Speaker 1: Good morning, everybody. My name is Jesse Carlton. Sorry, I should have said that earlier. I kind of just popped on and stopped talking, started talking. Josh and I are going to talk to you a little bit now about virtual student attendance. We know after during COVID, virtual students became very present in all districts. So we want to make sure we kind of give an overview of what's going on and how those students can be tracked. There's actually two setups for 22-23 for virtual students. I'm going to talk about the first group, full-time virtual students, and I'll throw it over to Josh, and he's going to talk about that virtual and performance-based course setup. That second setup with Josh is what is more, we consider your standard performance-based setup that has been done in the past. The full-time virtual students is something that came about during COVID with groups of students who were, you know, wanting to be 100% at home, 100% online, and weren't able to do performance-based setup. Remember that performance-based setup is in law for grades 5 through 12. So if you had kiddos kindergarten through fourth grade who wanted to do something fully virtual, there wasn't an option. So KDE created a waiver from the attendance regulation, we'll talk about in a minute, for those students that are 100% remote, and that waiver will allow your district to receive attendance credit based on this virtual attendance or participation each period. Okay, so these full-time virtual students. If your district has been granted a waiver from the pupil attendance regulation through, I believe, Marty Park and David Cook and on this PowerPoint, we actually have a link in the notes section to that area at KDE, so you can see where to submit this waiver if you don't have it for the 22-23 school year. What that waiver has actually done is the attendance regulation says that there are two ways to get attendance funding. In-seat attendance, the student is there, or performance-based, which means the student successfully completes the course and then you get attendance funding for the time that the student was enrolled in that course that was successfully completed. So when students wanted to go full-time virtual, there was no way to track. So what this waiver has done, it has waived the part of the pupil attendance regulation that says that attendance has to be in-person in front of a certified teacher. Okay, so this can be for any student who is full-time in a virtual school program or academy that is not spending any time in the school at all. There's guidance document that we have on the district supports page that's kind of going to go through a more detailed of how to set this up, but we're going to kind of hit the high points here. You can always reach out to Josh or I to talk about this setup, but I really keep harping on this, but I want you to understand this setup is for those students who are full-time virtual. They aren't coming in and out. They're not bouncing in and out with, it's not something where to put a kid if they have been quarantined or if they want to come in and out. There are allowances if a student is in this group of students and it's not working out for him or her. They just can't seem to perform the way they need to perform. You can pull them back into in-person learning, but it's not meant for the student to hop in and out of. Okay. All right. Setup of these full-time virtual students. So all full-time virtual students must be included in a blended learning group that is a functionality that was created and pushed down into Infinite Campus by Infinite Campus during COVID. Schools must post attendance for each period for grades six through 12. So you're going to have every period attendance and at minimum twice a day for grades K through five. So that's a little different than what you have to do in-person. In-person elementary is once a day. If they're full-time virtual, it has to be twice a day. So you're going to have to have an AM and a PM setup. This virtual attendance or, you know, tracking through participation must be written to the attendance tables using the virtual attendance posting tool. And that's because writing that attendance over to the attendance tables is how it's going to be collected and pulled for your funding. If you're not writing that attendance over to the, to the attendance tables, you're not going to have any attendance showing for funding purposes. Do have a little warning here that districts have reported some issues of ghosted or stuck virtual attendance or participation when we use this in the past years. But that is mainly because it was new and people were, for lack of a better word, they were kind of messing with it. They weren't getting their setup and they were trying to, they were making changes and they were learning how it was being used. So we encourage you to try and get everything set up before the school year starts. Try not to have any of those setup changes. Try not to change the teacher assigned to a course. Don't be clicking that attendance checkbox on and off. It should be on. Try and keep those period schedules the same for these full-time virtual students. If you do come to a point a couple weeks, months into school and say, Oh, I got that set up wrong. I need to change it. Please reach out to Josh or myself. It can be changed. It's just, there's a very specific order it needs to be changed in to make sure that participation doesn't kind of get stuck there. This is very high level steps of kind of what you need to do. Once again, like I said, that step-by-step document is listed on our website. You're going to create a blended learning group, and then you're going to assign that blended learning groups to all days in your calendar. You're going to assign all your full-time virtual students to that blended learning group. You're going to give your teacher access to track that virtual attendance. And you're going to, that means there's a little check box on enable virtual attendance. It's its own little module. Then you're going to turn on that virtual attendance posting. And that's what I was talking about. So all of the, all of the participation or virtual attendance that the teacher tracks, that gets written back to the attendance tables every night. And that's where your, your funding will be generated from. So we do have an attendance code for that virtual attendance. It is the NVA, no virtual attendance. If you've been around attendance world during all of COVID, you know, there was an NCVP, no COVID virtual participation code that was used in 21, 2021. It's, it's no longer to be used. What we're using is this NVA code. And so if a teacher marks that, you know, Jesse didn't show up for algebra in second period, either we had a Google meet or there was something that's supposed to be done in following that waiver. The teacher will mark that there was no participation that'll be written back as this NVA code. Then your clerks will still have the same opportunity they have just like for in-person kids. You know, if I then send in a doctor's note the next day to say, Hey, I was at the orthodontist, the attendance clerks can go in, remove that NVA code and give me a doctor's excused code for the reason that I wasn't at that meeting. Okay. All right. I think I'm going to throw it over here to Josh. I've left him a little bit of a time, about 10 minutes to zip through his side.

Speaker 2: I can do it. So this is, so what I'm going to be covering is what we call the traditional virtual performance-based pre-COVID whole nine yards. So just some facts about virtual and performance-based. Infinite Campus should reflect closely as possible what's actually happening in the school with your student. So I know there's all kinds of different schedules, the way that virtual performance-based works. I have found out real fast coming to KTE, no district is set up the same and that's okay. But we just to make sure that that is, that Infinite Campus is reflecting as closely as we can. Again, students cannot be checked out in Infinite Campus during non-attendance classes. So again, virtual performance-based is not in seat time. Virtual performance-based does not count on the growth factor to show growth. So if you have half of your juniors and seniors, because I know that's where it usually pops in at, if you have all those on virtual performance-based, your numbers are going to drop on your growth factor. So just keep that in mind. Seat time attendance must contain a carding unit of 120 hours. And then the virtual performance-based classes can be set up to earn a carding unit of time of attendance if the course is completed in less time. So if they finish the class in three months instead of the whole entire year, that's great. Okay, just some ways that you can do virtual performance-based. You're getting a craft academy, dual credit college classes, your online classes, credit recovery, and then classes where credit is given upon completion of predefined criteria. So just those are your virtual performance-based ways of doing things. Some pros and cons for virtual performance-based. Your pros, you know, you get 100% attendance if that student passes the course. It does not require the 120 hours of seat time and allows students to work at their own pace. And on your con side, you know, if the student fails that class, you're going to get zero funding for that class. Again, you cannot check in or check out with seat time attendance. And then no virtual performance-based is shown on your growth factor. So just a quick setup and snapshot of how you set up a virtual performance-based and scheduling and then checking the funding. So first, you're going to make sure your courses are set up correctly. You're going to make sure the type is virtual or performance-based. Yeah, the attendance checkbox is not checked and that you're using the correct state code, state course code. After that is done, you're going to move over to your scheduled students and you're going to make sure that you place the classes in the right area for the Carnegie unit. And we'll go into detail in just a minute on that. And that this is a biggie that you do not use a start or end dates on your student schedules just because it can lapse over to make sure that they're receiving that 120 hours of Carnegie unit. And then lastly, you're going to check for funding on each student. So you're going to make sure if a fully student has full virtual performance-based, that they're going to have a full entire schedule. Entering your passing grades for virtual performance-based classes, you can create a single ad hoc to make sure that that student is pulling on the record seven, which is the next bullet point to make sure that they were receiving full funding. I will say that this is a big area that you need to make sure that you are looking at when you're setting up your virtual performance-based. So to make sure you're receiving the full Carnegie unit of time, you're going to take this standard day minutes, which is 415. And in this district, they have six class periods. So you're going to do the 415 divided by six, which comes out to around 69.1. We're going to tell you here at KDE to bump that up to 70 minutes to make sure that you're receiving the full Carnegie unit. Again, that just goes at the bottom and make sure that is set outside the school day. So it's a non-instructional period. So make sure that it's correct as well. Again, here's where we're talking about the type, virtual performance, you know, the attendance check box is not checked, and then make sure you're using the correct state code. Another big area that we look at too, when we're running the SAR report, our SAR report does not look at transcripts. So if you want to make sure, you have to make sure that this area is set up with a final grade and a passing grade or failing grade. So if you want funding, you make sure it's a passing grade in this area right here. Because again, we do not look at transcripts. We have run into that issue before COVID. We would have to go in and look at transcripts. We would have to go in and change some things when we would sit down with districts. Here's another, it's not a new report, but a lot of districts still forget about it. This is my first report that I pull. If I have a district calling me and saying, hey, I don't know what to do. I'm not showing all my correct students on my record seven. So this is the first report that we're going to look at. And it's called the Funding Gap Audit Report that can be found under Kentucky State Reporting and Funding Gap Audit. What this report does, it pulls all students who have a potential gap, funding gap in their schedules. Again, it's, it looks at their student schedules. It looks at, if you go down into it, you can see seat time percentage and virtual performance base percentage. You can see where the student starts having a gap in their schedule and when it ends. So it kind of narrows it down for you on that area as well. And again, I do have a lot of districts say, hey, I have 12 students on this funding gap audit, what do I do? And I can look at it and I can show you in just a few, in the next slide, but this is not a report that is designed to be cleared. It's just saying, hey, this is potential funding gaps. Yes, I, yes, you know, we have a special ed student who is partial day. And so that student's going to show up on this report, but then I know that that student is partial day. So I know that he's good to go. So just digging a little deeper here on this blue line, you see that the student has a 64% of seat time and 13% of virtual performance base. You know, you add those two together, you're going to get 77%. So I know that there's something wrong with the student's schedule. Either it's the student's schedule, or it can be the virtual performance base time that, you know, it's not set up correctly. So dig a little deeper on the student's schedule, look at those courses, and then if not, look at the period schedule for the virtual performance base time. Right here on the red line, you see 78% seat time and 0% virtual performance base time. So automatically, I know that that is a schedule gap. So, because I know he doesn't have virtual performance base. So again, we can look at 816 through 821, more likely the student has moved classes around. Teachers have, you know, or I'm sorry, guidance counselors have just forgot to put in end date and start times. So you're good there. On the green line, it's given us 0% on seat time and then 93% on virtual performance base time. This one is good to go. And the reason why we're saying that's good to go, Infinite Campus has given us the magical number of 92%, 92-93% and above. If that student has anything with that, you know, if you add your seat time in virtual performance base and that adds up to 92-93%, that student is getting maximum funding. And that is due to no district is set up with the same lunch minutes or passing time. So when they built this report, you could not, they could not enter that in. So again, 92-93 and above, that student is getting the maximum funding that they can get. Also, just a reminder, the report is not to be cleared. So if you see this 93 and Josh Whitlow has 93% of virtual time, you can just let that go and you're good to go. And here's our data standard guidance document for virtual, traditional virtual performance base. This is A to Z, walks you through on how to set up courses, your student schedule, again, the period schedule, all that. And there is our contact here, district support. And I think that's it for us.

Speaker 3: Except for questions. So we got a couple for you. So the first one is, is the NVA code used in place of the unexcused code for virtual students?

Speaker 1: The NVA code will be the unexcused code for virtual students. So when you set all of this up and you set up the, where it's just left me, Josh, the, what's it called when it takes it back to the attendance tab? Virtual performance base set up, sorry, the, taking my slides, Dede, sorry. When you set up the transfer of all of the teacher attendance back to the attendance tables, when you enable your virtual attendance posting, I found it, sorry. When you enable your virtual attendance posting, it's going to ask you, which code do you want to push back to those tables for whenever a teacher marks a student as not participating or not attending? It needs to be that NVA code because you can only pick one code in there for everyone to mark, to write down. So that's the one standard code that it'll all go back to the attendance tables. Then, like I said, if you get a doctor's note or something, just like in-person students, the attendance clerk can update that to make it, you know, the excused doctor's note so that you can use your district policy on how many doctor's notes or whatever can be used. And one thing I will say there,

Speaker 2: Jessie made a good point. On in-seat attendance, every kid is marked present until marked absent. Yes, that's good. On virtual, on the waiver side, on blended learning groups, every kid is marked absent until marked present. So it's backwards there. So teachers have to go in and make sure, yes, Josh Whitlow attended or has done his work. Jessie Carlton has done her work. Didi Conner has done her work. And then you hit save. So if you don't, if the teachers are not going there and clicking that participation, it's automatically going right to NVA code. So it's something to keep in mind when you're training your teachers and staff. Yes, good point, Josh. It'll be good to explain to your full-time virtual teachers

Speaker 1: just to say it's opposite of what you do in class.

Speaker 3: All right, I have another question for you. If the attendance checker is not marked present If the attendance checkbox is not checked, then participation cannot be taken. I don't understand how we are supposed to set up the virtual schools with performance-based classes.

Speaker 2: So I think what's happening is what Jessie talked about is totally different than what my virtual and performance-based is. So you have the attendance waiver, and that's called virtual, and they have to have checkmark. The attendance checkbox has to be checked. But for the what we call the traditional virtual performance-based before COVID, it does not have, it cannot have the attendance checkbox checked.

Speaker 1: So if you have a full-time virtual student that is on full-time virtual due to the waiver in your district, that is going to be need to be set up with blended learning groups, checkbox on the course, teachers tracking that participation virtual attendance that gets transferred over. If you just have a student in grades 5 through 12 who is taking a virtual or performance-based course, which was standard even before COVID, you know, they don't have to report, but it's based on the criteria for the course. You get full attendance upon completion of that course. If you're in that type of course, and those students could even be coming in and out of school, you could be coming to school for the morning and then having a performance-based course in the afternoon. That can happen for full-time virtual. Those students, you're correct, they do not have the attendance checkbox on there. So if you have questions or what, you know, I know a lot of schools have virtual academies or, you know, not full schools, but programs within other schools. Feel free to reach out to us and just say, hey, Josh, Jessie, which one do I have? What's going on? Do I have the waiver? Which, how should this, we can talk it through with you, get you on the

Speaker 3: right path. I think you answered the last question. It says it's traditional virtual performance-based still grades to 5 through 12. Yes. And one thing I will say on that too, make

Speaker 2: sure that it's in your board policy. Yes. Because a lot of board policies are saying high school virtual performance-based, and so they may have to amend those as well. So make sure that they check with their virtual, I mean, I'm sorry, their board policies. Right. It's law that it can be used

Speaker 1: 5 through 12, but you have to make sure you're allowing it on those same grades in your district policy.