The World of Acronyms
The following are only some acronyms and abbreviations that are commonly used in schools.
A
o ADD - Attention Deficit Disorder
o ADHD - Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder
o AEIS – Academic Excellence Indicator System. AEIS reports pull together a wide range of information on the performance of students in each school and district in Texas every year. These reports also provide extensive information on school and district staff, finances, programs and demographics.
o AESOP – Automated Substitute Placement and Absence Management
o AF - Academic Facilitator (Math specialist, Reading specialis, etc.)
o AIP - Academic Improvement Plan
o AP - Advanced Placement / Advanced Placement (Honor Students, national preparatory courses, take an AP test and get a college credit for the course. Students can graduate with a lot of college credits if they can pass the nation test. US News and World Report use the scores from the test and the number of students who take AP courses to rate the school nationally.)
o ARD - Admission, Review, Dismissal Committee (makes all of the decisions as it pertains to SPED students. Teacher has a right to call an ARD meeting if any situation arises)
o ATPE - Association of Texas Professional Educators
o AYP – Adequate Yearly Progress
o ADHD - Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder
o AEIS – Academic Excellence Indicator System. AEIS reports pull together a wide range of information on the performance of students in each school and district in Texas every year. These reports also provide extensive information on school and district staff, finances, programs and demographics.
o AESOP – Automated Substitute Placement and Absence Management
o AF - Academic Facilitator (Math specialist, Reading specialis, etc.)
o AIP - Academic Improvement Plan
o AP - Advanced Placement / Advanced Placement (Honor Students, national preparatory courses, take an AP test and get a college credit for the course. Students can graduate with a lot of college credits if they can pass the nation test. US News and World Report use the scores from the test and the number of students who take AP courses to rate the school nationally.)
o ARD - Admission, Review, Dismissal Committee (makes all of the decisions as it pertains to SPED students. Teacher has a right to call an ARD meeting if any situation arises)
o ATPE - Association of Texas Professional Educators
o AYP – Adequate Yearly Progress
B
o BICS - Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills (language skills needed in social situations. It is the day-to-day language needed to interact socially with other people. English language learners (ELLs) employ BIC skills when they are on the playground, in the lunch room,on the school bus, at parties, playing sports and talking on the telephone. Social interactions are usually context embedded. They occur in a meaningful social context. They are not very demanding cognitively. The language required is not specialized. These language skills usually develop within six months to two years after arrival in the U.S)
o BIP – Behavior Intervention Plan
o BOY – Beginning of Year
o BIP – Behavior Intervention Plan
o BOY – Beginning of Year
C
o CALP – Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency (formal academic learning. This includes listening, speaking, reading, and writing about subject area content material. Students need time and support to become proficient in academic areas. This usually takes from five to seven years. Recent research (Thomas & Collier, 1995) has shown that if a child has no prior schooling or has no support in native language development, it may take seven to ten years for ELLs to catch up to their peers.)
o CIC - Campus Instructional Coach (Local Label, changes based on the district or time)
o CPS - Child Protective Services (legal requirement of the teacher to report suspected child abuse, then have to report it to the principal that you made a report)
o CRC - Computerized Records Controller (Attendance Clerk, Registrar, the Data Person)
o CIC - Campus Instructional Coach (Local Label, changes based on the district or time)
o CPS - Child Protective Services (legal requirement of the teacher to report suspected child abuse, then have to report it to the principal that you made a report)
o CRC - Computerized Records Controller (Attendance Clerk, Registrar, the Data Person)
D
o DNQ – Do Not Qualify
o DRA - Developmental Reading Assessment
o DRA - Developmental Reading Assessment
E
o EB - Emergent Bilingual - new acronym for ELs (English Learners)
o ED - Emotionally Disturbed / Executive Director (kind of like Associate Superintendent) (DISD term - a principal's boss, a person who is in charge of a few elementary-middle-high school principals. They are program/area oriented and usually are over one feeder pattern. Whatever ED says, it is a mandate and the principal (and the teachers underneath) must do it.)
o ELPS – English Language Proficiency Standards
o ELA – English Language Arts
o ELL – English Language Learners
o EOY – End of Year
o ESL – English as a Second Language
o ESOL - English Speakers of Other Languages
o ED - Emotionally Disturbed / Executive Director (kind of like Associate Superintendent) (DISD term - a principal's boss, a person who is in charge of a few elementary-middle-high school principals. They are program/area oriented and usually are over one feeder pattern. Whatever ED says, it is a mandate and the principal (and the teachers underneath) must do it.)
o ELPS – English Language Proficiency Standards
o ELA – English Language Arts
o ELL – English Language Learners
o EOY – End of Year
o ESL – English as a Second Language
o ESOL - English Speakers of Other Languages
F
o FAPE - Free Appropriate Public Education (Free education with appropriate support and services regardless the disability of the Least Restricitve Environment. Each child with disability must be educated with children who are not disabled unless the nature and severity of the disability is such as that education in the general environment with support cannot be achieved satisfactorily.)
o FERPA - The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) is a Federal law designed to protect the privacy of a student's education records. The law applies to all schools which receive funds under an applicable program of the U.S. Department of Education.FERPA gives parents certain rights with respect to their children's education records. These rights transfer to the student, or former student, who has reached the age of 18 or is attending any school beyond the high school level. Students and former students to whom the rights have transferred are called eligible students.
o FIRST - Financial Integrity Rating System of Texas
o FERPA - The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) is a Federal law designed to protect the privacy of a student's education records. The law applies to all schools which receive funds under an applicable program of the U.S. Department of Education.FERPA gives parents certain rights with respect to their children's education records. These rights transfer to the student, or former student, who has reached the age of 18 or is attending any school beyond the high school level. Students and former students to whom the rights have transferred are called eligible students.
o FIRST - Financial Integrity Rating System of Texas
H
o HLS – Home Language Survey
I
o ID - Intellectual Disability (SPED)
o IDEA - Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act. IDEA is a federally mandated program providing assistance to states for the education of children with disabilities and early intervention program for infants and toddlers with disabilities.
o IEP – Individualized Education Plan (Dictates what level of mastery the student on IEP has to achieve. It is like a Bible and must be read and followed to the T for each SPED student in the classroom. Not knowing what IEP says might bring on a law suit upon the teacher and the school and will result in the definite loss of job and possible revocation of teaching certificate.)
o IR - Improvement Required (School Rating based on scores)
o ISD - Independent School District
o ISS - In School Suspension
o I&S tax rate in Texas - Interest and Sinking tax, debt service tax
o IQ - Intelligence Quotient (average intelligence - 100)
o IDEA - Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act. IDEA is a federally mandated program providing assistance to states for the education of children with disabilities and early intervention program for infants and toddlers with disabilities.
o IEP – Individualized Education Plan (Dictates what level of mastery the student on IEP has to achieve. It is like a Bible and must be read and followed to the T for each SPED student in the classroom. Not knowing what IEP says might bring on a law suit upon the teacher and the school and will result in the definite loss of job and possible revocation of teaching certificate.)
o IR - Improvement Required (School Rating based on scores)
o ISD - Independent School District
o ISS - In School Suspension
o I&S tax rate in Texas - Interest and Sinking tax, debt service tax
o IQ - Intelligence Quotient (average intelligence - 100)
L
o LEP – Limited English Proficiency (it is becoming an outdated term among people but it is still a legal label)
o LRE - Least Restrictive Environment
o LRE - Least Restrictive Environment
M
o MR - Mental Retardation
o M&O tax rate in Texas - Maintenance and Operations tax
o M&O tax rate in Texas - Maintenance and Operations tax
N
o NCLB – No child Left Behind Act of 2001
o NTD – New to the District
o NTD – New to the District
O
o OLPT – Oral Language Proficiency Test
P
o PA - Public Address System
o PBL - Project - Based Learning
o PBMAS- Performance Based Monitoring Analysis System
o PEIMS - Public Education Information Management Systems. PEIMS encompasses all data requested and received by TEA about public education, including student demographic and academic performance, personnel, financial, and organizational information.
o PGP - Professional Growth Plan
o PO - Purchase Order
o PLC- Professional Learning Community
o PTA - Parent Teacher Association
o PBL - Project - Based Learning
o PBMAS- Performance Based Monitoring Analysis System
o PEIMS - Public Education Information Management Systems. PEIMS encompasses all data requested and received by TEA about public education, including student demographic and academic performance, personnel, financial, and organizational information.
o PGP - Professional Growth Plan
o PO - Purchase Order
o PLC- Professional Learning Community
o PTA - Parent Teacher Association
Q
o QRI - Qualitative Reading Inventory
R
o RTI - Response to Intervention
S
o SBEC- State Board for Educator Certification
o SBDM - Site Based Decision Making Committee (make decisions on what is going on in school, give an input to the principal but the principal makes/overrules the decision)
o SBOE - State Board of Education
o SCE - State Compensatory Education Program
o SIFE - Students with Interrupted Education
o SIOP- Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol
o SPED- Special Education
o SSI - the Student Success Initiative grade advancement requirements apply to enrolled grades 5 and 8 students who take the STAAR reading and mathematics tests at grades 5 and 8. As specified by these requirements, a student may advance to the next grade level only by passing these tests or by unanimous decision of his or her grade placement committee that the student is likely to perform at grade level after additional instruction.The goal of the SSI is to ensure that all students receive the instruction and support they need to be academically successful in reading and mathematics. This effort depends greatly on schools, parents, and community members working in partnership to meet individual student needs.
o SST - Student Support Team (Local Label - a group of people (teachers, parents, administrators) who work with a teacher of a student who is in trouble academically or behaviorally)
o STAAR – State of Texas Assessment of Academic Readiness
o STAAR-Alt - State of Texas of Academic Readiness - Alternate
o SBDM - Site Based Decision Making Committee (make decisions on what is going on in school, give an input to the principal but the principal makes/overrules the decision)
o SBOE - State Board of Education
o SCE - State Compensatory Education Program
o SIFE - Students with Interrupted Education
o SIOP- Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol
o SPED- Special Education
o SSI - the Student Success Initiative grade advancement requirements apply to enrolled grades 5 and 8 students who take the STAAR reading and mathematics tests at grades 5 and 8. As specified by these requirements, a student may advance to the next grade level only by passing these tests or by unanimous decision of his or her grade placement committee that the student is likely to perform at grade level after additional instruction.The goal of the SSI is to ensure that all students receive the instruction and support they need to be academically successful in reading and mathematics. This effort depends greatly on schools, parents, and community members working in partnership to meet individual student needs.
o SST - Student Support Team (Local Label - a group of people (teachers, parents, administrators) who work with a teacher of a student who is in trouble academically or behaviorally)
o STAAR – State of Texas Assessment of Academic Readiness
o STAAR-Alt - State of Texas of Academic Readiness - Alternate
T
o TAPR - The Texas Academic Performance Reports (TAPR) pull together a wide range of information on the performance of students in each school and district in Texas every year. Performance is shown disaggregated by student groups, including ethnicity and low income status. The reports also provide extensive information on school and district staff, programs, and student demographics.
o TE - Teacher Edition (in Texas they come with ancillary materials (additional resources to go along))
o TEA – Texas Education Agency
o TEI - (Dallas ISD) Teacher Excellence Initiative
o TEKS – Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (Sometimes TEK or SEs. pronounced: with short "e") - curriculum, what we teach
o TELPAS - Texas English Language Proficiency Assessment System
o TINA - Teacher in Need of Assistance
o Title I - Title I is the largest federal education funding program for schools. Its aim is to help students who are behind academically or at risk of falling behind. School funding is based on the number of low-income children, generally those eligible for the free and reduced price lunch program. Title I used to be known as Chapter I.
o Title III - Title III is the section of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act that provides funding and addresses English language acquisition and standards and accountability requirements for limited English proficient students.
o Title IX - Title IX of the Educational Amendments of 1972 bans sex discrimination in schools receiving federal funds, whether it is in academics or athletics.
o TPRI - Texas Primary Reading Inventory
o TE - Teacher Edition (in Texas they come with ancillary materials (additional resources to go along))
o TEA – Texas Education Agency
o TEI - (Dallas ISD) Teacher Excellence Initiative
o TEKS – Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (Sometimes TEK or SEs. pronounced: with short "e") - curriculum, what we teach
o TELPAS - Texas English Language Proficiency Assessment System
o TINA - Teacher in Need of Assistance
o Title I - Title I is the largest federal education funding program for schools. Its aim is to help students who are behind academically or at risk of falling behind. School funding is based on the number of low-income children, generally those eligible for the free and reduced price lunch program. Title I used to be known as Chapter I.
o Title III - Title III is the section of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act that provides funding and addresses English language acquisition and standards and accountability requirements for limited English proficient students.
o Title IX - Title IX of the Educational Amendments of 1972 bans sex discrimination in schools receiving federal funds, whether it is in academics or athletics.
o TPRI - Texas Primary Reading Inventory
W
o WADA - Weighted Average Daily Attendance. It is a measure of the extent a school district's students in average daily attendance are participating in special programs (special education, career and technology education, bilingual education, compensatory education, and gifted education. WADA is used in the calculation of a school district's TIER II entitlement. WADA is also use for determination of wealth status and recapture amounts.