Montgomery, Ala. – Alabama teachers who must renew their teaching certificates this summer won’t have to travel far, thanks to a new online renewal system developed by the Alabama Department of Education. It’s now as simple as a few mouse clicks.
“It might take several hours to get everything together. Now I can have it done in about three minutes. And that’s really a big change,” said Sharon Massie, Secretary to the Superintendent of Coosa County.
The new online renewal system, DEW Point, is available and in use by local school personnel offices for renewing teaching certificates which all expire every year on June 30. Due to the large amount of paperwork that was previously required, it took months for a school’s renewals to be completed. Hours spent on the renewal process are now shaved down to minutes for local schools and the Alabama Department of Education. The new system will also save considerable material and human resource hours as the Department of Education continues to search for ways to reduce costs in light of the budget cuts in 2009 and 2010.
“I think the department benefits because it is a cost saving measure and we have budget cuts like everyone else, so it is a way for us to economize. I really think it is a win-win for everyone,” said Joe Morton, State Superintendent of Education.
A designated local school system (LEA) administrator now can log on to ALSDE’s On-Line Renewal Web site to renew teaching certificates for their system’s teachers. DEW Point allows local school personnel to be notified when an individual’s certificate is up for renewal, tracks the progress of the renewal from the initial email to the final approval and includes online payment option for the certificate. The certificate is then immediately sent to the teacher and the school system.
“It’s all paperless, it’s easy and it’s instantaneous. And the feedback from the local systems has been nothing short of fantastic,” said Morton.
“What has amazed me is…I will send it into the state online, and just check a couple of boxes and send it to them. Immediately the person that the renewal is for gets a request for payment. And soon as they get the payment, the certificate’s there,” Massie said.
Generating reports, viewing user feedback, obtaining training via Webinars on the system, and completing accuracy checks are at the hands of the local school personnel. This advanced functionality allows an ease of use in renewing teaching certificates not seen before by teachers, local and state department of education employees.
“By use of the online renewal system, the school system, the state Department of Education, and the educator can save weeks and months,” said Sarah Justiss, Teacher Certification Specialist at the Department of Education, who oversees the new online process.
The online renewal system saves time and work performed by local school personnel and the state education department. This system creates a more efficient and streamlined processing of teaching certificate renewals and allows Teacher Certification Specialists to devote extra hours to new certificate applications and reduces the processing timeline for teaching applications.
At this point in a year without the online system, DEW Point, a small percentage of certificate renewals would have been completed. “We have done basically eighty-nine percent of the online renewable certificates. We have had some school systems email us and tell us they are completely finished with all of their people,” said Justiss. Also, the state education department previously printed all the certificates and sent them by mail. This new system allows for at-home printing of the electronically generated certificates, saving reams of paper.
To eliminate hours of Web maintenance that could come with this new technology, the Department of Education’s Information Systems Section (IS) has designed a “governor” to monitor the system. The “governor” would identify any problems that are backing-up any renewal and notify IS, after which an employee would correct the issue promptly. The “governor” also identifies any kind of system problem at a very early point, as to prevent failure.
DEW Point has more goals on the horizon. A system called G-Link now holds all information on all teachers in the state and their certificate information. The Department of Education hopes to eliminate the use of the G-Link system in the next 18-24 months and incorporate the information into DEW Point so that all applications for teaching certificates – initial and renewal – are located in the same application, furthering efficiency in usage. Approximately 30,000 teachers each year may benefit from the new online renewal system.
For more information on this new online teaching certificate renewal system, please visit ALSDE’s On-Line Renewal Web site or contact the Alabama Department of Education.
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