edTPA Use of Materials and Originality
| To: | Deans and Directors of Institutions Offering Educator Preparation Programs; Certification Officers; edTPA Coordinators; Other Interested Parties. |
| From: | John L. D’Agati, Deputy Commissioner of Office of Higher Education |
| Date: | July 23, 2015 |
| Subject: | edTPA Use of Materials and Originality  (208KB)
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As described in a November 25, 2013 memorandum, the use of original edTPA portfolio materials submitted by New York State teacher certification candidates is governed by the policy established by the State Education Department. This memorandum may be found on the Department’s web site at http://www.highered.nysed.gov/pdf/MemotoDeans-edTPA-useofmaterials.pdf. edTPA portfolio materials are also governed by the Rules of Assessment Participation (http://edtpa.com/PageView.aspx?f=GEN_CandidatePolicies.html).
A candidate’s edTPA portfolio materials, regardless of when prepared or submitted, may not be shared with other candidates at any time. Candidates preparing edTPA portfolios for submission may not copy materials submitted as part of another edTPA portfolio. Further, the edTPA Rules of Assessment Participation, which a candidate agrees to when registering for edTPA, require that the candidate be “the sole author of the commentaries and other written responses to prompts and other requests for information in [edTPA], and that [the candidate] ha[s] cited all materials in the assessment whose sources are from published text, the internet, or other educator[s].”
As part of the edTPA scoring process, originality detection software is employed to compare all edTPA submissions nationwide against all other edTPA submissions received, including outside written sources and other sources of material. The software reports any substantial degree of matching between submitted edTPA portfolios. In cases where there is substantial matching, a specially trained portfolio reviewer may then elect to seek enforcement action against the candidate(s) involved and/or refer the candidate(s) to the State Education Department for enforcement action.
Please ask your faculty to remind their teacher candidates that those who fail to abide by these Rules of Assessment Participation and/or Department policies may face serious consequences. A candidate’s edTPA score may be voided and the registration fee may not be refunded to the candidate. In this case, the candidate may not be eligible for the edTPA Safety Net. Further, the candidate’s application for certification may be denied if it is determined that these actions constitute a reasonable question of moral character. As it may raise a reasonable question of moral character, the State Education Department may elect to seek revocation of a certificate or certificates held by the candidate, without regard to whether the failure to abide by the Rules of Assessment Participation and/or Department policies was detected before or after such certificates were issued.
It is important to remind candidates that programmed systems are being employed to detect any edTPA portfolio that has a substantial amount of duplication with any other edTPA portfolio, regardless of where or when those two or more edTPA portfolios were submitted.
By abiding by the Rules of Assessment Participation and Department policies, candidates ensure that release of their edTPA score will not be delayed, that they will not become ineligible for the edTPA Safety Net, that their application for certification will not be denied, and that their certificate(s), when received, will not later be challenged because of questions regarding their certification assessment score.