2021-2023 Professional Development Plan

CTLE Requirements and Process to Request a Certificate

Who needs to do these hours?

A registered holder of a professional classroom teaching certificate, educational leadership certificate, or Level III teaching assistant certificate is required to successfully complete 100 clock hours of acceptable CTLE during the registration period if they practice in a NYS school district or BOCES.

CTLE requirements do not apply to holders of Continuing Teaching Assistant certificates and Pupil Personnel Services (PPS) certificates, such as School Attendance Teachers, School Counselors, School Psychologists, School Social Workers, School Dental Hygiene Teachers and School Nurse Teachers.

Additional Information can be found on the State Education website.

Acceptable Continuing Teacher and Leader Education (CTLE)

Acceptable CTLE must be taken from a sponsor approved by NYSED. You get your certificate of completed hours from the sponsor. The district can only provide certificates for activities we sponsor. If a BOCES provider is doing an activity in our district, BOCES will provide the certificate. If you go to a conference, you will get a certificate from them.

Acceptable CTLE shall be study in the content area of any certificate title held by the inpidual or in pedagogy, and include any required study in language acquisition addressing the needs of English language learners as described in section 80-6.3 of Commissioner's Regulations.

Acceptable CTLE must be conducted through activities designed to improve the teacher or leader's pedagogical and/or leadership skills, targeted at improving student performance, including but not limited to formal CTLE activities. Such activities shall promote the professionalization of teaching and educational leadership, as applicable, and be closely aligned to district goals for student performance.

Record Keeping

CTLE certificate holders shall maintain a record of completed CTLE, which shall include: the title of the program, the total number of hours completed, the number of hours completed in language acquisition addressing the need of English language learners, the sponsor's name and any identifying number, attendance verification, and the date and location of the program. You can request a certificate that contains all this information after each CTLE activity. Such records shall be retained by you for at least three years from the end of the registration period in which the CTLE was completed and shall be available for review by the Department upon request. Completion certificates are not to be submitted to the Office of Teaching Initiatives unless they are requested.

Requesting a Certificate

Employees in need of CTLE credit must follow the process outlined below to obtain a certificate:

• Attend a CTLE approved event

• Have documentation of your attendance (certificate of completion, sign in sheets, etc)

• Download a CTLE form from the district website

• Fill out sections I & II

• Attach event documentation

• Inter-office CTLE form and documentation to the Office of Curriculum and Instruction

• Certified forms will be copied and sent back to you.

What Counts

Superintendent's conference days will only count for time spent enhancing your teaching or leadership ability. Working in your classroom to set up the room will not count. Traditionally opening day has primarily been an informational staff meeting and classroom set up so that will not count as "enhancing your teaching". If the opening day format changes, we will reevaluate at that time.

Activities provided by the district must be an hour or more to count. BOCES is not counting anything less than three hours. You need a separate form for each event.

All providers must either be approved by NYSED or must be in our PD plan. You can check the provider list on the school district website under curriculum and instruction. If you don't see a provider that you work with, please let us know and we can add them.

CTLE hours can be in content, pedagogy or language acquisition. If you attend content related training, it must be in the area you are certified in. Pedagogical training counts towards all certificates.

Here are some examples that count:

• Strategic Planning meetings

• CSLO days

• Network Team Days

• BOCES events

• College courses

• Summer curriculum work

• Scoring training at BOCES

• Mendler Training

• PLC Training

• ENL Workshops

Here are examples that do not count:

• CSE meetings

• IEP writing

• Grade level or department meetings

• Kindergarten activity day

• Setting up your classroom

• Actually scoring the assessments

• Training others to score the assessments (you get a certificate for attending the BOCES training, not being the district trainer)