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This Week鈥檚 ESSA News: New Online Literacy Program Offers Baltimore Students Personalized Support, Florida Says English Proficiency Tests Are Optional, Arts Education Advocates Call for Post-Pandemic Reset & More

This update on the Every Student Succeeds Act and the education plans now being implemented by states and school districts is produced in partnership with ESSA Essentials, an ongoing series from the Collaborative for Student Success. It鈥檚 an offshoot of their newsletter, which you can ! (See our recent ESSA updates from previous weeks right here.)

New York and Michigan added their names to the list of states again , citing continued disruption imposed by the pandemic.

While the states join a few others in asking for the tests to be called off, officials in other states are voicing their hope to move forward with tests that they say can deliver data to help them through the worst of their pandemic-related challenges.

In and , for example, state officials moved to ease accountability measures typically dependent on test scores, but stated that administering the tests would be useful 鈥渢o determine how much impact the pandemic has had on learning in schools.鈥

Beyond issues of testing, student data and accountability systems, here are five of the week鈥檚 top developments for how states are implementing (and innovating under) ESSA:

1 Baltimore Schools to Offer Students Personalized Literacy Support Through New Online Program

Reading Plus, an online program that provides 鈥減ersonalized intervention and instruction for students鈥 in reading and literacy, 鈥 a district that serves nearly 80,000 students.

The program has achieved the highest level of evidence required by the Every Student Student Succeeds Act, having completed a 鈥渨ell-designed and well-implemented experimental study.鈥 The program claims to be able to help students increase reading proficiency by as much as 2.5 grades in a single academic year.

2 Florida Officials Extend English Proficiency Testing Window, Make Test Optional

In an effort to keep the flow of academic data flowing while accommodating the concerns parents have in sending their children to test in-person, .

The state鈥檚 public school chancellor, Jacob Oliva, urged parents to have students sit for the exams, citing the impact that the lack of data could have on schools鈥 abilities to meet the needs of more than 265,000 English Learners in the state. To grant additional flexibility, schools will have an additional two months to administer the exam this year.

3 Uber-Like Program Brought Into Spokane, Washington Public Schools to Meet Transportation Needs

HopSkipDrive, a Los Angeles-based transportation service originally started by a group of working mothers, .

鈥淭his is part of an ongoing effort of being innovative and efficient, and being good stewards,鈥 Superintendent Adam Swinyard said. The transportation service will particularly benefit students with special education needs, as those associated costs will be covered under ESSA.

4 Conservative Education Leaders Lay Out Vision for Assessments Through COVID-19

The pandemic poses a number of obvious and well-discussed challenges to testing but, , it also presents 鈥渆ven bigger opportunities.鈥

In a new essay, Petrilli and Hess lay out five broad principles they believe , including ensuring that testing data become as actionable and agile as possible and to invest the time to fine-tune tests鈥 role in state and federal accountability systems.

5 New York Advocates Say Pandemic Presents Opportunity to Reprioritize Arts Education

Penny Swift, director of the NYC nonprofit Education Through Music, says that the 鈥 and says that the pandemic presents an opportunity to 鈥渞eprioritize funding for arts education as soon as possible.鈥

Swift cites research establishing the academic and wellness benefits that quality arts opportunities can have for students, as well as how inequitable access to arts education can provide one depiction of how racial injustice manifests in the nation鈥檚 largest school district.

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