Districts and Charter Schools,
 
Please forward this E-lert to your school-level stakeholders. We often have enrollment information for counselors, grades for data managers, tips for lab facilitators, announcements for testing coordinators, and strategies for school leaders, all of whom support your district's and school's e-learning efforts.
NCVPS E-lert for March 24, 2016 - Spring Edition X
Calendar Check
2016

March 18 : Last day to transfer into classes.

March 18: Last day to add to credit recovery classes.

March 24: Weighted marking period grades for block and yearlong courses posted in the registration system.

March 24: Progress reports for early calendar posted. 

April 4: Registration opens for the 2016-2017 Academic Year in the NCVPS registration system.

April 7: Progress reports for all classes posted in the registration system.

See the complete NCVPS calendar at this link.
Essential Links







Celebrate & Connect

Connect with us on Twitter! Find us here. Tweet to us on Twitter at @ncvps or with the hashtag #ncvps.
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Important From Last Week!


In addition, be sure to check out all of our tips and reminders in this week's e-lert .
regsys2016-17 Registration Will Open in the CURRENT NCPVS Registration System
NCVPS will open its 2016-2017 registration on Monday, April 4 in its current registration system. Schools will not use PowerSchool to enroll as anticipated. The cross-LEA feature is not ready for release yet, and the need to register is impending.

We apologize for this inconvenience. We want our end users to have a good enrollment experience, and the cross-LEA feature cannot deliver that at this time. Fortunately, schools are already familiar with our registration system, so enrolling can proceed as usual.  

There is the prospect of transitioning to PowerSchool during the 2016-2017 school year. We will have more details on that in the coming weeks.

Again, we apologize for the inconvenience, but we look forward to opening our current registration system for enrollments on Monday, April 4.
SpringRegSpring 2016 Updates

NCVPS posts progress reports every two weeks in the registration system. Be sure to check the progress of your NCVPS students.

Our first weighted grade reports will be posted on March 10 for early calendar classes. Traditional weighted grade reports will be posted on March 24.


Friday, March 18 is the last date that we will accept transfer students, and it is the last day that students can be enrolled into credit recovery courses.  OCS students can be added to existing OCS sections until the end of the semester. 


Please remind your school's AP testing coordinator to have NCVPS AP students input the NCVPS code (045) during administration of the exam. 

Students should enter the 045 code into the "Online Provider Code" found on Page 1, Item G of the student's AP answer sheet. 

This allows NCVPS to receive a copy of their May 2016 test scores for our records.  These scores are needed as part of the accountability piece for NCVPS. 


We still have three enrollments options after March 18 for schools.

OCS: Schools can continue to enroll in existing OCS sections throughout the semester. We cannot open new OCS sections after February 3. 

1/2 Credit Health and 1/2 Credit PE CoursesRegistration for our 2nd 9-week health courses will remain open until March 21. 

PEUpdateNote: Currently, we have three sections of Health and one section of Fitness-PE with only 2 students. We must have ten students registered in the Fitness-PE. We must have ten enrollments to run the course.

Mastery Learning for First-Time Credit : Our new mastery learning courses will help students who have a special or hardship situation. If any of the above options work for a student, you will need to use those options, but when you are out of options, check out the details here for mastery learning enrollment.
LookingAhead2016-2017 Academic Year

We have published our 2016-2017 Academic Year calendar. See all the dates here!


Our catalogs for the 2016-2017 Academy Year have been posted. See the listings here


NCVPS is moving all of its courses into the Canvas learning management system. Most of our courses will be in Canvas this summer, and the rest should be migrated by fall.

We've added a Canvas orientation to our Getting Started for Students checklist here.

Here's a direct link to the orientation. Many districts are now using Canvas. We look forward to seeing great benefits from having a statewide system.


NCVPS will offer the newly developed AP Computer Science course. Read more about this new course at the College Board's website


NCVPS will be offering the HPE - Health and Physical Education 1 credit course and the Health Education 1/2 credit in the summer. We will not be able to offer the Fitness-Physical Education 1/2 credit course because of the number of required videos students must submit to show mastery in four weeks. Also, it will be harder to see a change in the student's fitness level in four weeks. 

Students will have eight weeks to submit videos to show mastery and change in their fitness rate in the  HPE - Health and Physical Education 1 credit course because both Health and PE will be covered each week in the eight week summer session. The Health Education 1/2 credit will still be offered in four weeks twice during the summer session. If you have any questions, please contact Karen Creech at  karen.creech@ncpublicschools.gov.
GradeReportingGrade Reporting

March 24 - Weighted Grade Report for Traditional Calendar Block Courses - 1st Marking Period Grades

March 24 - Weighted Grade Report for Traditional Calendar Yearlong Courses - 3rd Marking Period Grades

March 24 - Progress Report for Traditional Calendar


See the details below for all of our reporting.
 
See how your students are progressing! We post progress reports every two weeks in the registration system.
 
Follow this link to see the details on this progress report.


Our grade reports are weighted grades similar to school report cards.
 
Follow this link to see the details on the latest grade report. 
 
 
NCVPS posts student status reports after the third and seventh days of class. These reports indicate if students have logged in or not to their NCVPS courses. These reports are early warning indicators for schools.
 
Follow this link to see the details on student status (no-show) reports.
 
 
Follow this link  to see how to run a grade report.

Follow this link to see our Quick Reference Guide on Grades.  
HireNCVPS Is Hiring Teachers
NCVPS is seeking North Carolina certified teachers in a number of subject areas. Most of our instructors teach during the day for schools throughout North Carolina, and then they teach for NCVPS in the evenings. You may know some NCVPS teachers at your school or in your district. Join them in teaching with us! We also have teachers who only teach for NCVPS. These are often teachers who have retired or have found working from home better suits their needs.

We do have an application process that includes a professional learning course and teaching practicum. The skills developed in the course and practicum will enhance your classroom instruction, as well. You will learn new technologies and digital-learning strategies that can be applied anywhere. Also, our pay is very competitive and comparable to other online programs.

Right now, we have a critical shortage in math teachers, but we also have a high demand in other areas:
  • AP Calculus BC and AB
  • AP Computer Science A
  • AP Computer Science Principles
  • AP Human Geography
  • AP Music Theory
  • AP Physics 1
  • AP Physics 2
  • AP Psychology
  • Chinese 1-4 and AP
  • Japanese
  • Math (all levels)
  • Psychology
  • Psychology Honors
  • OCS American History 1
  • OCS American History 2
  • OCS Applied Science
  • OCS Biology
  • OCS English 1, 2, 3, 4
  • OCS Financial Management
  • OCS Introduction to Math
  • OCS LDME/ Math 1
Learn more about teaching with NCVPS at this link
Tech Updates
Password Reset

If you have had your password reset, the new password will not expire unless you have reset it. If you have forgotten what your password was reset to, you can look up the help desk ticket to access the new password or click on "Forgot Password". 


When requesting help regarding a course it always easier for tech support to respond quickly if we have the specific section name, for example: 

CourseSec01Spring16.


When opening a ticket with the virtual support center, please always include the following:
  • Student's first & last name
  • PowerSchool ID number (This will help ensure we have the correct student)
  • School name (full name, i.e. Eastern Mills High School, not EMHS)
  • Course name - if the student is already enrolled,  include specific section, i.e. CourseSec01Spring15.
If you need a new student account for a student who is new to PowerSchool (not just transferring schools), include the following:
  • Your full school name (i.e. Eastern Mills High School, not EMHS)
  • The student's first and last name
  • The student's PowerSchool ID number
  • The student's email address 
  • The student's phone number (the contact number this will be in PowerSchool) 
  • Does the student have an IEP? Yes/No
  • Does the student have a 504 Plan? Yes/No

Replying to a Support Center Ticket
 
After you submit a ticket to the Virtual Support Center, you will receive a ticket confirmation and resolution via email. To expedite your resolution, please do not reply to the email. The email will have a link in it for your response. Please click on that link (see below). 



This will put the ticket right back in the queue of the person who is working on your ticket. If you reply to the email, then that will have to be manually put into the ticket, and that can delay the process by several hours. 

Please have students confirm/update their e-mail. Here's how to do that:
In Moodle:

Navigate to Administration
My Profile settings
Edit Profile
Verify or update e-mail
Scroll to bottom and "Update Profile"

In Blackboard:
Click on students name in the upper right side of your BB course
Click on setting
Click on Personal Information
Click on Edit Personal Information to update e-mail if it's incorrect.
Scroll to bottom and Submit

In Canvas:
Click on "settings" on your name in the upper right side of your course.
Click on "Add Email Address" under Ways to Contact on the right of screen.
Add your correct email if Canvas is not displaying your correct email.  
Click on "Register email."
Click the star next to your correct email address. 

Student Logins:
Students, are you having difficulty locating your class? During the 2016 Spring semester NCVPS will be offering courses in three learning management systems, Canvas, Blackboard and Moodle. If you are unsure which platform your course is being offered in, please see the "Student BB/Moodle/Canvas Login" link below:
http://www.ncvps.org/index.php/student-bbmoodle-login/ 

javaflashUpdatesJAVA and Flash Updates

Please update your Java to Version Java 8, Update 71.

Head to http://java.com/en/download/manual.jsp and follow the instructions from there.

Please go to the following link to update Adobe Flash Player to the latest Version 20.0.0.286 
http://get.adobe.com/flashplayer/ 

Blackboard Instant Messaging (BBIM)
 
Students will need to click on the BBIM link in their class and create an ID and password that they will remember. NCVPS does not issue BBIM logins nor do we store this information.   

 
Many students visit our homepage to log in to their courses. It is a best practice to bookmark the actual login pages for both Moodle and Blackboard. Please have students and lab facilitators bookmark the following pages:



In addition, many school administrators visit our homepage to log in to our registration system or Virtual Support Center. Please bookmark both of these pages in your web browser:


Virtual Support Center:  http://www.help.ncvps.org/ 
 
 
For additional information, please see our Tech Requirements:
http://www.ncvps.org/index.php/technology-requirements/  
FacilitatorsLab Facilitator's Guide
Do you have NCVPS students who are working in a facilitated lab at your school?

We have a lab facilitator's guide that  is designed to provide an understanding of the basic processes and procedures that successful online facilitators use to support students. 

We reached out to North Carolina public schools and our partner schools in the Virtual Schools Leadership Alliance to pull together the most fundamental elements of facilitating online learning.

Each time we visit a facilitated lab in North Carolina, we see a new process, a new innovation, a or just a new way of thinking in supporting lab students, and we add that to our evolving guide.

Course Catalogues
NCVPS Courses
 
NCVPS offers over 150 different courses, including advanced placement, electives, traditional, honors, core, STEM, occupational course of study, and credit recovery courses. 

Check out our 150+ list of courses here

VendorApprovedUpdatesVendor Approved Courses

In addition to NCVPS courses, North Carolina public schools also have a list of approved third-party vendor courses that they may choose from for virtual classes. Please follow this link to see the list of approved vendor courses. More on the vendor approval process can be found here.  

Here are the newest approved vendor courses: 
(Course Title - Vendor) 

Courses -  Vendor

OdysseyWare -  American History 1
OdysseyWare -  Earth and Environmental Science
North Carolina Virtual Public School
1017 Main Campus Drive, Partners I Bldg., 
SUITE 3900, Raleigh, NC 27606
Phone:   919-513-8550    |  Fax:   919-513-2557  |