percentage of teachers receiving
high-quality professional development (as the term, "professional
development," is defined in section 9101(34).)

**Performance Target:** The target percentages of teachers receiving
high-quality professional development will be 40% in 2003-2004; 75% in
2004-2005; and 100% in 2005-2006. Revised Performance Target is 90% in
2005-2006 and 100% in 2006-2007 for all teachers, including special
education teachers.

**Oklahoma High Quality Professional Development will:**

-   Provide teachers, principals, and administrators the knowledge and
    skills to provide students with the opportunity to learn the state
    academic content standards, *Priority Academic Student Skills
    (PASS).*

-   Improve and increase teachers' knowledge of the academic subjects
    they teach.

-   Advance teacher understanding of effective instructional strategies
    that are based on scientifically based research.

-   Increase teachers' knowledge of how to modify the curriculum to meet
    the needs of individual learners.

-   Develop teacher leaders that will take the role of sharing knowledge
    and effective practices with teachers.

**Requirement 3: The revised plan must include information on the
technical assistance, programs, and services that the SEA will offer to
assist LEAs to successfully completing their HQT plans (Attachment H),
particularly where large groups of teachers are not highly qualified and
the resources the LEAs will use to meet their HQT goals.**

***3.1 Does the plan include a description of the technical assistance
the SEA will provide to assist LEAs in successfully carrying out their
HQT plans?***

**REVISED INFORMATION**

***Oklahoma has consistently made ongoing and comprehensive efforts to
assure that all districts have a clear understanding of the highly
qualified teacher requirements and that districts understand how to
support all teachers in core academic subjects to meet the highly
qualified requirements. Oklahoma provides***

***targeted district-based technical assistance including on-site visits
by Regional Accreditation Officers and School Improvement Division
monitoring teams, as well as, e-mail and phone assistance to address
highly qualified teacher issues and inquiries. Ongoing technical
assistance to districts in successfully carrying out their highly
qualified teacher plans is provided by OSDE teams. The OSDE divisions
work as a team to provide this technical assistance. These OSDE
divisions include: The Office of Grants Planning, the Office of Grants
Management, and the Curriculum Office of the School Improvement
Division, the Special Education Division, the Professional Standards and
Certification Division and the Accreditation Division team to provide
technical assistance.***

***The Office of Grants Planning will review all highly qualified
teacher plans in a timely manner by OSDE staff and feedback to districts
will occur prior to second semester, so that the districts can implement
strategies outlined in their plan at the beginning of second
semester.***

***Targeted technical assistance will occur for high-poverty,
high-minority low-performing schools including the following areas:***

-   ***Assist districts with the process to determine a teacher's highly
    qualified status and how to utilize the Oklahoma Credentialing
    System Highly Qualified component to streamline the process;***

-   ***Provide guidance for NCLB highly qualified requirements (sent to
    all districts and provided on OSDE Web site);***

-   ***Provide assistance to districts in research-based strategies to
    recruit and retain highly qualified teachers;***

-   ***Provide assistance to resolve specific highly qualified teacher
    issues including appropriate use of HOUSSE;***

-   ***Identify appropriate strategies to help teachers become highly
    qualified;***

-   ***Provide districts with information about state and regional
    professional development options to assist teachers in becoming
    highly qualified.***

> ***The technical assistance provided to districts will focus on the
> 7.13% of classes taught by non-highly qualified teachers. See Section
> 2.3 for timeline and technical assistance strategies. This will
> include assisting special education teachers that need content
> professional development; technical assistance to complete HOUSSE;
> support and professional development to assist teachers in passing
> subject tests.***

-   ***OSDE sent letters to superintendents about new standards related
    to using HOUSSE for veteran special education teachers and
    strategies in July, 2006 (Attachment A).***

-   ***OSDE provided professional development from Dr. Marilyn Friend,
    Co-Teaching: Principles, Practices, and Pragmatics to 2,000 special
    educators on September 6^th^ and 7^th^, 2006.***

-   ***OSDE plans to purchase Dr. Friend's DVD to distribute to all
    districts. This DVD provides the interactive presentation related to
    effective research-based strategies for co-teaching. This will be
    purchased with Special Education funds and Title II, Part A funds
    before second semester of the 2006-2007 year.***

-   ***OSDE has scheduled Dr. Friend to return next September, 2007 to
    continue and sustain the professional development for co-teaching
    and collaboration of special education teachers and core content
    teachers.***

-   ***The Regional Accreditation Officers will verify highly qualified
    status as reported by districts during their onsite visits.***

-   ***The new Oklahoma Web-based Educator Credentialing System (OECS)
    will verify teacher quality data.***

***A contract issued in June 2006, for the 2006-07 development of an
Oklahoma Web-based Educator Credentialing System (OECS), will provide
essential data on teachers (areas of certification, subject test
results, degree, major, and National Board Certification), in a
relational database than can be easily linked with other teachers
systems that provide key information affecting equality: systems such as
School Personnel Records, (location and type of school), Teacher Class
Schedules (subject and number of students taught) and Accreditation
(demographics of student population). Oklahoma's improved capacity to
accurately assess the highly qualified status of teachers in each school
will provide a solid foundation for the future identification, analyses
and plan for correction, of the distribution inequity of quality
teachers between high-poverty/high-minority schools vs.
low-poverty/low-minority schools.***

***Oklahoma has developed and implemented an online grant consolidated
application used by all districts. Within the district consolidated
application, the district must address Performance Indicator 3.1, the
percentage of classes being taught by highly qualified teachers and must
provide specific targets and strategies to and programs to carry out
their highly qualified teacher plans.***

***Oklahoma State Department of Education directors and program
specialists use the following initiatives to provide districts with
technical assistance as follows:***

***3.1.1 Professional Development***

-   ***Conduct annual videoconferences to explain highly qualified
    requirements and provide information about resources for ensuring
    all core content teachers meet the highly qualified requirements.***

-   ***Conduct annual highly qualified professional development and
    provide information about resources for teachers to meet the highly
    qualified requirement including but not limited to: Teacher --
    Teacher Initiative and state teacher testing information for core
    content areas.***

-   ***Baseline data, targets and actual percentage of teachers who
    received "high-quality professional development" is listed below as
    reported in the Oklahoma Accreditation report.***

  ------------------ ------------------------- ---------------------------
  ***Baseline Data   ***Target Percentage of   ***Actual Percentage of
  and Targets***     Teachers Receiving        Teachers Receiving
                     High-Quality Professional High-Quality Professional
                     Development***            Development***

  ***2002-2003       ***Data not available***  
  Baseline***                                  

  ***2003-2004       ***40***                  ***98.6***
  Target***                                    

  ***2004-2005       ***75***                  ***98.4***
  Target***                                    

  ***2005-2006       ***100***                 ***98.5***
  Target***                                    
  ------------------ ------------------------- ---------------------------

> ***Baseline data on the number of teachers completing high quality
> professional development is compiled and reported annually.***

***3.1.2 Technology***

-   ***Collaborate with Data Services to ensure accurate and complete
    highly qualified data at the district and school levels is
    collected.***

-   ***Maintain current highly qualified information and updated
    documents that provide increased understanding of highly qualified
    teacher requirements on the OSDE Web site -- NCLB page.***

-   ***The Oklahoma Special Education Division in collaboration with
    PASSport II, has developed video vignettes available during
    2006-2007 school year, illustrating accommodations and modifications
    being provided in classrooms and collaboration between regular
    education and special education teachers. Theses are available to
    download from OSDE Web site.***

***3.1.3 Monitoring***

***Teams of program specialists will monitor in 2006-2007 schools that
do not have 100% of core content classes taught by highly qualified
teachers as reported in 2005-06. Monitoring will occur in the following
ways:***

-   ***Onsite monitoring for all districts that have 21% or more classes
    taught by teachers who are not highly qualified will occur. In
    addition, the two largest districts in Oklahoma with 44,000+
    students in each will be monitored. These districts have high
    poverty and high minority student populations. Additional districts
    will be monitored as part of Oklahoma's five year cycle to monitor
    its 540 districts.***

-   ***District and individual teacher plans are required to be
    submitted by November 17, 2006 to provide:***

    a.  ***specific activities that will be completed by the teacher to
        reach highly qualified status by the most efficient option;***

    b.  ***specific actions to be taken by the District to facilitate
        the process;***

    c.  ***specific financial assistance and/or other support that will
        be provided by the District.***

***Priorities for schools are set using the following scale and will
be***

***used for Title II monitoring.***

> ***Priority 1 includes 5 districts where percent of teachers who are
> not HQ is 21% or higher.***
>
> ***Priority 2 includes 22** **districts where percent of teachers who
> are not HQ is greater than or equal to 16% and less than 21%***
>
> ***Priority 3 includes 80 districts where percent of teachers who are
> not HQ is greater than or equal to 10% and less than 16%***

***3.1.4 Continual Technical Assistance***

-   ***Professional Standards and Certification Office; Special
    Education Office; Accreditation Office; Data Services Office and
    Office of Standards and Curriculum (includes Title II and Title I)
    consistently respond to inquiries from teachers and districts in a
    timely manner.***

-   ***Respond to administrators and teachers via telephone, e-mail, and
    in-person with information specific to their needs for becoming
    highly qualified.***

-   ***Provide information related to exam information and preparation
    for exams administered by Oklahoma Commission for Teacher
    Preparation.***

-   ***Provide USDE guidance and information to district federal program
    administrators and district superintendents and principals.***

-   ***Provide highly qualified and certification updates regularly to
    district administrators.***

***3.2 Does the plan indicate that the staffing and professional
development needs of schools that are not making AYP will be given high
priority?***

***REVISED INFORMATION***

***OSDE has analyzed the data on highly qualified teachers as well as
data from schools and districts identified in need of improvement. All
districts that have not reached 100 percent goal of all core academic
classes taught by highly qualified teachers and that have schools listed
in years two, three, four, five and six of AYP will be given priority
for targeted assistance and professional development to meet the needs
of schools. As determined from data analysis, meeting the needs of
teachers of special education classes is a high-need, high-priority
focus for professional development and technical assistance.***

***Consolidated State Application***

***The Oklahoma priority is that all students be taught by highly
qualified teachers. At the beginning of the Consolidated State
Application, all districts provide an assurance that the district will
target Title II, Part A funds to schools that have the lowest population
of highly qualified teachers or are identified for school improvement
under 1116(b)(1)(A) of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act
(ESEA).***

***Title II, Part A***

***Through the Title II, Part A Consolidated State Application,
districts provide a justification for class-size reduction choices of
schools, grade levels and subjects, particularly in schools that do not
make Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP). The plan must document that high
quality professional development is provided to teachers as defined in
NCLB. In addition, a priority for districts and sites that do not have
100% of classes taught by highly qualified teachers should be staffing
needs. The Office of Grants Planning and Grants Management staff are
assigned to districts to ensure the priority for use of funds is to
ensure that highly qualified teachers are teaching the core content
areas.***

***State Legislation***

***Senate Bill 1485 (70 O.S. § 6-194) Professional Development
Requirements***

***Effective July 1, 2006, state legislation provides that each
professional development committee, in developing program
recommendations shall annually utilize a data-driven approach to analyze
student data and determine district and school professional development
needs. The professional development programs adopted shall be directed
toward development of competencies and instructional strategies in the
core curriculum areas for the following goals:***

1.  ***Increasing the academic performance index scores for the district
    and each school site;***

2.  ***Closing the achievement gaps among student groups;***

3.  ***Increasing student achievement as demonstrated on state-mandated
    tests and the ACT;***

4.  ***Increasing high school graduation rates; and***

5.  ***Decreasing college remediation rates.***

***Each district shall, at the end of each school year, submit a report
to the Oklahoma State Department of Education on the:***

1.  ***District level professional development needs;***

2.  ***Activities completed;***

3.  ***Expenditures, and;***

4.  ***Results achieved for each school year by each goal listed
    above.***

***School Support Teams -- On-Site Visits to School Improvement
Schools***

***Oklahoma's School Support Teams provide significant support and
technical assistance, including high quality professional development
for identified school improvement schools including the 7.13% that are
not highly qualified teacher in the areas of special education and
middle school language arts and mathematics. In June, 2006, Dr. Joe
Johnson and Dr. Melvina Phillips provided professional development for
School Support Team members that will be coaching school improvement
schools during the 2006-2007 school-year.***

***Dr. Robert Marzano Seminars for School Improvement Schools***

***Schools identified for school improvement will participate in three
two-day seminar sessions in November, 2006 and February and March, 2007
with Dr. Marzano and his team. Each school improvement site team will
complete What Works in Schools Surveys which will be analyzed by Dr.
Marzano and returned to the schools to determine professional
development needs of staff. The follow-up seminars will be focused on
individual school needs and provide strategies for next steps for these
schools not making AYP.***

***Nine Essential Elements Resource Guide***

***The Oklahoma Nine Essential Element resource guide is a
research-based document to assist schools in completing a comprehensive
needs assessment. This resource guide also provides suggested strategies
for each performance indicator. The Nine Essential Elements include the
following:***

***Academic Performance: Curriculum; Classroom Evaluation/Assessment;***

***Instruction***

***Learning Environment: School Culture; Student Family, Community***

***Support; Professional Growth and Development***

***Efficiency: Leadership; Organizational Structure and Resources;***

***Comprehensive and Effective Planning***

***This document has been mailed to every district superintendent and
principal as well as presented at the State Superintendent's Leadership
Conference. It is also available on the OSDE Web site. The Nine
Essential Elements focus on one goal: Improved Student Achievement.
Continuous technical assistance and training is available to all
districts and this resource guide is used as the framework for school
support team coaching and assistance of low-performing schools. This
fall, 2006, Dr. Robert Marzano plans to align the Oklahoma document with
What Works in Schools research for use with Oklahoma's School
Improvement Schools.***

***3.3 Does the plan include a description of programs and services the
SEA will provide to assist teachers and LEAs in successfully meeting HQT
goals?***

***REVISED INFORMATION***

***Technical assistance will be provided by OSDE to districts as they
write their District highly qualified teacher plans for having 100% of
their teachers become highly qualified. This assistance will be provided
by the Office of Grants Planning team with input from the Professional
Standards and Certification Team prior to second semester of 2006-2007.
The district and teacher plans are due November 17, 2006. Once the plans
are written, technical assistance will be provided to districts as they
implement their plans through on-site visits, videoconferences, and with
the assistance of our School Support Coordinators at the 10
videoconference sites across the state. Priority for technical
assistance will be for those districts with high numbers or percents of
teachers who are not highly qualified.***

***The Oklahoma State Department of Education provides professional
development and technical assistance to teachers to ensure that the 100%
highly qualified requirements are met through a variety of programs and
services. In order to provide special education teachers assistance in
meeting highly-qualified teacher goals, the OSDE plans to continue to
provide professional development so that core content teachers meet
highly qualified requirements by demonstrating core content knowledge;
recruiting highly-qualified teachers; retaining highly qualified
teachers.***

***Based on Oklahoma data, the priority for OSDE is to provide special
education teachers and teachers of middle school mathematics and
language arts targeted professional development to ensure they meet the
highly qualified requirements.***

***The OSDE is here to work with districts so that the remaining 7.13%
of classes taught by non-highly qualified teachers have highly qualified
teachers as quickly as possible.***

***3.4 Does the plan specifically address the needs of any subgroups of
teachers identified in Requirement 1?***

***REVISED INFORMATION***

***The data indicates that special education teachers and middle school
language arts and mathematics teachers are the subgroups of teachers
identified in Requirement 1 and identified for professional
development.***

***Special Education Teachers***

***Special education teachers are a subgroup that has been identified
for technical assistance and professional development to ensure that
districts and sites have 100% of classes taught by highly qualified
teachers.***

***Videoconferences***

***Oklahoma Special Education Services provides professional development
through the videoconference center including but not limited to:
differentiated instruction; collaborative teaching; including students
with significant cognitive disabilities in the general education
curriculum; accommodations and modifications in the general education
curriculum; and inclusion.***

***September 7-8, 2006 Special Education Personnel Development
Opportunity***

> ***Featured speaker, Dr. Marilyn Friend, Chairperson and Professor of
> Education in the Department of Specialized Education Services at the
> University of North Carolina shared with 2,000 participants effective
> strategies for special education teachers to co-teach and
> collaboratively teach to provide instruction to students. She teaches
> coursework on inclusive practices and collaboration among service
> providers. She has consulted with school professionals nationally and
> internationally. Her particular areas of interest include skills for
> collaboration, co-teaching and inclusive school practices.***

***September 21-22, 2006 State Superintendent's Conference for Special
Education Teachers and Directors***

> ***This conference provided opportunities for personnel development
> regarding highly qualified teachers in the area of special education.
> Sessions included strategies for effective collaborative teaching.***

***State Personnel Development Grant***

> ***The SIG is in a no-cost extension that will end December 31, 2006.
> Recently, SIG staff submitted a proposal to the USDE, Office of
> Special Education Programs, for the State Personnel Development Grant
> (SPDG). As of Friday, September 29, 2006, Oklahoma was awarded the
> SPDG for implementation over a five year period. A major focus of the
> SPDG will be assisting secondary special education teachers in
> becoming highly qualified in a core content subject area. The SPDG
> will also attempt to recruit highly qualified candidates interested in
> becoming certified in special education. The pool of candidates will
> be drawn from existing highly qualified regular education teachers
> and, specifically, those that are alternatively certified. Tuition
> reimbursement for college classes, review sessions for certification
> exams, and reimbursement for passing certification exams will be
> provided to these successful candidates. A stipend will be provided to
> those candidates who teach a special education class one additional
> year after receiving special education or core area certification.***

***First Year Special Education Teacher Academy***

> ***Another focus of the SPDG is to continue to help provide support to
> first-year teachers. The Special Education Services section will be
> initiating a First-Year Teacher Academy where first-year teachers are
> provided training and support through their first year. The SPDG will
> implement activities to continue providing support during the second
> and third years of teaching, since attrition is greatest within the
> first three years of teaching. These activities will be an extension,
> or continuation, of the FACETS and ASSETS programs.***

***Special Education Video Vignettes***

> ***The Oklahoma Special Education Division in collaboration with
> PASSport II (an online lesson planner), has developed video vignettes
> available during 2006-2007 school year, illustrating accommodations
> and modifications being provided in classrooms and collaboration
> between regular education and special education teachers.***

***Middle Level Mathematics***

***Mathematics has been identified as an area for professional
development of teachers, particularly in the middle level grades. The
Oklahoma Mathematics Improvement Program supports teachers in increasing
content knowledge and becoming more highly qualified and highly
effective teachers.***

***Oklahoma Mathematics Improvement Program is for teachers to become
highly qualified based on professional development and teacher
testing.***

***The Oklahoma Mathematics Improvement Program focuses state funding on
increasing the content knowledge of teachers of mathematics in grades
6-8. Through three tracks of professional development opportunities
(mathematics academies, higher education courses, and smaller learning
community lesson studies), the program offers instruction in mathematics
content as well as pedagogy. Upon completion of the professional
development program, teachers will be able to complete the testing
requirement that will consider them highly qualified for middle school
mathematics through Algebra II.***

***Oklahoma Mathematics Laboratory Program (Oklahoma state funding)***

***This is a program for teachers and students to improve middle school
student mathematics achievement.***

***The Oklahoma Mathematics Laboratory Program provides state funding to
offer a scientifically research-based mathematics laboratory program, I
CAN LEARN, to ten middle schools/junior highs each year beginning
2005-2006. Qualifying requirements include:***

-   ***Ten public schools with low student achievement in mathematics at
    the middle school level.***

-   ***Each school shall have at least fifty percent of its students
    performing below satisfactory on the eighth grade mathematics
    criterion referenced test of the Oklahoma School Testing Program in
    at least one of the two preceding years.***

-   ***There shall be a limit of one school per district each year.***

-   ***There shall be representation from urban, suburban, and rural
    districts provided that such schools meet all other criteria.***

-   ***There shall be representation from each quadrant of the state
    provided that such schools meet all other criteria.***

***The laboratory focuses on using technology to provide mathematics
instruction to students attending schools who have not been successful
in mathematics on statewide testing. Through the use of the system,
teachers are provided professional development opportunities both in
content and pedagogy. By completing the courses available with the
program, teachers are exposed to new content or reminded of previously
learned mathematics content from fundamentals through Algebra II.
Studies in best practices and focus groups related to the use of the
program increase pedagogical skills.***

***For the 2005-2006 school-year, student results for the participating
schools was an average increase of 16% for the ten participating schools
on the eighth grade criterion-referenced mathematics test. An important
note is that part of the selection criteria for participating schools
was that these schools have at least 50% of their students scoring below
satisfactory on the state mathematics assessment.***

***3.5 Does the plan include a description of how the State will use its
available funds (e.g. Title I, Part A; Title II, Part A, including the
portion that goes to the State agency for higher education; other
Federal and State funds, (as appropriate) to address the needs of
teachers who are not highly qualified?***

***REVISED INFORMATION***

***All Oklahoma districts use at least a portion of their Title II, Part
A funding to target schools that have the highest number of teachers
that do not meet the highly qualified requirements in addition to those
schools in need of improvement. Districts can also use Title I, Part A,
Title II, Part D, Title III, Title V and IDEA funds for focused
professional development.***

***Oklahoma has identified classes not taught by highly qualified
teachers in the areas of special education and middle school mathematics
and language arts. In order to provide targeted professional development
for these teachers, OSDE has identified the following programs and
funding sources to address the needs of teachers who are not highly
qualified.***

***Oklahoma Reading Academies (Title I, Part B, Subpart 1 funding)***

***The Oklahoma Reading Academy is committed to helping teachers achieve
success through effective professional development. The Academy content
is independent of any specific reading program.***

***The Academy offers professional development program combining online
learning with face-to-face study group interaction and classroom based
practice activities that foster student achievement.***

***A teacher can receive college credit for the Oklahoma Reading Academy
and the state encourages districts to use their Title II, Part A funds
to support teachers in obtaining content knowledge through this high
quality instruction.***

***Mathematics and Science Partnerships (Title II, Part B funding)***

***The Mathematics and Science Partnerships (MSP) competitive grant
program provides high-need schools, that is, those that serve no fewer
than 10,000 children from families with incomes below the poverty line
or a school district in which 40% of the children live in poverty, with
professional development. The professional development is a partnership
with institution(s) of higher education and business. The professional
development is sustained, intensive, classroom focused, and aligned with
the state mathematics and science standards and curricula. For the
2006-2007 school year, priority will be given to high-poverty,
high-minority, low-performing schools. The funds are used to:***

1.  ***Establish and operate mathematics and/or science summer workshops
    or institutes conducted for a period of at least two weeks during
    the summer.***

2.  ***Provide follow-up training during the academic year that is
    conducted in the classroom for a period of four days***

3.  ***Enhance the ability of the teachers to understand and use the
    Priority Academic Student Skills (PASS), Oklahoma's academic content
    standards, for mathematics and science.***

4.  ***Train teachers to use curricula supported by scientific research,
    aligned with PASS, object-centered, experiment-oriented, and based
    on concepts, content and process.***

***State Personnel Development Grant***

> ***The SIG is in a no-cost extension that will end December 31, 2006.
> Recently, SIG staff submitted a proposal to the USDE, Office of
> Special Education Programs, for the State Personnel Development Grant
> (SPDG). As of Friday, September 29, 2006, Oklahoma was awarded the
> SPDG for implementation over a five year period. A major focus of the
> SPDG will be assisting secondary special education teachers in
> becoming highly qualified in a core content subject area. The SPDG
> will also attempt to recruit highly qualified candidates interested in
> becoming certified in special education. The pool of candidates will
> be drawn from existing highly qualified regular education teachers
> and, specifically, those that are alternatively certified. Tuition
> reimbursement for college classes, review sessions for certification
> exams, and reimbursement for passing certification exams will be
> provided to these successful candidates. A stipend will be provided to
> those candidates who teach a special education class one additional
> year after receiving special education or core area certification.***

***3.6 Does the plan for the use of available funds indicate that
priority will be given to the staffing and professional development
needs of schools that are not making AYP?***

***REVISED INFORMATION***

***School improvement schools and schools not making AYP are a high
priority for professional development and monitoring.***

***Several initiatives currently address the staffing and professional
development needs of schools that are not making AYP. Oklahoma provides
the following:***

-   ***School Improvement schools receive extra funds and technical
    assistance through the videoconference network to demonstrate
    strategies that assist teachers.***

-   ***State and federal funds provide for professional development and
    services to teachers to ensure that special education teachers and
    middle school mathematics and language arts core content teachers
    are highly qualified.***

-   ***School Support Teams provide technical assistance to SI schools
    for years 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6.***

-   ***Oklahoma provides focused professional development. For example,
    Dr. Joe Johnson has provided professional development aligned to the
    Nine Essential Elements for Oklahoma's School Support Teams that
    coach sites identified for school improvement for two consecutive
    years.***

-   ***Using Title II, Part A funds, Dr. Bob Marzano will provide three
    sessions during the 2006-2007 school-year, using What Works Survey
    in the first session as a focus for a needs assessment and two
    follow-up sessions to provide feedback and continuous support for
    implementing What Works strategies.***

-   ***Best practices videoconferences continue to be presented by Title
    I Distinguished Schools and Title I Academic Achievement Award
    schools that have closed the achievement gaps as targeted
    professional development for low-performing schools with
    high-minority and high-poverty populations.***

-   ***Federal Title II, Part A, technical assistance funds are used for
    contracts for retired educators who have been successful in
    high-minority, high-poverty schools. to be Team Leaders of School
    Support Teams.***

-   ***Title II, Part A funds the Master Teacher program research-based
    materials, and for stipends to Master Teachers who provide training
    at the site, district and regional level including study groups
    focused on targeted content areas. Priority is given to
    low-performing schools when Master Teachers are selected.***

-   ***Title II, Part A funds Curriculum Walkthroughs professional
    development for instructional leaders and priority is given to
    school improvement sites.***

-   ***Dr. Marilyn Friend's presentation of practices for effective
    co-teaching is available on DVD and will be purchased using Title
    II, Part A and Special Education funds so that all districts can
    benefit from the research-based strategies of effective co-teaching
    (regular education teachers and special education teachers).***

-   ***Title II, Part A funding provides for School Support Coordinators
    at each videoconference site to facilitate presentations. The OSDE
    uses the videoconference center to provide technical assistance and
    professional development for teachers and to assist districts and
    schools regionally with writing and implementing school improvement
    plans, corrective action plans and restructuring plans and securing
    resources.***

**Requirement 4: The revised plan must describe how the SEA will work
with LEAs that fail to reach the 100 percent HQT goal by the end of the
2006-07 school year.**

1.  ***Does the plan indicate how the SEA will monitor LEA compliance
    with the LEAs HQT plans described in Requirement 2 and hold LEAs
    accountability for fulfilling their plans?***

Oklahoma State Department of Education will provide technical assistance
and professional development opportunities for all districts and focus
particularly on those districts that do not reach the 100 percent highly
qualified teacher goal. The OSDE will use the data that identifies those
districts that have less than 100% of their teachers highly qualified
and require them to complete and submit a plan by November 17, 2006 to
the OSDE. To assist districts with the writing of the plan and the
implementation of the plan, the OSDE will have videoconferences, and
onsite technical assistance. In addition, the Title I and Title II staff
will do team monitoring (Attachment J). All schools in school
improvement status will receive visits from the School Support Teams to
assist in strategies for increasing teacher content knowledge.

Information will be available on the OSDE Web site including the Title I
letter to districts outlining the Highly qualified plan requirements;
the powerpoints from the State Superintendent's Leadership Conference
related to highly qualified requirements; the State Equity Action Plan;
the data for highly qualified on state report cards; the HOUSSE
requirements; Professional Development Toolkit and Curriculum
conferences and resources.

2.  ***Does the plan show how technical assistance from the SEA to help
    LEAs meet the 100 percent HQT goal will be targeted toward LEAs and
    schools that are not making AYP?***

Data collected on classes taught by teachers who are not highly
qualified was aligned with the data on districts and sites that did not
make AYP for the 2005-2006 school year. Analysis of this data will
determine the monitoring schedule and technical assistance provided by
the OSDE for the fall of 2006. Priority will be given to districts and
sites that did not make AYP and that have the greatest percent of
classes taught by non-highly-qualified teachers. In the Office of Grants
Planning, Program Specialists are assigned to districts to provide
technical assistance to ensure that all core content classes are taught
by highly qualified teachers. Further consequences will be discussed as
districts enter year two and three of failing to meet both goals of 100%
of classes being taught by highly qualified teachers and not making AYP.

3.  ***Does the plan describe how the SEA will monitor whether LEAs
    attain 100 percent HQT in each LEA and school:***

-   ***In the percentage of highly qualified teachers at each LEA and
    school; and***

-   ***In the percentage of teachers who are receiving high-quality
    professional development to enable such teachers to become highly
    qualified and successful classroom teachers?***

***REVISED INFORMATION***

***OSDE collects highly qualified data; monitors district and teacher
plans; analyzes all information to ensure districts are placing high
quality teachers in the classrooms.***

***The data collection disaggregates the data to include the percentage
of highly qualified teachers at each district and site. In addition,
data will be collected for the percentage of teachers who are receiving
high quality professional development that will enable identified
teachers to become highly qualified through the professional development
programs available in the state. Monitoring will occur through review of
district Consolidated State Applications; Regional Accreditation
Officers on-site review of teacher credentials and class assignments;
on-site and desk-monitoring by Office of Grants Planning and
verification through the new Oklahoma Educator Credentialing System.***

***Oklahoma's certificate renewal system requires that all teachers
receive high quality professional development that supports teachers'
professional growth. The professional development is required to be
aligned to Oklahoma's state academic content standards, the Priority
Academic Student Skills (PASS) and provide for student learning.***

***Oklahoma's PASSport II provides teachers a Web resource with
Oklahoma's PASS standards as it core. It provides teachers with a Web
database that has lessons and strategies directly aligned to PASS
standards. There is a lesson planning template for teachers to create
standards-based interactive, Web-based lessons.***

***PASSport II allows teachers to create high quality lessons and units
directly aligned to Oklahoma's state standards; to store and share
lessons and/or units with students, teachers and parents; to provide a
professional development resource that assists other teachers in
identifying and creating a high quality standards-based lesson.***

1.  ***Consistent with ESEA 2141, does the plan include technical
    assistance or corrective actions that the SEA will apply if LEAs
    fail to meet HQT and AYP goals***

The Office of Grants Management and Office of Grants Planning will
continue to provide technical assistance to districts and schools that
do not meet HQ goals and AYP goals. Programs and support are described
in Requirement 3 responses. Oklahoma's school support teams provide
coaching and technical assistance to school improvement sites in years
2, 3, 4, and 5. These teams include superintendents, principals, and
other district personnel; higher education representatives and SDE staff
and are led by retired educators. The Oklahoma Nine Essential Elements
Resource Guide is a research-based tool that identifies the essential
elements; the performance indicators; strategies for success and
resources to implement a continuous school improvement plan. (Attachment
K ) Each site receives three visits from the team from October through
March of the school year.

Oklahoma is adding a new data system to interface with our Educator
Credentialing system that will be operational January 5, 2007. The
2006-2007 data collection will be available at the beginning of second
semester and be compared to the 2005-2006 data collection to identify
districts and sites that have not made sufficient progress toward
meeting the highly qualified goal. These districts will be a priority
for monitoring to determine the implementation status of plans submitted
to the OSDE November 17, 2006. In addition, districts will attach a copy
of the letter of notification sent to parents in cases where a
non-highly-qualified teacher is teaching a core academic content area.

**Initiative #3: Recruit and hire highly qualified teachers,**

**including those licensed or certified through alternative**

**routes and retain highly qualified teachers.**

**Oklahoma State Department of Education**

**Title II, Part A Plan**

**Highly Qualified Teachers**

**Performance Goal 3:** By 2005-2006, all students will be taught by
highly qualified teachers.

**Performance Indicator 3.1:** Performance Indicator: The percentage of
classes being taught by "highly qualified" teachers (as the term is
defined in section 9101 (23) of the ESEA), in the aggregate and in
"high-poverty" schools (as the term is defined in section 1111
(h)(1)(C)(viii) of the ESEA).

**Baseline Data:** The percentage of classes being taught by "highly
qualified" (64%) teachers (as the term is defined in section 9101(23) of
the ESEA), in the aggregate and in "high poverty" (57%) schools (as the
term is defined in section 1111(h)(1)(C)(viii) of the ESEA).

**Performance Target:** The target percentages of classes being taught
by "highly qualified" teachers will be 72% in 2003-2004, 86% in
2004-2005, and 100% in 2005-2006. The target percentages of classes
being taught by "highly qualified" teachers in "high-poverty" schools
will be 65% in 2003-2004, 75% in 2004-2005, and 100% in 2005-2006.
Revised performance target for the classes being taught by "highly
qualified" teachers in "high poverty" schools, including special
education teachers, is 88% in 2005-2006 and 100% in 2006-2007.

**Requirement 5: The revised plan must explain how and when the SEA will
complete the HOUSSE process for teachers not new to the profession who
were hired prior to the end of the 2005-2006 school year, and how the
SEA will discontinue the use of HOUSSE procedures for teachers hired
after the end of the 2005-2006 school year.**

***5.1 Does the plan describe how and when the SEA will complete the
HOUSSE process for all teachers not new to the profession who were hired
before the end of the 2005-2006 school year?***

**92.85 percent of Oklahoma teachers are highly qualified. Many of
Oklahoma teachers have tested in core subject areas since Oklahoma has
had teacher testing since 1982. As the data reflects, 7.13% of classes
are taught by non-highly-qualified teachers and the majority of those
are classes of special education students. OSDE recognizes that the area
of focus is providing assistance to our special education teachers.**

**With that in mind, a general education teacher wanting to use HOUSSE
after June, 2007 to achieve highly qualified status will be required to
send past employment documentation to OSDE along with the HOUSSE rubric
to verify they are a veteran teacher in the specific assignment area of
the request. The exception to this will be for teachers who can document
they had an approved plan of study from their building or district
administrator and have been working toward the highly qualified
designation and submitted documentation to OSDE.**

**Oklahoma Department of Education sent a letter and plan template to
all District Superintendents in August, 2006 requiring districts to
provide the funding support as appropriate for professional development;
college coursework; test preparation; and/or test fees to act in good
faith to ensure teachers become highly qualified as soon as possible.
Teachers also are required to develop a plan of study to meet the highly
qualified requirements.**

**The HOUSSE rubric for special education content teachers was not
approved by the United States Department of Education in March, 2006.
Therefore, OSDE will need to do a new data collection during the
2006-2007 school year to determine highly qualified status of special
education teachers providing direct instruction. The OSDE will give
special education teachers providing direct instruction an opportunity
where appropriate to achieve highly qualified status in any additional
content areas for which they are not currently teaching.**

***5.2 Does the plan describe how the State will discontinue the use of
HOUSSES after the end of the 2005-2006 school year, except in the
following situations:***

-   ***Multi-subject secondary teachers in rural schools who, if HQ in
    one subject at the time of hire, may use HOUSSE to demonstrate
    competence in additional subjects within three years of the date of
    hire; or***

-   ***Multi-subject special education teachers who are new to the
    profession, if HQ in language arts, mathematics, or science at the
    time of hire, may use HOUSSE to demonstrate competence in additional
    subjects within two years of the date of hire.***

***Most Oklahoma teachers have met the highly qualified requirements.
Oklahoma has had teacher testing in place since 1982 and therefore
HOUSSE has limited use.***

***Currently, only 7.13% of Oklahoma teachers do not meet the highly
qualified requirements and the use of HOUSSE will be the exception
rather than the rule after 2006-2007 school year. Approximately fifty
percent of the 7.13% classes not taught by highly qualified teachers are
classes taught by special education teachers. Special provisions have
been made by the state to ensure that special education teachers are a
high priority in meeting highly qualified requirements.***

***The Title I letter to districts (Attachment H) describes the
requirements for highly qualified status. A plan template was sent as an
attachment to the Title I letter. The plan template requires the
district to describe the actions to be taken to ensure all teachers meet
the requirements by June 30, 2007.***

***Multi-subject special education teachers***

***Multi-subject special education teachers who are new to the
profession, if highly qualified in language arts, mathematics, or
science at the time of hire, may use HOUSSE to demonstrate competence in
additional subjects within two years of the date of hire.***

***Multi-subject secondary teachers in rural schools***

***Multi-subject secondary teachers in rural schools who, if highly
qualified in one subject at the time of hire, may use HOUSSE to
demonstrate competence in additional subjects within three years of the
date of hire. The HOUSSE for multi-subject secondary teachers in rural
areas is not used extensively in Oklahoma. The HOUSSE will be available,
however, on a case by case basis for veteran teachers in this
situation.***

***Information related to certification and highly qualified
requirements were presented July 6^th^ and 7^th^, 2006 at the State
Superintendent's Leadership Conference (Attachments B and C). In
addition, several videoconferences are* *scheduled to assist school
districts with plans to be submitted by November 1,* *2006, to describe
how all teachers will meet the highly qualified requirements by June 30,
2007.***

***Oklahoma State Department of Education personnel will monitor
districts that have greater than 20% of classes not taught by highly
qualified teachers.***

**Requirement 6: The revised plan must include a copy of the State's
written 'equity plan' for ensuring that poor or minority children are
not taught by inexperienced, unqualified, or out-of-field teachers at
higher rates than are other children.**

**GOAL: Ensure that poor and minority children are not taught by
inexperienced, unqualified, or out-of-field teachers at higher rates
than are other children.**

The chart on the next page shows the data that has been analyzed to
determine the focus of technical assistance and professional development
for non-highly-qualified teachers in high-poverty and high-minority
schools. We continue to review this data to ensure appropriate
assistance to our districts and sites.

**NOTE: Bitmap image inserted. If image is not visible either print or
use print preview.**

![](media/image3.png){width="8.247916666666667in"
height="6.096527777777778in"}

***6.1 Does the revised plan include a written equity plan?***

Oklahoma will focus on recruiting, retaining and training teachers,
particularly in high-poverty, high-minority schools, to ensure that poor
and minority children are not taught by inexperienced, unqualified, or
out-of-field teachers at higher rates than are other children. Oklahoma
will provide all districts information about recommended strategies to
increase the number of highly qualified teachers, redistributing
existing teachers, improving teachers content knowledge and skills and
improving working conditions.

Recommended strategies to increase the number of highly qualified
teachers include:

Strategies to increase the number of highly qualified teachers:

-   Consider teachers that have alternative certification including
    Troops to Teachers

-   Teacher preparation programs to prepare teachers specifically to
    work in high minority, high poverty schools

-   Provide information to teacher candidates about scholarships, loans,
    loan forgiveness programs to recruit and prepare teachers
    specifically for high-poverty, high-minority, low-performing and
    hard-to-staff schools.

Strategies to redistribute existing teachers:

-   Financial incentives including the use of Title II, Part A funds

-   Non-monetary incentives

-   Increase the number of National Board Certified teachers in
    high-poverty, high-minority and/or low-performing schools

-   Hire retired teachers to provide experienced teachers in
    hard-to-staff schools

Strategies to improve teacher content knowledge and skills

-   Provide instructional facilitators targeted to low-performing sites
    within a district

-   Provide district induction program in addition the Oklahoma resident
    teacher program

-   Use master teachers available in all regions of the state to provide
    content support and study groups

-   Provide professional development targeted toward content classes not
    taught by highly qualified teachers

Strategies to improve working conditions

-   Reallocate resources to high-needs schools

-   Improve safety and discipline in high-needs schools

-   Develop policies and programs to attract highly qualified teachers
    and principals

-   Provide professional development resources

The Oklahoma equity plan provides for monitoring progress and ensuring
that 100% of Oklahoma teachers providing direct instruction in core
content areas meet the highly qualified requirements.

1\. Through data collection and analysis, Oklahoma will continuously
monitor that Oklahoma's poor and minority students are not being taught
at higher rates than other students by inexperienced, unqualified, and
out-of-field teachers.

-   Collect data for the percentage of core academic subjects taught by
    teachers who meet the highly-qualified teacher requirements in
    Oklahoma's districts and schools with the highest concentration of
    poverty and minority children.

-   Collect data for the percentage of core academic subjects taught by
    teachers who meet the highly-qualified teacher requirements in
    Oklahoma's schools that have not met Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP).

-   Collect data for the percentage of teachers with three or more years
    of teaching experience in high-need schools (30% or more of the
    population qualify for free/reduced lunch)

-   Publicly Report Progress: State Report Card, District Report Card,
    School Report Card (See Attachment P and Q)

2\. Provide resources and technical assistance to districts and sites to
increase the percentage of core academic subjects in Oklahoma taught by
teachers who meet the highly qualified requirements to 100%.

-   Measure and report the percentage of core academic subjects taught
    by teachers who meet the highly qualified requirements in Oklahoma's
    districts and sites.

-   Publicly Report Progress: State Report Card, District Report Card,
    School Report Card (See Attachment P and Q)

Equity Plan Components include:

A.  Data and Reporting Systems

B.  Teacher Preparation

C.  Out-of-Field Teaching

D.  Recruitment and Retention of Experienced Teachers

E.  Professional Development

F.  Specialized Knowledge and Skills

G.  Working Conditions

H.  Policy Coherence

**A. Data and Reporting Systems**

**How is the state planning to develop the teacher data and reporting
systems needed to identify and correct inequities in the distribution of
quality teachers in high-poverty/high-minority schools vs.
low-poverty/low-minority schools?**

The first step in providing assistance to high-poverty/high-minority
schools vs. low-poverty/low minority schools is to identify those areas
of need. Oklahoma continues to update its data systems and is in the
process of creating a new Oklahoma Web-based Educator Credentialing
System which will link to a Highly Qualified Teacher reporting system
for 2006-2007 available January, 2007.

**A.1 Oklahoma Web-based Educator Credentialing System (OECS)**

A contract issued in June 2006, for the 2006-07 development of an
Oklahoma Web-based Educator Credentialing System (OECS), will provide
essential data on teachers (areas of certification, subject test
results, degree, major, and National Board Certification), in a
relational database than can be easily linked with other teachers
systems that provide key information affecting equality: systems such as
School Personnel Records, (location and type of school), Teacher Class
Schedules (subject and number of students taught) and Accreditation
(demographics of student population). Oklahoma's improved capacity to
accurately assess the highly qualified status of teachers in each school
will provide a solid foundation for the future identification, analyses
and plan for correction, of the distribution inequity of quality
teachers between high-poverty/high-minority schools vs.
low-poverty/low-minority schools

**A.2 Teacher Shortage Report**

Oklahoma State Department of Education (OSDE) provides information about
teacher shortage areas in annual reports for the State Board of
Education

**A.3 School Report Cards**

School report cards include professional qualifications of teachers and
percent of classes not taught by highly qualified teachers.

**School Report Cards for the State and Districts are provided on the
Oklahoma State Department of Education Web site** that includes
Professional Qualifications of Teachers **(**Bachelors; Masters;
Post-Masters or Doctorate) and Percent of Classes Taught by Teachers
Considered Highly Qualified According to Federal Law in high poverty
schools and low poverty schools. (Attachment H and I for 2004-2005 and
2005-2006 State Report Card of Professional Qualifications of Teachers).

Data to districts for sites that include the Professional Qualifications
of Teachers and Percent of Classes Taught by Teachers Considered Highly
Qualified in high poverty schools and low poverty schools is available
through the Oklahoma State Department of Education Office of
Accountability and Assessment upon request.

**A.4 District Professional Development Report**

Each district shall annually submit a report to the State Department of
Education on the district level professional development needs,
activities completed, expenditures, and results achieved for each school
year by each goal.

**A.5 Oklahoma Accreditation Reporting Site**

Oklahoma Accreditation Reporting Site requires data submission of highly
qualified teacher status disaggregated by high poverty and low poverty
schools.

District Data and Site Data reports are available and will be verified
by District and Site Administrators. In addition, Title I and Title II
desk and on-site monitoring checks highly qualified data entry. Title I
communicates by letter to each district superintendent and principal the
requirements for all core academic content classes to be taught by a
highly qualified teacher and provides a template for preparing a plan to
ensure all teachers meet the highly qualified requirements (Attachment
C). Title I also provides a sample letter for principals to send to
parents if a class is not taught by a highly qualified teacher
(Attachment D). Regional Accreditation Officers (RAOs) visit schools
annually and monitor teacher class assignments for all teachers. RAOs
particularly check for new personnel and reassigned personnel to
determine if they meet the highly qualified teacher requirements. During
the summer of 2006, letters to district superintendents, special
education directors and principals were sent describing collaborative
teaching, co-teaching and requirements for direct instruction in core
academic subject areas by special education teachers. In addition, two
sessions related to instruction by special education teachers and
requirements for highly qualified status for all teachers were presented
at the State Superintendent's Leadership Conference for approximately
3,000 superintendents, principals, special education directors,
counselors July 6^th^ and 7^th^ (Attachment E and F).

**A.6 OSDE Web site Reporting**

The Oklahoma State Department of Education (OSDE) Web site links to
state and federal initiatives; federal program guidance; curriculum
opportunities and conferences; professional development toolkit; and
state report cards. \<http://sde.state.ok.us\>

**B. Teacher Preparation**

**How is the state planning to build a pipeline of prospective teachers
for high-poverty, low-performing schools?**

**B.1 Future Teacher Scholarships** are given to preservice teachers at
all state universities who are majoring in a teaching shortage area.
Critical Teacher Shortage Areas for 2005-06 include: science, foreign
language, mathematics, English and Special Education.

\<okhighered.org/student-center/financial-aid/future-teach.shtm.\>

**B.2 Teacher Shortage Employment Incentive Program (TSEIP)** was
legislated to encourage preservice teachers to major in math or science
education and to teach at least five years in Oklahoma public schools.
For those who complete the five years of mathematics or science
teaching, student loans are repaid or, if no outstanding loans, a
stipend equal to the average of three years of tuition and fees at state
universities is awarded.

**B.3 Teacher Loan Forgiveness Program**

To qualify for up to \$5,000 loan forgiveness under this program you
must not have had an outstanding balance on a FFEL or Direct Loan
program loan as of October 1, 1998. It is possible to qualify for the
increased amount of loan forgiveness up to \$17,500 for mathematics,
reading, writing, science, or special education.

**B.4 National Governor's Association Grant**

Oklahoma has received funds from the National Governors Association to
recruit teachers to become Nationally Board Certified. This pilot
program provides financial support to teachers pursuing NBC and is in
one of Oklahoma's urban, high poverty, high minority school districts.

**B.5 Teacher-to-Teacher.com**

Teacher-to-Teacher.com is an online recruitment service for all Oklahoma
K-12 schools and is a useful tool particularly in hard to staff schools.

**C. Out-of-Field Teaching**

**How is the state planning to reduce the incidence of out-of-field
teaching (particularly in mathematics, science, special education, and
bilingual education/English as a Second Language) in high-poverty,
high-minority, and low-performing schools?**

**In Oklahoma the number of out-of-field teachers (exceptions granted by
the State Board of Education) during the 2005-2006 school year was 63
teachers out of 56,536.**

In the State of Oklahoma we have policy and licensure requirements in
place that is a system of accountability. It is clear that with only 63
of 56,536 teachers, out-of-field teachers is not an issue for Oklahoma.
Data has continued to show us year after year that our system is
working.

The programs listed in the Specialized Knowledge and Skills section
would also apply to reducing the incidence of out-of-field teaching in
high-poverty, high-minority, and low-performing schools. These are
additional programs with the same focus.

-   Alternative Certification provides an opportunity for individuals
    with degrees and who take a subject area test to teach in Oklahoma
    accredited schools.

-   Scholarship Program to encourage teachers of hard-to-fill subjects
    and others in "critical need" occupations to work in specified
    high-need geographic areas of the state.

-   Teacher-to-Teacher.com is an online recruitment service for Oklahoma
    K-12 schools.

-   Troops to Teachers recruits military personnel from all the bases in
    Oklahoma and takes all applicants through the alternative
    certification process.

**D. Recruitment and Retention of Experienced Teachers**

**How is the state planning to build a critical mass of qualified,
experienced teachers willing to work in hard-to-staff schools?**

Currently, Oklahoma has a critical mass of qualified, experienced
teachers. We have examined the data and are focused on sharing
strategies with school districts that do not have a critical mass of
qualified, experienced teachers in hard-to-staff schools. This includes
many of our schools in the two largest school districts, Tulsa Public
School and Oklahoma City Public Schools. Each of these urban districts
has implemented programs to improve recruitment and retention. For
example, Tulsa Public Schools has been adding days to its school year
which increases teacher pay. Oklahoma City Public Schools has added
instructional facilitators in academic content areas that work
specifically with those sites in need of improvement to support and
assist teachers which increases retention in these hard-to-staff
schools.

The statewide activities proposed in this plan build on activities
already in place to recruit and retain highly qualified teachers and
administrators for Oklahoma public schools. They include policies to
facilitate the licensing of individuals and programs to recognize and
reward teachers.

**D.1 Alternative Certification Program**

The Oklahoma Alternative Placement Program provides an opportunity for
individuals with degrees to teach in Oklahoma accredited schools.
Degrees must come from an accredited institution of higher education
with a major in a field that corresponds to an area of specialization
for an elementary-secondary certificate (PK-12), a secondary
certificate, or a vocational technical certificate. To obtain licensure,
several criteria must be met.

Oklahoma allows additional subject areas to be added to an existing
license/certificate upon passing the subject test. Early Childhood and
Elementary Education certification may be added to a license/certificate
upon passing a subject area competency exam.

**Support Documentation for Oklahoma's Alternative
Licensure/Certification**

> Oklahoma law states that no teacher candidates shall be eligible for
> licensing until successfully completing a competency examination in
> the subject area. A teacher may be certified in as many areas as the
> teacher has successfully completed the subject area examination.
>
> **Oklahoma Subject Area Test by Teaching Areas**
>
> **Oklahoma General Education Test**
>
> **Oklahoma Professional Education Test**

**Background for Teacher Testing, Mentoring, and Professional
Development**

> The Teacher Reform Act of 1980 (House Bill 1706) established a
> procedure for teachers to meet an enhanced teacher education program,
> pass a subject area test (first test administered in January 1982), be
> issued a license, complete a mentor program, and participate in
> professional development activities throughout their professional
> teaching career.

**Upon employment Alternative Licenses may be renewed for three years.**
An alternatively licensed teacher must successfully complete Oklahoma's
Resident Teacher Program. At any time during the three years, the
teacher must also pass the Professional Education Examination and
complete a professional education component of 6-18 semester hours or 90
to 270 clock hours as outlined in a plan approved by the Oklahoma State
Department of Education and on file with the institution of higher
education.

**Oklahoma Alternative Licenses Issued for 2005-2006 School Year**

  ----------------------------------- -----------------------------------
  Certification Area                  Number of Licenses

  Art Education                       32

  Foreign Language                    30

  Language Arts                       85

  Mathematics                         70

  Music                               27

  Science                             133

  Social Studies                      290

                                      

  Total                               667
  ----------------------------------- -----------------------------------

**D.2 Troops to Teachers Program - \$10,000 Bonus to Teach in High-Need
Area**

Oklahoma supports the Troops to Teachers program, which is funded by the
U. S. State Department of Education and is on contract to the Department
of Defense (DOD) to administer the program through Defense Activity for
Non-Traditional Education Support (DANTES). The DOD and the Oklahoma
State Department of Education has a Memorandum of Agreement to
administer their program. Oklahoma recruits military personnel from all
the bases in Oklahoma and takes all applicants through the alternative
certification process. The applicants must meet all the qualifications
for certification. Troop participants receive a stipend up to \$5,000.00
and a stipend and/or a bonus up to \$10,000.00 to teach in a high-needs
area. There is a \$10,000.00 cap (stipend plus bonus) per individual
troop participant.

**D.3 Teacher Minority Recruitment Program**

Oklahoma Law 70 O. S. § 6-130 created the Minority Teacher Recruitment
Center under the auspices of the Oklahoma State Regents for Higher
Education in the interests of recruiting, retaining and placing minority
teachers in the public schools of the state of Oklahoma.

The Minority Teacher Recruitment Center supports the following
recruitment programs:

> • collegiate and middle school/high school grants
>
> • special events which highlight the teaching profession
>
> • professional development for teacher to develop \"grow your own\"
> programs
>
> • Future Educators Association chapters,
>
> • Academic Commitment to Education (ACE) high school curriculum
>
> • Leadership, Education and Achievement Program (LEAP) middle school
> curricula
>
> • collegiate programs designed to recruit those who are making
> transitions from other careers or areas of study.

All of the above are designed to recruit, retain and place minority
teachers in the public schools of the State of Oklahoma.

The appropriations to the Minority Teacher Recruitment Center for the
last four years are as follows:

2006. \$418,372

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2005. \$367,564

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2004. \$367,564

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2003. \$383,942

Based on the social security numbers that are available from 1998-1999
to 2004-2005, the following information has been provided by the
Oklahoma State Regents for Higher Education:

> Out of 526 college students who participated in Teacher Cadet or ACE
> and who provided social security numbers,
>
> 118 majored in teacher education in the Oklahoma public university
> system.
>
> 26 have teacher education degrees.
>
> 78% are majoring in education are still matriculating.
>
> 83% are White.
>
> 12% are Native American.
>
> 2% are Black.
>
> 1% are Asian.
>
> 2% are of unknown ethnicity.

These numbers do not reflect the collegiate programs sponsored by the
Minority Teacher Recruitment Center. Such stats are not available at
this time.

**D.4 Teachers-Teachers.com/oklahoma**

This is an online recruitment service for Oklahoma K-12 schools which
assists districts in rural areas and assists all districts in recruiting
hard-to-staff assignments and schools.

**D.5 Resident Teacher Program**

The Resident Teacher Program was initially implemented as a result of
the Teacher Reform Act of 1980 (House Bill 1706). In 1995, House Bill
1549 changed the name from Entry-Year Assistance Program to Resident
Teacher Program**.** Resident Teacher Program, during the initial year
of teaching in an accredited school, provides guidance and assistance of
a Resident Teacher Committee.

**The intent of legislation is to establish qualifications of teachers
in the accredited schools of Oklahoma through licensing and
certification requirements to ensure that the education of children of
Oklahoma will be provided by teachers of demonstrated ability**.

The licensed teacher is required to participate in the Resident Teacher
Program during the initial year of teaching in an accredited school
under the guidance and assistance of a Resident Teacher Committee in
order to qualify for an Oklahoma teaching certificate. The Resident
Teacher Committee consists of a mentor teacher, the principal, or an
assistant principal of the employing school or an administrator
designated by the local board, and a teacher educator in a college or
school of education of an institution of higher learning or an educator
in a department or school outside the institutions' teacher education
unit.

The Resident Teacher Committee is responsible for: 1) working with the
resident teacher to assist in all matters concerning classroom
management and professional development, 2) making a recommendation
regarding certification, and 3) making a recommendation for a
professional development program for the resident teacher, designed to
strengthen the resident teacher's teaching skills in any area identified
by the committee.

**D.6 State Improvement Grant for Recruitment, Retention and
Retraining**

Oklahoma was awarded a five-year State Improvement Grant (SIG) that
focused on the recruitment, retention, and retraining of special
education and related service personnel. Retention activities involved
providing first- and second-year teachers with mentors/coaches to ease
their transition from higher education into their own classrooms and
sustaining those supports for two years. These programs were called
FACETS and ASSETS. There were regular meetings, resources provided,
trainings, and evaluations. Every first-year teacher was provided with a
bag of resources to assist them in beginning their careers.

**Recruitment activities** included making presentations at high schools
and university classes. SIG staff also hosted booths at various
professional conferences, job fairs, and other events. Numerous
professional development activities were provided throughout the grant
in an effort to provide personnel with tools to enable them to be more
successful in serving students with disabilities. The SIG also provides
a free membership to all 540 LEAs for use of
\<teachers-teachers.com/Oklahoma) to post vacancies and search for
highly qualified candidates. Additionally, SIG maintains another Web
site for posting vacancies at \<oklahomateachingjobs.org\>.

**D.7 State Personnel Development Grant**

The SIG is in a no-cost extension that will end December 31, 2006.
Recently, SIG staff submitted a proposal to the USDE, Office of Special
Education Programs, for the State Personnel Development Grant (SPDG). As
of Friday, September 29, 2006, Oklahoma was awarded the SPDG for
implementation over a five year period. A major focus of the SPDG will
be assisting secondary special education teachers in becoming highly
qualified in a core content subject area. The SPDG will also attempt to
recruit highly qualified candidates interested in becoming certified in
special education. The pool of candidates will be drawn from existing
highly qualified regular education teachers and, specifically, those
that are alternatively certified. Tuition reimbursement for college
classes, review sessions for certification exams, and reimbursement for
passing certification exams will be provided to these successful
candidates. A stipend will be provided to those candidates who teach a
special education class one additional year after receiving special
education or core area certification.

For Another focus of the SPDG will be to continue to help provide
support to first-year teachers. The Special Education Services section
will be initiating a First-Year Teacher Academy where first-year
teachers are paired with mentors and provided training and support
through their first year. The SPDG will implement activities to continue
providing support during the second and third years of teaching, since
attrition is greatest within the first three years of teaching. These
activities will be an extension, or continuation, of the FACETS and
ASSETS programs.

**D.8 National Board Certification Scholarships**

Past proposed state legislation stated the following:

> *To fulfill the objectives of the Education Leadership Oklahoma Act,
> the Oklahoma Commission for Teacher Preparation shall:*
>
> *1. Inform teachers of the Education Leadership Oklahoma program and
> the scholarships and services it provides to teachers seeking National
> Board certification, emphasizing recruiting efforts toward teachers at
> schools on the school improvement list as determined by the State
> Department of Education pursuant to the No Child Left Behind Act, at
> schools where more than fifty percent of students qualify for the free
> and reduced price lunch program, and in districts with the lowest
> percentage of teachers who have achieved National Board
> certification.*
>
> *The Committee shall give preference to teachers at schools on the
> school improvement list as determined by the State Department of
> Education pursuant to the No Child Left Behind Act, at schools where
> more than fifty percent of students qualify for the free and reduced
> price lunch program, and in districts with the lowest percentage of
> teachers who have achieved National Board certification.*

**E. Professional Development**

**How is the state planning to strengthen the skills, knowledge, and
qualifications of teachers already working in high-poverty,
low-performing schools?**

**Program Focus**

Curriculum, assessment and federal program staff within the Oklahoma
Department of Education have developed training materials and routinely
conduct professional development activities for school district
personnel. These activities are conducted at the state, regional, and
local levels. They focus on curriculum, research-based instructional
strategies and the use of data to inform instruction, strategies for
special populations including students with Individualized Education
Programs, English Language Learners, and racial and ethnic education.

**E.1 Master Teacher Project (Title II Part A funding)**

The Master Teacher program is a state-wide teacher coaching program to
assist teachers in the lowest-performing schools. Master teachers in
core content areas receive a \$1,000 stipend for providing coaching
within school and/or schools within the geographic area. Master teachers
represent some of the low performing schools and provide professional
development upon request to other low performing schools. The 2005-2006
Master Teacher Program focused on high-quality professional development
for special education teachers and English Language Learning Teachers.

Oklahoma Master Teacher participants receive extensive training
throughout the academic year in standards-based instruction, curriculum
alignment and mapping, data-driven decision making, standards and
testing alignment, and accommodations for closing the achievement gap.

***Project Rationale:***

-   Increase the number of highly-qualified teachers in each region of
    the state by developing their knowledge of specific content and
    instructional strategies related to the content.

-   Increase the number of students who reach satisfactory or advanced
    levels in the Oklahoma School Testing Program.

-   Use community and higher education resources including the
    involvement of business and industry to provide a network of support
    for teachers in each region.

-   Develop strategies to close the achievement gap among sub-groups of
    students.

***Program Growth:***

2003-2004 20 members

2004-2005 55 members

2005-2006 65 members

**E.2 Curriculum Walk Through Training (Title II, Part A funding)**

Curriculum Walk Through training is provided for all administrators in
school improvement status schools; all Reading First principals.

In 2006-2007 TPS has requested that all administrators be trained in
Curriculum Walkthroughs

***Increase*** student achievement

***Talk with teachers*** about improvement in teaching and learning

***Assess curriculum*** and instructional alignment on a day-to-day
basis

A tool to ***enhance classroom*** visits

Technology tools for ***data management***

In today's climate of high standards and accountability, it is important
that instructional leaders are able to spend considerable time in the
classrooms collecting data, coaching, and supporting quality classroom
instruction. Many of our superintendents and principals have never
received solid, research-based training to help achieve that goal. As a
result, it is not unusual for a teacher to receive a classroom visit
only when written evaluations are required.

**Curriculum Walk-Through (CWT)** for *Improved Teaching and Learning*
provides:

> • A brief classroom visit structure and process that focuses on
> teaching and learning

• Skills to analyze teaching and learning through frequent, brief
classroom visits

> • A powerful strategy for increasing student achievement
>
> • Effective data-gathering strategies
>
> • Curriculum analysis skills
>
> • Means for aligning instruction
>
> • Use of reflective prompts for providing feedback
>
> • Methodology for analyzing the classroom for feedback purposes

CWT provides *"look fors"* that become a source for real-time data used
by site decision-makers to design professional development to support
school improvement planning. Follow-up reflection, practiced during the
day-long training session, enhances communication between an
instructional leader and teacher. Participants receive a resource
notebook, three books for their professional libraries (recommended),
and accompanying supplies to start their Curriculum Walk Throughs.

**School Improvement Sites trained in the Curriculum Walk Through
process: 52**

**School administrators trained in the Curriculum Walk Through process:
710**

**E.3 Mathematics and Science Partnerships (Title II, Part B)**

Targeted statewide professional development is provided to strengthen
teacher content knowledge. In the Mathematics and Science partnerships
teachers in target schools receive customized training and in-depth
professional development in mathematics and science.

**E.4** **PASSport II** **(Title II, Part D funding) SPECIAL EDUCATION
VIDEO VIGNETTES**

PASSPort II is an online database and lesson planner aligned to the
state academic content standards to assist teachers in providing
content-rich lessons. The Oklahoma State Department of Education has
also provided MarcoPolo/PASSport II training to students in teacher
preparation programs to increase the levels of expertise among potential
teacher candidates in the instructional uses of technology. These
training sessions have been conducted at Oklahoma Baptist University and
Oklahoma City University.

**E.5 Videoconferences (Title II, Part A funding) Specific topics for
special education teachers and middle school language arts and
mathematics.**

The videoconference system makes it possible for administrators and
teachers in many locations across the state of Oklahoma to participate
in professional development and to receive technical assistance
concerning many subject areas. Two-way audio and video communication
among 10 sites is useful for delivering information while reducing
costly travel expenses, and it permits more efficient use of time for
participants and presenters.

Curriculum specialists provide information on scientifically based
research, updates on state and federal guidelines and legislation, grant
opportunities, and innovative practices during regularly scheduled
videoconferences. Specialists also provide individualized technical and
professional assistance through "point-to-point" conferences with one
school, or even one teacher.

**F. Specialized Knowledge and Skills**

**How is the state planning to ensure that teachers have the specialized
knowledge and skills they need to be effective with the populations of
students typically served in high-poverty, low-performing schools
(including Native American students, English language learners, and
other students at risk)?**

Oklahoma data identifies teachers of special education students and
English language learners as populations that require additional
professional development for teachers to be highly effective. In
addition, data identifies teachers of middle school mathematics as an
area of need for high quality professional development. The following
professional development strategies and programs are designed to ensure
that teachers have the specialized knowledge and skills they need to be
effective with these populations, particularly in high-poverty,
low-performing schools.

**F.1 Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol (SIOP) (Title III
funding) 36,000 --**

SIOP is particularly for English Language Learners, professional
development provided for all Master Teachers in 2005-2006. Additional
training in SIOP is provided for School Support Team members and schools
identified in school improvement status.

Sheltered instruction is an approach for teaching content to English
Language Learners (ELLs) in strategic ways to make subject matter
concepts comprehensible, while promoting students' English language
development. The Oklahoma State Department of Education, through the
Title III office, provides free educator training in Sheltered
Observation Instruction Protocol (SIOP). This SIOP training includes
eight components: Lesson Preparation; Building Background;
Comprehensible Input; Strategies; Interaction; Practice and Application;
Lesson Delivery; and Indicators of Review and Assessment. Special
Education teachers participated in SIOP training July 17^th^ and 18^th^
and July 25^th^ and 26^th^, 2006, one in Oklahoma City and one in Tulsa.

**F.2** **Oklahoma Mathematics Academies (Title II, Part A funding)**
were designed for Middle Level Mathematics Teachers and Algebra I
Teachers who are willing to train and collaborate with other teachers in
their region and serve as Teacher Leaders.

**Purpose:**

To develop Middle Level Mathematics Teachers and Algebra I Teachers who
are willing to train and collaborate with other teachers in their region
and serve as Teacher Leaders whose duties include:

1.  Attending a four-day summer Professional Development Institute (PDI)
    in Oklahoma City. The PDI will focus on training in standards-based
    instruction, alignment of curriculum with assessment, and closing
    the achievement gaps for all students in middle level mathematics
    and Algebra I.

2.  Training teachers in their region in the content listed above
    through lesson study group sessions and videoconferences during the
    school year.

**Project Rationale:**

> 1\. To increase the number of highly qualified teachers in each region
> of the state by enhancing their content knowledge and instructional
> strategies.
>
> 2\. To increase the number of quality classrooms in which educators
> teach Oklahoma's Priority Academic Student Skills (PASS) in
> mathematics on grade level.
>
> 3\. To increase the number of students who reach the satisfactory and
> advanced levels of academic standards as assessed on the Oklahoma Core
> Curriculum Tests.

**Project Narrative:**

The State Superintendent's 2005 Mathematics Academy uses a "train the
trainer" model of instruction and includes forty (40) teachers from
various regions in the state of Oklahoma. Twenty teachers had teaching
assignments of Grades 6-8 Mathematics, and twenty teachers will had
teaching assignments of Algebra I at any grade level for the 2005-2006
school year. Teachers participated in a four-day professional
development institute in the Oklahoma City area conducted by Kerri
White, Director of Mathematics Education, during the summer of 2005.
Teachers also conducted lesson study groups of at least ten teachers in
their home regions during the 2005-2006 school year and participated in
periodic videoconferences as follow-up of the summer institutes.

The summer PDI focused on aligning high quality mathematics problems
with Oklahoma's *Priority Academic Student Skills (PASS)*, developing
research-based instructional strategies, and closing the achievement gap
for all students in accordance with No Child Left Behind (NCLB).
Regional lesson study groups conducted by the forty Mathematics Academy
participants translated the summer PDI instruction to teachers around
the state. Periodic videoconferences during the 2005-2006 school year
allowed teachers to discuss successes and set-backs in their classroom
experiences and seek further enhancement of instructional practices.

**Deliverables and Evaluation:**

The 2005 Mathematics Academy produced the following deliverables for the
State Department of Education:

1.  A toolkit of at least 80 power lessons aligned to PASS at various
    grade levels for classroom available to Oklahoma educators.

2.  A toolkit webpage containing all 80 lessons on the state Mathematics
    Education website.

3.  Monthly videoconferences and teaching video vignettes.

The 2005 Mathematics Academy will be evaluated on meeting the purposes
listed above through the following:

1.  Participant portfolios highlighting teacher attitudes and changes in
    classroom practices.

2.  Pre- and Post-testing of curriculum alignment surveys.

3.  Higher student scores on Oklahoma Core Curriculum Tests over time.

**F.3 Oklahoma Mathematics Improvement Program** provides an opportunity
for mathematics teachers in grades six, seven, and eight to participate
in professional development to improve content knowledge. After the
professional development, teachers who take and pass the Intermediate
Mathematics certification test receive a \$1,000 stipend.

**F.4 Oklahoma Reading Academies (Title I, Part B, Subpart 1 funding)
Special education teachers have participated in this program to become
highly qualified in this area of reading.**

These academies provide two college courses to prepare elementary
reading teachers. This opportunity is available to all teachers
including special education teachers.

The Oklahoma Reading Academy is committed to helping teachers achieve
success through effective professional development. The Academy content
is independent of any specific reading program.

The Academy offers professional development program combining online
learning with face-to-face study group interaction and classroom based
practice activities that foster student achievement. K-8 teachers
participate in a nine-month learning experience based at their school.

Teachers spend approximately 10 hours per month in:

Self-paced online/web-based learning and communication

Classroom based practice and assessment activities

School based study teams facilitated by a coach

Through the experience, teachers will:

Develop a shared knowledge of scientifically based reading research

> Apply and practice proven instructional strategies in their classroom
> throughout the year.

Build a collaborative learning community to reinforce their training
experience.

**The Academy Courses include:**

**Course 1: Foundations of Reading**

Module 1: Reading Academy Introduction

Module 2: Phonological Awareness and Phonemic Awareness

Module 3: The Alphabetic Principle and Phonics

Module 4: Word Study

Module 5: Fluency

Module 6: Vocabulary

Module 7: Comprehension I

Module 8: Comprehension II

**Course 2: Reading for Understanding**

Module 1: Challenges and Approach

> Module 2: Finding a Starting Point: Gauging Readers' Skills and
> Selecting

Readings for Growth

Module 3: Advancing Readers' Motivation

Module 4: Building Readers' Vocabulary Knowledge

Module 5: Developing Focused Strategic Readers of Literature

Module 6: Developing Focused Strategic Readers of Information

Module 7: Encouraging Understanding Through Discussion

Module 8: Developing Focused Strategic Readers of Literature

Module 9: Encouraging Lifelong Reading

**F.5 Reading First Teacher Reading Academies ((Title I, Part B, Subpart
1 funding)**

Oklahoma, in its federally-approved Reading First plan, outlined
professional development services for Reading First and non-Reading
First schools. One of those services included the delivery of four-day
professional development institutes called "Teacher Reading Academies."
These Academies are grade level specific training in scientifically
based reading research including instructional strategies and
assessments. The Academies have also been customized to include Oklahoma
state standards, *Priority Academic Student Skills (PASS)*. In the two
summers that Reading First has offered these institutes, over 1,400
teachers, interventionists, reading coaches, and administrators have
been trained.

**F.6 Special Education State Personnel Development Grant** will focus
on special education teachers in becoming highly qualified in a core
content subject area.

**F.7** Technical assistance relating to meeting the requirements of
highly qualified for all teachers, including special education teachers
will occur throughout the 2006-2007 school year. In September, Dr.
Marilyn Friend, Chairperson and Professor of Education in the Department
of Specialized Education Services at the University of North Carolina
will share with participants effective strategies for special education
teachers to co-teach and collaboratively teach to provide instruction to
special education students in core academic subject areas. September
21-22, 2006 the State Superintendent's Conference for Special Education
teachers and directors will feature sessions on professional development
and other resources available for teachers to meet the highly qualified
requirements if as a special education teacher they are providing direct
instruction in core academic content areas.

**F.8** State provides **Advanced Placement professional development**
for vertical teams (middle school and high school) for Pre-AP and AP
teachers at no cost in core content areas. This includes schools with
high-poverty, high minority and low-performing schools.

**Oklahoma Advanced Placement Incentives Program - Professional
Development (Oklahoma state funding)**

Professional Development for teachers, counselors, and administrators
related to Advanced Placement, Pre-Advanced Placement, or International
Baccalaureate is funded by the state of Oklahoma.

Teachers who are awarded First Time Materials and Equipment grants must
attend the corresponding Advanced Placement or International
Baccalaureate professional development within one year of receiving the
grant. Copies of the certificate of completion from the professional
development attended must be sent to the State Department of Education
for verification.

Recipients of the Vertical Team grant must include all teachers within a
subject area in Grades 7-12. Vertical Team members must participate in
the corresponding subject area and vertical team training as offered by
the Advanced Placement or International Baccalaureate programs.

**Please see information below for statistics of students participating
in Advanced Placement programs based on teachers trained in Advanced
Placement. The AP program is available in high-poverty and low-poverty
schools and high minority schools.**

**Overall Participation and Performance**

2004: 9,872 public school students took AP exams

2005: 10,323 public school students took AP exams

**American Indian Student Participation**

The number of American Indian students in Oklahoma public schools taking
an AP Exam from 1995-2000 grew by 301.

Since 2000, the number of American Indian students in Oklahoma public
schools taking an AP Exam has grown by 435.

**African American Student Participation**

The number of African American students in Oklahoma public schools
taking an AP Exam from 1995-2000 grew by 210.

Since 2000, the number of African American students in Oklahoma public
schools taking an AP exam has grown by 263.

**Hispanic Student Participation**

The number of Hispanic students in Oklahoma public schools taking an AP
exam from 1995-2000 grew by 158.

Since 2000, the number of Hispanic students in Oklahoma public schools
taking an AP Exam has grown by 383.

**Low-income Student Participation**

Since 2000, the number of AP Exams taken by low-income Oklahoma public
school students has grown by 2,427.

By way of contrast, the number of AP Exams taken by low-income Oklahoma
public school students from 1995 to 2000 grew by 615.

The Oklahoma Advanced Placement Program provides access to all teachers
to receive high quality professional development in the content areas
and in turn, provides access to students from high-poverty, high
minority, low-performing schools.

**G. Working Conditions**

**How is the state planning to improve the conditions in hard-to-staff
schools that contribute to excessively high rates of teacher turnover?**

**MAPS for Kids in Oklahoma City Public Schools -- Providing Equitable
Environment for High-Poverty, High-Minority Students**

Oklahoma City Public Schools (OCPS) has been providing services to
stakeholders since 1891. It is a large urban district that covers 136
square miles and include the municipalities( or parts) of Oklahoma City,
Nicoma Park, Spencer, Nichols Hills, The Village, Midwest City, Del
City, and Valley Brook. OCPS have 90 schools, including 9 charter
schools and enrollment is about 40,000 in grades Pk-12. Currently, 84.5%
of our students are eligible for free and reduced lunch. Fifteen percent
of students have IEPS and nearly 25% of students speak a language other
than English at home which represents more than 50 native languages.

Oklahoma City Public Schools is operating the largest construction and
modernization project of its kind called Maps for Kids (MAPS). MAPS. is
a sales tax and bond issue that was passed by the citizens of Oklahoma
City in November, 2001. This ten-year, \$531 million initiative will
enable the district's children to attend school in first-rate facilities
with state- of- the- art equipment. At the end of 2008, OCPS will open
five new schools which include 3 new high schools and 2 elementary
schools. OCPS will receive an estimated \$52 million for technology
projects.[^1]

**G.1 National Board Certification**

Oklahoma has 1,306 National Board Certified Teachers, making it ninth
nationally in the number of teachers holding national certification.
Oklahoma also ranks 5^th^ in the nation for the percentage of National
Board Certified Teachers, compared to the total number of teachers in
the state.

According to Oklahoma statute, subject to the availability of funds, the
State Board of Education provides a \$5,000 bonus annually no later than
January 31 to teachers who attain National Board Certification and are
employed by a public school district on a full-time basis as a classroom
teacher, counselor, or librarian. National Board Certified Teacher
Scholarship Program assists teacher candidates with fees for program
application.

**G.2 Teacher of the Year Program**

The Oklahoma Teacher of the Year Program recognizes outstanding
teachers. The Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO), sponsor of
the National Teacher of the Year program, has found Oklahoma provides
the best recognition program for its Teacher of the Year. The Oklahoma
Teacher of the Year serves as the state's Ambassador for Teaching,
representing Oklahoma in national selection, sharing knowledge and
resources with fellow educators around the state, and encouraging
education as a profession. For 2005-2006, the State Teacher of the Year
received more than \$8,000 in cash and prizes.

**G.3 Milken National Educator Awards**

The purpose of the Oklahoma Milken Educator Network is to serve as a
resource to promote and enhance quality educators in the state:

-   By attracting new educators and encouraging our quality educators to
    stay in the profession.

-   By acting as a voice for educational policy.

-   By increasing communication among members, communities and state
    government.

The Milken National Educator Award Program is the largest teacher
recognition program in the United States. The awards were created to
reward, retain, and attract the highest quality K-12 educators to the
profession. Each Milken Educator receives an unrestricted financial
award of \$25,000 and an all-expenses-paid trip to Washington, D.C. to
participate in the annual Milken National Education Conference held each
May.

As Milken recipients, educators are able to join the The Milken Educator
Network. The network is a voluntary association of more than 2,100
Milken Educators and other exemplary educators and business leaders from
across the country who are dedicated to improving teacher quality and
utilizing research and expertise to shape education policy at state and
local levels.

The Oklahoma Milken Educator Network is dedicated to making a positive
impact on Oklahoma professional development and supporting highly
qualified teachers. Each year Oklahoma Milken Educators serve as
presenters at the Teacher Quality Conference sponsored by the Oklahoma
State Department of Education. The Oklahoma Milken Educator Program
began in 2000 and has had seventeen recipients awarded a total of
\$425,000.

**G.4 Teachers-Teachers.com/oklahoma (Online recruitment service for
Oklahoma K-12 school districts)**

In a continuing effort to recruit qualified education personnel for all
Oklahoma public school districts, the Oklahoma State Department of
Education Special Education Improvement Grant provides each school
district with a FREE membership to Teachers-Teachers.com. Oklahoma
recruiters use Teachers-Teachers.com to post vacancies as well as search
the database for qualified candidates. Since its inception in Oklahoma,
249 school districts have made use of this site for recruiting highly
qualified teachers. The pool of candidates nationwide has increased to
over 300,000. This service is funded through the Special Education State
Improvement Grant and assists district administrators in hiring highly
qualified teachers. This is especially helpful to rural Oklahoma
districts and for shortage teaching areas.

**G.5 Supply and Demand Data**

Data is collected on the supply and demand of teachers and reported to
the State Board of Education monthly.

**G. 6 Special Education Teachers 5% Above Minimum Salary Schedule**

Qualified and properly certified teachers of special education shall be
paid a minimum of five percent (5%) above the prevailing wage paid
teachers of children who are nondisabled in the same school district. 70
O.S. § 13-110.

**G.7 Academic Achievement Award**

House Bill 1992 is a new law, which relates to the development of an
Academic Achievement Award (AAA) program by the Oklahoma State Board of
Education. The bill became effective July 1, 2005. The AAA program was
developed by the Oklahoma State Board of Education. The program provides
monetary awards to qualified school employees that attain the:

1\) highest overall student achievement and

2\) the highest annual improvement in student achievement as measured by
the Academic performance Index (API) in each of the five groups based
upon Average Daily membership.

The awards are provided no later than January 31 of each year.

The bill provides for the determination of the school sites in each of
the five groups that achieve the highest score for items one and two
mentioned above. Methodology for a tiebreaker is provided by first
comparing the current year's API data to that of the previous year; and
next, using reading achievement assessments.

"Qualified employee" means certified personnel employed for at least
one-half of the school year from which the student test data was derived
*and* at least one-half of the school year during which the provided
awards will be paid.

Awards are not included in the calculation of a teacher's salary for the
purpose of meeting the state minimum salary schedule or for calculating
Oklahoma Teachers' Retirement System contributions or benefits. No
school district is liable for the payment of awards pursuant to this
section.

Oklahoma continually works to provide high quality professional
development and technical assistance to all schools, particularly
high-poverty; high-minority; and low-performing schools. This is a
continuous process to provide support to teachers so that they may reach
the highly qualified requirements and become highly effective teachers.

**H. Policy Coherence**

**How is the state planning to improve internal processes or revise
state policies that may inadvertently contribute to local staffing
inequities?**

**H.1 Oklahoma Web-based Educator Credentialing System**

Reduce time required to process teacher certification applications with
online teacher certification data system, the Oklahoma Web-based
Educator Credentialing System, to be implemented during the 2006-2007
school year. 2006-2007 **Oklahoma Web-based Educator Credentialing
System** will provide essential data on teachers to determine highly
qualified status 2006 state legislation requires Professional
Development data-driven approach to meet five measurable goals aligned
to the teaching of core content areas.

**H.2 Oklahoma Academic Achievement Awards**

State Academic Achievement Awards provide monetary awards to all
teachers in schools with the highest academic performance index in five
enrollment categories and the team of teachers closing the achievement
gap in five enrollment categories.

**H.3 Senate Bill 1485 (70 O.S. § 6-194) Professional Development
Requirements**

This state legislation provides that each professional development
committee, in developing program recommendations shall annually utilize
a data-driven approach to analyze student data and determine district
and school professional development needs. The professional development
programs adopted shall be directed toward development of competencies
and instructional strategies in the core curriculum areas for the
following goals:

6.  Increasing the academic performance index scores for the district
    and each school site;

7.  Closing the achievement gaps among student groups;

8.  Increasing student achievement as demonstrated on state-mandated
    tests and the ACT;

9.  Increasing high school graduation rates; and

10. Decreasing college remediation rates.

***6.2 Does the plan identify where inequities in teacher assignment
exist?***

***Further Analysis Reveals Inequities (See chart at the beginning of
Requirement 6)***

***The OSDE initially prioritized our 540 school districts by the
percent of classes taught by non-highly qualified teachers. However, the
second phase of our analysis -- at school site level -- clearly
demonstrated that in districts with multiple school sites, the large
numbers used for district level analysis obscured the inequities within
the district. Only 107 districts appeared to have a disproportionate
percent of classes (greater than 10%) taught by non-highly qualified
teachers when the classes for the entire district were considered as a
whole. When the site-level analysis was done, 443 sites in 219 districts
were identified as having greater than 10 percent of classes taught by
non-highly qualified teachers. Consequently the OSDE has revised its
strategy to target the individual school sites, prioritizing the 443
sites into three target groups.***

***Being aware of these inequities, allows us to focus technical
assistance and services to all districts to ensure that all students
have experienced, highly qualified teachers. Although every district is
required to have an individual plan for each teacher that is not highly
qualified, the data provides us with an awareness of specific district,
site and teacher priorities.***

***6.3 Does the plan delineate specific strategies for addressing
inequities in teacher assignment?***

***Every district will have a plan to meet the needs of teachers who are
not highly qualified. On-site monitoring of the districts that have
sites with the greatest number of non-highly qualified districts will
occur for the 2006-2007 school year to determine.***

**Equitable Teacher Distribution -- Suggested Strategies for Districts**

**6.3.1 Provide specialized training for teachers working in challenging
classrooms. Some examples follow.**

-   Oklahoma sponsored Dr. Joe Johnson June 27^th^ and 28^th^, 2006 to
    work specifically with teachers and administrators with effective
    strategies to improve student achievement aligned to Oklahoma's Nine
    Essential Elements research-based document.

-   Oklahoma provided professional development with Dr. Melvina
    Phillips, National Association of Secondary School Principals
    practitioner and author of the book, *Creating a Culture of
    Literacy: A Guide for Middle and High School Principals*. Dr.
    Phillips will return October 4, 2006 to provide interactive
    professional development for secondary educators including
    principals and teacher teams to provide effective reading
    opportunities for adolescents.

-   On July 10, 2006, Larry Bell, noted for providing strategies to
    close the achievement gap provided professional development
    available to all teachers and administrators.

-   Oklahoma State Department of Education will provide a series of six
    School Improvement professional development conferences, beginning
    in October, 2006, with a focus on helping all schools operate at
    advanced levels of teacher effectiveness. Dr. Robert Marzano will
    share his research-based strategies, *What Works in Schools*. All
    schools participating will take the online survey and data will be
    analyzed and returned to determine professional development needs.
    Books to be used in this professional development include: *What
    Works in Schools; Building Background Knowledge; and Building
    Academic Vocabulary.*

**Improve working conditions in high-need schools so they can compete
for the best teachers.**

-   The Title I School Support teams visit the school improvement sites
    in Years 2, 3, 4, and 5 to provide support and resources for
    high-need schools.

-   The two largest school districts in the state of Oklahoma, have
    implemented successful strategies for teachers and students
    including the use of instructional facilitators in the areas of
    mathematics and reading.

    2.  **Provide strong principal, mentoring, resources, assistance in
        working with parents and the community and structure for an
        environment for learning.**

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-   Oklahoma provides all administrators training in the State Standards
    for the evaluation of teachers.

-   Curriculum Walk Through Training is available upon request from the
    Oklahoma Office of Standards and Curriculum. Most of the school
    improvement sites have received this training as well as all Reading
    First sites.

-   Best Practices examples have been the focus of multiple
    videoconferences from Title I Distinguished Schools; Academic
    Achievement Award schools; and one of five 2006 Excellence Award
    winners of the National Center for Urban School Transformation,
    Linwood Elementary School, Oklahoma City Public Schools. These
    identified schools provide first hand information for districts on
    mentoring, resources, parents and community involvement and how to
    create professional learning communities.

-   Principals' Leadership Academy is a series of five professional
    development seminars designed to help PreK-12 principals enhance
    their leadership and management skills.

-   New Principal Assistance Program based on national standards
    provides skills necessary for successful school leadership.

-   Oklahoma Educators Leadership Academies provide principals and
    superintendents high quality leadership training in the summer with
    four follow-up sessions in the fall and spring.

    2.  **Use the Oklahoma Nine Essential Elements document to guide
        LEAs and schools in promoting a culture for teacher and student
        learning in all schools but particularly in school improvement
        schools. This document supports not only teacher quality but
        teacher effectiveness.** This document has been distributed to
        every superintendent and principal and is available online. The
        Oklahoma Nine Essential Elements research-based document is used
        to guide the process of the School Support Teams that coach and
        support sites and districts identified for school improvement.
        Numerous presentations have been made for the use of the Nine
        Essential Elements rubric including July 7, 2006 at the State
        Superintendent's Leadership Conference.

Oklahoma will be piloting a new technology, the Logi Tech pen with the
Nine Essential Elements document for use by the School Support Team
members to document observations and for writing recommended strategies
and resources for School Improvement sites they are coaching.

***6.4 Does the plan provide evidence for the probable success of the
strategies it includes?***

The strategies implemented to ensure equitable distribution of
experienced teachers in high-minority and high-poverty schools are
research-based and have proven successful across the nation.

**Oklahoma Title II, Part A Equity Plan**

**Requirement 6:** Listed below are some new strategies for Oklahoma.
The State will be gathering baseline data during the 2006-2007
school-year and will continue to gather qualitative and quantitative
feedback from districts implementing these strategies over the next five
years to determine effectiveness with Oklahoma schools.

In addition, some strategies listed below have been in place in Oklahoma
for a number of years and data has been collected relative to these
programs and strategies. All these strategies have been identified and
implemented in Oklahoma to address teacher quality, equity, recruitment
and retention.

+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| **S       | **Data   | **Years | **Evidence | **Collected By**      |
| trategy** | Type**   | of Data | of         |                       |
|           |          | Colle   | Effec      |                       |
|           |          | ction** | tiveness** |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| Future    | Quan     | 2006    | \# of      | okhighered.org/stude  |
| Teacher   | titative |         | teachers   | nt-center/financial-a |
| Sch       |          |         | that are   | id/future-teach.shtm. |
| olarships |          |         | hired      |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| Teacher   | Quan     | 2006    | \# of      | Oklahoma State        |
| Shortage  | titative |         | teachers   | Regents for Higher    |
| E         |          |         | in         | Education             |
| mployment |          |         | shortage   |                       |
| Incentive |          |         | areas      |                       |
| Program   |          |         |            |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| Teacher   | Quan     | 2006    | \# of      | Oklahoma State        |
| Loan      | titative |         | teachers   | Regents for Higher    |
| Fo        |          |         | entering   | Education             |
| rgiveness |          |         | program    |                       |
| Program   |          |         | and \#     | Oklahoma State        |
|           |          |         | receiving  | Department of         |
|           |          |         | benefit    | Education             |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| National  | Quan     | 20      | Number of  | Oklahoma State        |
| G         | titative | 05-2006 | Teachers   | Regents for Higher    |
| overnor's |          |         | Becoming   | Education             |
| As        |          |         | Nationally |                       |
| sociation |          |         | Board      |                       |
| Grant     |          |         | Certified  |                       |
|           |          |         | in urban   |                       |
|           |          |         | district   |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| Al        | Quan     | 2006    | \# of      | Oklahoma State        |
| ternative | titative | begin   | Teachers   | Department of         |
| Cert      |          | data    | Employed   | Education             |
| ification |          | col     |            |                       |
| Program   |          | lection | \# of      | Professional          |
|           |          |         | Years      | Standards Division    |
|           |          |         | Teachers   |                       |
|           |          |         | Remain     |                       |
|           |          |         | Employed   |                       |
|           |          |         |            |                       |
|           |          |         | \# of      |                       |
|           |          |         | Teachers   |                       |
|           |          |         | Employed   |                       |
|           |          |         | in Hard to |                       |
|           |          |         | Staff      |                       |
|           |          |         | Content    |                       |
|           |          |         | Areas      |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+

+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| **S       | **Data   | **Years | **Evidence | **Collected By**      |
| trategy** | Type**   | of Data | of         |                       |
|           |          | Colle   | Effec      |                       |
|           |          | ction** | tiveness** |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| Troops to | Quan     | 2006    | \# of      | Oklahoma State        |
| Teachers  | titative |         | Troops to  | Department of         |
| Program   |          |         | Teachers   | Education             |
|           |          |         | Candidates |                       |
|           |          |         | that teach | Professional          |
|           |          |         | in         | Standards Division    |
|           |          |         | high-needs |                       |
|           |          |         | area. \#   |                       |
|           |          |         | of years   |                       |
|           |          |         | Troops to  |                       |
|           |          |         | Teachers   |                       |
|           |          |         | remain     |                       |
|           |          |         | employed.  |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| Teacher   | Quan     | 19      | \# of      | Oklahoma State        |
| Minority  | titative | 98-2005 | minority   | Regents for Higher    |
| Re        |          |         | teachers   | Education             |
| cruitment |          |         | completing |                       |
| Program   |          |         | teacher    |                       |
|           |          |         | education  |                       |
|           |          |         | degree     |                       |
|           |          |         | re         |                       |
|           |          |         | quirements |                       |
|           |          |         | and        |                       |
|           |          |         | teaching   |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| Teachers- | Quan     | 20      | \# of      | Oklahoma State        |
| Teachers. | titative | 05-2006 | teachers   | Department of         |
|           |          |         | employed   | Education             |
| com/      |          | Plan to | in         |                       |
|           |          | c       | Oklahoma   | Special Education     |
| Oklahoma  |          | ontinue | from       | Division              |
|           |          | for the | T          |                       |
|           |          | d       | eachers-Te |                       |
|           |          | uration | achers.com |                       |
|           |          | of SPDG |            |                       |
|           |          | -- 5    | In rural,  |                       |
|           |          | years   | suburban   |                       |
|           |          |         | and urban  |                       |
|           |          |         | areas and  |                       |
|           |          |         | high       |                       |
|           |          |         | poverty,   |                       |
|           |          |         | high       |                       |
|           |          |         | minority   |                       |
|           |          |         | schools    |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| Resident  | Quan     | 1982-   | \# of      | Oklahoma State        |
| Teacher   | titative |         | teachers   | Department of         |
| Program   |          | 2006-   | par        | Education             |
|           |          |         | ticipating |                       |
|           |          |         | each year  | Professional          |
|           |          |         | and \# of  | Standards Division    |
|           |          |         | years      |                       |
|           |          |         | retained   |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| State     | Quan     | 19      | \# of      | Oklahoma State        |
| Im        | titative | 99-2006 | special    | Department of         |
| provement | and      |         | education  | Education             |
| Grant     | Qua      |         | teachers   |                       |
| Rec       | litative |         | recruited  | Special Education     |
| ruitment, |          |         | and        | Division              |
| Retention |          |         | retained   |                       |
| and       |          |         |            |                       |
| R         |          |         |            |                       |
| etraining |          |         |            |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| State     | Quan     | 20      | Number of  | Oklahoma State        |
| Personnel | titative | 06-2011 | highly     | Department of         |
| De        |          |         | qualified  | Education             |
| velopment |          |         | special    |                       |
| Grant     |          |         | education  | Special Education     |
|           |          |         | teachers   | Division              |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+

+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| **S       | **Data   | **Years | **Evidence | **Collected By**      |
| trategy** | Type**   | of Data | of         |                       |
|           |          | Colle   | Effec      |                       |
|           |          | ction** | tiveness** |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| National  | Quan     | 1999-   | \# of      | Oklahoma State        |
| Board     | titative |         | teachers   | Department of         |
| Cert      |          |         | certified  | Education             |
| ification |          |         |            |                       |
| Sch       |          |         | \# in high | Professional          |
| olarships |          |         | poverty,   | Standards Division    |
|           |          |         | high       |                       |
|           |          |         | minority   |                       |
|           |          |         | schools    |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| Master    | Quan     | 20      | Program    | Oklahoma State        |
| Teacher   | titative | 03-2008 | growth     | Department of         |
| Project   | and      |         |            | Education             |
|           | Qua      |         | Regional   |                       |
|           | litative |         | C          | Office of Standards   |
|           |          |         | onferences | and Curriculum        |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| C         | Quan     | 2004-   | Program    | Oklahoma State        |
| urriculum | titative |         | growth     | Department of         |
| Walk      | and      |         |            | Education             |
| Through   | Qua      |         | P          |                       |
| Training  | litative |         | articipant | Office of Standards   |
|           |          |         | Comments   | and Curriculum        |
|           |          |         |            |                       |
|           |          |         | Number of  |                       |
|           |          |         | School     |                       |
|           |          |         | I          |                       |
|           |          |         | mprovement |                       |
|           |          |         | Sites      |                       |
|           |          |         | Trained    |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| Ma        | Quan     | 2004-   | Program    | Oklahoma State        |
| thematics | titative | 2008    | par        | Department of         |
| and       | and      |         | ticipation | Education             |
| Science   | Qua      |         | in         |                       |
| Par       | litative |         | hig        | Office of Standards   |
| tnerships |          |         | h-poverty, | and Curriculum        |
|           |          |         | high       |                       |
|           |          |         | minority   |                       |
|           |          |         | schools    |                       |
|           |          |         | identified |                       |
|           |          |         |            |                       |
|           |          |         | Surveys of |                       |
|           |          |         | Enacted    |                       |
|           |          |         | Curriculum |                       |
|           |          |         | Results    |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| PASSport  | Quan     | 2006-   | Count \#   | Oklahoma State        |
| II        | titative |         | of users   | Department of         |
| Special   | and      |         | to         | Education             |
| Education | Qua      |         | PASSport   |                       |
| Video     | litative |         | II         | Office of Standards   |
| Vignettes |          |         |            | and Curriculum        |
|           |          |         | Feedback   |                       |
|           |          |         | from users |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| Videocon  | Quan     | 2000-   | \# of      | Oklahoma State        |
| fer-ences | titative |         | pa         | Department of         |
|           | and      |         | rticipants | Education Office of   |
|           | Qua      |         | e          | Standards and         |
|           | litative |         | valuations | Curriculum            |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| Sheltered | Quan     | 2004-   | \# of      | Oklahoma State        |
| In        | titative |         | educators  | Department of         |
| struction | and      |         | trained    | Education             |
| Ob        | Qua      |         | Reported   |                       |
| servation | litative |         | use in     | Professional          |
| Protocol  |          |         | classrooms | Standards Division    |
| (SIOP)    |          |         |            |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+

+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| **S       | **Data   | **Years | **Evidence | **Collected By**      |
| trategy** | Type**   | of Data | of         |                       |
|           |          | Colle   | Effec      |                       |
|           |          | ction** | tiveness** |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| Oklahoma  | Quan     | 2006    | \# of      | Oklahoma State        |
| Ma        | titative |         | teachers   | Department of         |
| thematics | and      |         | completing | Education             |
| Im        | Qua      |         | the        |                       |
| provement | litative |         | pr         | Office of Standards   |
| Program   |          |         | ofessional | and Curriculum        |
|           |          |         | d          |                       |
|           |          |         | evelopment |                       |
|           |          |         | \# of      |                       |
|           |          |         | teachers   |                       |
|           |          |         | passing    |                       |
|           |          |         | the        |                       |
|           |          |         | content    |                       |
|           |          |         | test       |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| Oklahoma  | Quan     | 2005    | \# of      | Oklahoma State        |
| Ma        | titative | and     | teachers   | Department of         |
| thematics | and      | 2006    | completing | Education             |
| Academies | Qua      |         | academy    |                       |
|           | litative |         |            | Office of Standards   |
|           |          |         | Videoc     | and Curriculum        |
|           |          |         | onferences |                       |
|           |          |         | to share   |                       |
|           |          |         | lessons    |                       |
|           |          |         |            |                       |
|           |          |         | Completion |                       |
|           |          |         | of toolkit |                       |
|           |          |         | with 180   |                       |
|           |          |         | lessons    |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| Oklahoma  | Quan     | 2004-   | Reading    | Oklahoma State        |
| Reading   | titative |         | First site | Department of         |
| Academies | and      |         | teachers   | Education             |
|           | Qua      |         | including  |                       |
|           | litative |         | special    | Office of Standards   |
|           |          |         | education  | and Curriculum        |
|           |          |         | teachers   |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| Reading   | Quan     | 2004-   | \# of      | Oklahoma State        |
| First     | titative |         | teachers   | Department of         |
| Teacher   | and      |         | and        | Education             |
| Reading   | Qua      |         | admi       |                       |
| Academies | litative |         | nistrators | Office of Standards   |
|           |          |         | trained    | and Curriculum        |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| Advanced  | Quan     | 1996-   | \# of      | Oklahoma State        |
| Placement | titative |         | teachers   | Department of         |
| I         | and      |         | and        | Education             |
| ncentives | Qua      |         | admi       |                       |
| Program   | litative |         | nistrators | Office of Standards   |
|           |          |         | trained    | and Curriculum        |
|           |          |         |            |                       |
|           |          |         | Increase   |                       |
|           |          |         | in number  |                       |
|           |          |         | of         |                       |
|           |          |         | students   |                       |
|           |          |         | par        |                       |
|           |          |         | ticipating |                       |
|           |          |         | in AP --   |                       |
|           |          |         | high       |                       |
|           |          |         | poverty    |                       |
|           |          |         | and        |                       |
|           |          |         | minority   |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| Academic  | Quan     | 2005-   | Schools    | Oklahoma State        |
| Ac        | titative |         | awarded    | Department of         |
| hievement |          |         | based on   | Education             |
| Awards    |          |         | API scores |                       |
|           |          |         | and        | Financial Services    |
|           |          |         | i          | Division              |
|           |          |         | mprovement |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+

+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| **S       | **Data   | **Years | **Evidence | **Collected By**      |
| trategy** | Type**   | of Data | of         |                       |
|           |          | Colle   | Effec      |                       |
|           |          | ction** | tiveness** |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| Pro       | Quan     | 2005-   | Schools    | Oklahoma State        |
| fessional | titative |         | report     | Department of         |
| De        | and      |         | eff        | Education             |
| velopment | Qua      |         | ectiveness |                       |
| Requ      | litative |         | of         | Professional          |
| ire-ments |          |         | pr         | Standards Division    |
|           |          |         | ofessional |                       |
|           |          |         | d          |                       |
|           |          |         | evelopment |                       |
|           |          |         | based on   |                       |
|           |          |         | meeting    |                       |
|           |          |         | d          |                       |
|           |          |         | ata-driven |                       |
|           |          |         | goals      |                       |
|           |          |         |            |                       |
|           |          |         | 70 O.S.    |                       |
|           |          |         | 6-194      |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| What      | Quan     | 2006-   | What Works | Oklahoma State        |
| Works in  | titative |         | in Schools | Department of         |
| Schools   | and      |         | Surveys at | Education             |
|           | Qua      |         | beginning  |                       |
| 6-Day     | litative |         | of 2006    | Office of Standards   |
| Pro       |          |         | and at the | and Curriculum        |
| fessional |          |         | end of     |                       |
| De        |          |         | 2006       |                       |
| velopment |          |         | analyzed   |                       |
| with Dr.  |          |         | by Dr.     |                       |
| Robert    |          |         | Robert     |                       |
| Marzano   |          |         | Marzano    |                       |
|           |          |         |            |                       |
|           |          |         | What Works |                       |
|           |          |         | in Schools |                       |
|           |          |         | aligned to |                       |
|           |          |         | Oklahoma's |                       |
|           |          |         | Nine       |                       |
|           |          |         | Essential  |                       |
|           |          |         | Elements   |                       |
|           |          |         | Resource   |                       |
|           |          |         | Guide      |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| P         | Quan     | 1992-   | \# of      | Oklahoma State        |
| rincipals | titative |         | pa         | Department of         |
| L         | and      |         | rticipants | Education             |
| eadership | Qua      |         |            |                       |
| Academy   | litative |         | Feedback   | Office of Standards   |
|           |          |         | from       | and Curriculum        |
|           |          |         | principals |                       |
|           |          |         | that       | Cooperative Council   |
|           |          |         | p          | of School             |
|           |          |         | articipate | Administrators        |
|           |          |         | in         |                       |
|           |          |         | training   |                       |
|           |          |         | funded by  |                       |
|           |          |         | OSDE and   |                       |
|           |          |         | f          |                       |
|           |          |         | acilitated |                       |
|           |          |         | by CCOSA   |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+
| Oklahoma  | Quan     | 1999-   | \# of      | Oklahoma State        |
| Educators | titative |         | pa         | Department of         |
| L         | and      |         | rticipants | Education             |
| eadership | Qua      |         |            |                       |
| Academy   | litative |         | Program    | UCO                   |
|           |          |         | e          |                       |
|           |          |         | valuations |                       |
+-----------+----------+---------+------------+-----------------------+

***6.5 Does the plan indicate that the SEA will examine the issue of
equitable teacher assignment when it monitors LEAs and how this will be
done?***

***REVISED INFORMATION***

**The data in Chart at the beginning of Requirement 6, shows the
distribution of highly qualified teachers in high-minority and
high-poverty schools as well as the distribution of novice teachers and
experienced teachers in high-needs schools. OSDE will continue to
monitor the equitable teacher assignments and provide districts with
recommended strategies to ensure equitable distribution. The
distribution data will be provided to districts for the district and
site level determinations of teacher assignments.**

***Oklahoma will conduct a review of the current data (05-06 school
year) for each district and site to determine each districts' current
status. Oklahoma program specialists will analyze available data to
determine highly qualified needs as well as trends in rural,
high-poverty and school improvement schools. Districts that have been
identified for on-site visits will be notified and required to provide
documentation for district and individual teacher plans. As part of the
Consolidated Monitoring process, Program Specialists will:***

a.  ***meet with district staff to obtain information and documentation
    and to verify district data***

b.  ***review and verify districts data on teacher assignments to ensure
    equitable distribution of highly qualified teachers through the
    schools;***

c.  ***conduct on-site visits to obtain information, review records,
    verity teacher and site data; and***

d.  ***complete report summary noting any findings, recommendations, or
    commendations;***

e.  ***Program Specialists will monitor the implementation of the
    District and teachers Highly Qualified Plans and provide technical
    assistance as needed for districts to attain 100% highly
    qualified.***

***Each district is required to submit Consolidated Application for
funds. The Office of Grant Management and Office of Grant Planning are
responsible for reviewing each application to ensure the following:
Target federal funds to high-needs schools within the districts.***

a.  ***Each application is in compliance with the required federal and
    state program requirements.***

b.  ***Each application includes sufficient information on the programs
    and activities that will be used to ensure that all teachers meet
    the HQ requirements.***

c.  ***Each application includes sufficient information to ensure that
    the districts has allocated sufficient financial and personnel
    resources required to implement the programs and activities in order
    to meet highly qualified performance goals.***

d.  ***Each application should target funds to the high needs schools
    within a district includes information on the district's progress in
    meeting the prior year highly qualified goals (Sample Attached).***

***The OSDE provides information about resources including programs and
professional development opportunities that support highly qualified in
all districts. It is then the district's responsibility to make choices
when placing and hiring teachers that take advantage of statewide
resources that may help increase the number of highly qualified teachers
in these districts. These resources and opportunities are included in
the equity plan.***

***The Oklahoma State Department of Education will work with all school
districts so that poor or minority children are not taught by
inexperienced, unqualified, or out of-field teachers at higher rates
than are other children. This entire document provides the components of
the OSDE written equity action plan for ensuring that poor or minority
children are not taught by inexperienced, unqualified, or out-of-field
teachers at higher rates than are other children.***

***The process that the OSDE uses includes the specific programs,
strategies, systems and legislation within the three identified
initiatives described in the previous sections of this document:***

***#1: Publicly report progress of meeting annual measurable objectives
in the percentage of highly qualified teachers at each LEA and school
and in the percentage of teachers who are receiving high-quality
professional development to enable such teachers to become highly
qualified and highly effective classroom teachers.***

***#2: Conduct effective high quality professional development
activities.***

***#3: Recruit and hire highly qualified teachers, including those
licensed or certified through alternative routes and retain highly
qualified teachers.***

**In summary, many strategies for districts are available on the State
Department of Education Web site and provided as an attachment to
communicate with all districts. In addition, in October, 2006
videoconferences will focus on strategies for districts that will ensure
equitable teacher distribution to ensure that poor or minority children
are not taught by inexperienced, unqualified, or out-of-field teachers
at higher rates than are other children.**

**The OSDE is committed to ensure every child in Oklahoma is taught by a
highly qualified teacher and will continue to provide technical
assistance and monitor progress in implementing those plans.**

[^1]: