Due to weather and power outages this past week, I am extending the Grades 9-12 EWS screening window. Please ensure that you prioritize completing screening on required students by Wednesday, April 9. This includes entering your written expression scores in the WEUS PowerApps. For students who have been suspended or absent, please make attempts to get them screened upon their return so that your school data team will have the data needed to inform intervention needs next school year.

*excerpt from email sent to High School MTSS Leads 4/4/25

Next steps for Grades 9-12, please plan to meet as a school data team so that you can determine which students will receive intervention as you collaboratively discuss each student's available data (screening results along with the risk indicator data from the EWS dashboard). Remember that any student with an ILP-D plan should be placed in Tier 2 or 3 intervention courses.

Due to weather and power outages, along with the rostering issues experienced with the vendor, the Grade 3 aimswebPlus Spring Benchmark has been extended. Please plan to complete testing by Friday, April 11. We will continue to communicate information via the Grade 3 Support Hub as needed. If you experience technical challenges be sure to communicate that information as soon as possible so that we can make the vendor aware.

1. Finalizing Plans-this problem persists and is with the vendor's development team.
2. User Access-MSCS IT and PCG are collaborating to clean up duplicate accounts, and names of employees no longer with the district. This is not as easy as a click of the button since some of these users are tied to student plans. Please expect information to be communicated via email over the next several weeks as we may need to work with school leads to ensure that we do not lose student data.

1. Rostering-the vendor has been working around the clock to ensure that our students and teachers are properly rostered in aimswebPlus. This has impacted multiple users over the past week, sometimes for a short period of time while others have been several days. All prior data should be accurate and appear in the platform. Please check your school roster by comparing PowerSchool to Pearson aimswebPlus.

• ALL SCHOOLS-Please complete the URGENT Roster Check by 10:00 a.m. this morning.
• Please report teachers who cannot log in via Clever by emailing RTI2@scsk12.org. Include the name and email address of the teacher.
• For students who were to be progress monitored last week, please work to get them progress monitored as soon as possible so that we are able to confirm that this is working.

Please review your ILP-Ds by April 17, 2025. There should not be red alerts. We are obligated to provide intervention to students as outlined in the ILP-D and Tier 2 or 3 plans. Students should have both an ILP-D and a Tier 2 or 3 plan. If they do not, we are non-compliant.

Troubleshooting:

• Dates should be sequential beginning with Universal Screening, Record of Decision, and Parent Notification/Response.
• Ensure that your name is listed as the case manager on tile number two.
• There should be information in tiles 3 and 4.
• If the plan needs to be exited because the student is no longer eligible, please complete this information.

iReady Alerts are back with a vengeance and while some have just occurred others have been there a full month. Please work with your school leader to remind staff to clear alerts and support students either in a 1:1 manner or small group. Consistency is key!

Do you know what the most common sound in the English language is? It’s the schwa!

Well, what is a schwa? The schwa is a sound that we produce when we say words that have an unstressed syllable, to make the words sound more natural and relaxed. The schwa sound resembles the “uh”, or “ih” sound in place of any vowel with a word that has more than one syllable.

For example: banana has two schwa sounds that take the place of the sound of short a. Say it out loud: buh-na-nuh. Did you hear it?

A schwa appears in an unemphasized syllable of a word, which is said faster and quieter than the emphasized (louder and slower) syllable. The schwa sound is in many common words such as: America, pencil, bottom, salad, carrot, dragon, vinyl and more!

The word “schwa” can be traced back to 1895, with German and Hebrew roots, and is defined as a “neutral vowel” or “emptiness”. It is represented by an upside-down e when it’s written in the International Phonetic Alphabet and you can find it in dictionaries in the pronunciation notes.

Please request support via MSCS Office Hours. This is the most efficient way for me to support well over 200 leads.