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Month: August 2019

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The passage of SB149 created the Teacher and Student Success Act (TSSA) for the purpose of improving school performance and student academic achievement. As one of the TSSA requirements, our JSD Board of Education has adopted a Student Success Framework with guidelines for each school to follow in developing a TSSA Plan. Plans are due on September 30, 2019. Your school allocation was sent to you as an additional item in the August 15, 2019 edition of the Jordan Administrative Memo (JAM).

To begin using your school’s TSSA funds, each principal will need to complete their TSSA plan Google Sheet created by the Teaching & Learning department. Completion of the School Planning Tool will ensure compliance with TSSA requirements. Here is a list with links to each school’s plan.

Each plan should include a goal using indicator(s) from the USBE Accountability system. USBE success criteria for the TSSA program requires schools to demonstrate a 1% increase in total points. Plans must address a school goal through at least one of the three priorities in JSD Board Framework:

  • coaching,
  • professional development, and
  • school-based initiatives.

You may use this checklist to guide your planning.

Optional work sessions will also be held to provide principals with support for the planning process. Bring a device.

Date Time Location
September 4, 2019 1:00 - 3:00 p.m. D.O. Room 129.
September 5, 2019 8:00 - 11:00 a.m. D.O. Room 129

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The Utah Council for the Social Studies annual fall conference will be held Saturday, Nov. 2 at South Jordan Middle School, 8:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m.  Registration is through Eventbrite at this link: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/ucss-2019-conference-tickets-68293697287  Registration options include: Individual registration $30, You & a friend $50, Social studies department or grade level team $100. Lane change credit will be given and breakfast and lunch provided.

The keynote speaker is a former POW, held in a Vietnamese prison. For details on other sessions, see attached flyer.

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District level resources for Blended and Digital Learning will be provided to each school through a Google shared folder named "Blended Learning (school name)." Access to the folders will be sent to each school administrator within the next week. The folder will include resources to support your digital learning efforts. The Blended and Digital Learning team would like to support school efforts to build the technology capacity of teachers through the Center for STEM and Digital Learning, the Trending Classrooms Badging program, and the Digital Teacher Leader program. Information regarding these programs will be included in the folder.

If you have any questions please contact Ross Menlove. ross.menlove@jordandistrict.org

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DATE:   
August 20, 2019

TO:  
All Principals
All Special Education Staff

FROM:  
Lisa Robinson, Administrator of Schools
Kim Lloyd, Director of Special Education
Brian King, Principal, River’s Edge

SUBJECT:   
A.S.P.E.N. Training for all Special Education Staff 2019-2020

A.S.P.E.N. training will continue to be required for all licensed special education teachers, SLPs, school psychologists, elementary school counselors, and for all instructional assistants in SEB and Autism self-contained support classrooms during the 2019-2020 school year. A.S.P.E.N. is a positive, preventative, and proactive approach to managing aggressive student behavior.

Although not required, instructional assistants working in any other special education setting may choose to attend at the discretion of their building administrator.

Those who participated in A.S.P.E.N. training during the 2018-2019 school year do not need to take the full course, but should instead plan on taking an ASPEN re-certification class.

If you have more than one teacher or instructional assistant that needs to attend, please consider having them attend on separate days in order to maintain adequate coverage in your school. The Special Education Department will cover the costs of substitutes for licensed special education teachers under budget code 1292. Instructional assistants will be asked to use True Time to record their typical workday hours on the day of the training. Any additional hours spent in the training above their typical workday will need to be recorded on a time sheet. Staff should register for a training session through JPLS.

Mandt training will continue to be required at Kauri Sue Hamilton and River’s Edge School and staff at these schools will not need to attend A.S.P.E.N. Others wishing to keep their Mandt training current may do so; however, participation is not mandatory and teachers and instructional assistants will not be compensated for their attendance. A Mandt training schedule will be forthcoming.

A.S.P.E.N. training dates and times are attached to this memo.

For questions, contact:
Daveed Goodrich at daveed.goodrich@jordandistrict.org or
Cassidy Hansen at cassidy.hansen@jordandistrict.org

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Attention Administrators:

One of the key responsibilities of the Purchasing Department is to help the District work as efficiently as possible and control our expenses. We are pleased to announce that we will be transitioning our Amazon Business account to an Amazon Business Prime account.

For those of you that use Amazon Business now for your purchasing needs, not much will change. In fact, for some of you the change will be nearly unrecognizable. Currently some schools or departments have one user pay for one Amazon Prime account of $127/year to order from. With this change any authorized person (set-up and authorized by your administrator) in the building can access Amazon Business Prime and get free two-day shipping at no cost.

Initially, the number of authorized users will be limited to 5 at elementary schools, 10 at middle schools, 20 at high schools, and 2 at each district department. This can be increased later if desired by the administrator. Of course, these accounts should only be used for business purposes and not personal use. Purchasing will pick up the Amazon Business Prime annual fee for the entire district, saving thousands of dollars in prime account fees and shipping costs each year.

Administrators will have the ability to approve or decline purchases and/or delegate approval to their custom workflow of staff. Detailed emails will be sent out and Kris Wishart in Purchasing will be contacting each school/department for initial set-up of users and workflow.

Stay tuned for more news on this as we go forward. Secondary schools and District departments will begin the process very shortly. Elementary schools will follow after things settle down some.

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Principals and Administrative Assistants:

Attached are the guidelines and revised payroll worksheet for Parking Lot Duty. As stated in the guidelines, please list each educator in your building and beside each name indicate the dollar amount ($0, $200, or increments of $400) the teacher should be paid. Please return this sheet along with your regular September payroll by September 3, 2019. If you have any questions, please contact your Administrator of Schools.

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DATE:    
Thursday, August 22, 2019

TO:   
High School Principals

FROM: 
Dr. Anthony Godfrey, Superintendent of Schools
Ben Jameson, Director of Evaluation, Research and Accountability

SUBJECT: 
Testing Updates and Reminders

Please see memo below.

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DATE:   
Thursday, August 22, 2019

TO:   
Middle School Principals

FROM: 
Dr. Anthony Godfrey, Superintendent of Schools
Ben Jameson, Director of Evaluation, Research and Accountability

SUBJECT:  
Testing Updates and Reminders

Please see memo below.

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DATE:  
Thursday, August 22, 2019

TO:
Elementary School Principals

FROM:     
Dr. Anthony Godfrey, Superintendent of Schools
Ben Jameson, Director of Evaluation, Research and Accountability

SUBJECT:    
Testing Updates and Reminders

Please see memo below.

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The Utah Literacy Association will be holding its annual conference on October 3rd at the Mountain America Expo Center. The theme this year is "Empowering Students with Literacy Super Powers." Our presenters will be focusing on teaching writing and using effective interventions for struggling readers through engaging strategies. See flyer below for more details.

 

 

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DATE:   
August 15, 2019

TO: 
All Principals

FROM:  
John Larsen, Business Administrator
Derek Anderson, Director of Accounting, Budgets, and Audits

SUBJECT:
2019-20 TSSA Allocations

Attached are the 2019-20 TSSA allocations. Please work with these amounts as you make plans for TSSA spending.

Remember to plan for benefit costs on all wages paid. For benefited employees (those that can take health insurance) the cost of benefits is about 32.14% of wages plus $9852 for health insurance and $156.60 for disability insurance per FTE. For non-benefited employees (e.g. substitutes, 17 hour assistants) the cost of benefits is 8.45% of wages. To help you with this, you may choose to download and use the included loaded salary worksheet.

Until you have turned in your TSSA budget plan, all of your TSSA allocation will show in Skyward in one budget category, instructional supplies (10 E xxx 5678 1090 610). Once you turn in your TSSA budget plan we will revise your TSSA budget in Skyward to reflect your plan. The TSSA budget and its use will be tracked utilizing program code 5678. Your Skyward reports will be revised to include program 5678 so you can see its status whenever you wish, but it will also be emailed to you on the 5th of each month.

If you have any questions about the TSSA allocation or how it will be tracked in Skyward, please contact Derek Anderson at x88275.

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Attached are all forms and documents distributed during the level meetings at the annual Administrative Leadership Conference held August 6-7, 2019

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Attached are all forms and documents distributed during the level meeting at the annual Administrative Leadership Conference held August 6-7, 2019

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DATE:  
August 1, 2019

TO:   
All Principals, Directors and Supervisors

FROM: 
John Larsen, Business Administrator
HR Administrators

SUBJECT: 
Classified Part-Time Employee Work Hour Maximums

Historically, classified part-time employees have been limited to working 17 hours/week to avoid retirement eligibility.  With the increasing difficulty in recruiting and retaining qualified part-time classified assistants, assistants working in designated positions are now allowed to work up to 25 hours/week, with principal/director approval.  School funds must be used to pay the additional hours worked.

Please see guidelines below.