NHEdGIS and NHSTE are proud to announce the state winners of the 2023 New Hampshire’s Student Storytelling Competition for middle and high school students. From hemlock woolly adelgid to oriental bittersweet, this year's projects were interesting, well thought out, and told great stories!
 
State Finalists: Hemlock Woolly Adelgid by 7th graders Maisie Emerson & Ella-Mai Johnson, Hopkinton Middle High School
The State Finalists will each receive a prize of $100 thanks to ESRI’s monetary support and the administrative support of NHSTE.

This is from our Advocacy Chair, Kathleen McClaskey. She has summarized where you can get information and add input on the state and federal levels.

• Federal
  Take this opportunity to contribute to the revision of the National Ed Tech Plan (NETP). One-hour focus groups are being conducted in April and May in the following categories. Here are the links to apply.

• • K-12 District Administrators (Technology Leaders see below) on April 18 at 12 PM ET/9 AM PT

  • Teachers & Librarians on April 27 at 7 PM ET/4 PM PT

  • School Building Leaders (including counselors and coaches) on May 2 at 12 PM ET/9 AM PT

  • Students Grades 6-12 (Advisor completes RSVP form) on May 3 at various times – 3 offerings

  • Accessibility Proponents May 4 at 11 AM ET/8 AM PT

  • K-12 District Technology Leaders on May 18 at 11 AM ET/8 AM PT

The U.S. Department of Education Student Privacy Policy Office (SPPO) is offering a three-day Spring Webinar Series in April:

• Day 1:FERPA 101 and FERPA 201, April 12, 2023, 2-4pm EDT

• Day 2:Data Security and Data Breach Response, April 19, 2023, 2-4pm EDT

• Day 3:Vetting EdTech and Transparency, April 26, 2023, 2-4pm EDT
  
  

• State
  (Following information is from the NHSAA Weekly Newsletter)

How to Participate in New Hampshire Legislative Hearings

• New Hampshire citizens can upload written testimony on bills without appearing in person, specific to the House of Representatives. Legislators check this submissions page frequently to review testimony that has been submitted on bills coming before their committee. Testimony submitted online is available for anyone to view. The form accepts testimony through the end of the day of each bill’s public hearing.  

• For NH Senate bills, a copy of your written testimony must still be emailed to the committees, using the links provided further on in this update (see “Participation Methods for the 2023 Legislative Session”).  

 

A link to sign in and register a position, FOR THE NH HOUSE ONLY and to submit a PDF of written testimony, can be found here: NH House of Representatives Upload Testimony

Here are some links to keep up on what's happening on state and national levels

• Introducing the USDOE Office of Educational Technology (OET) “New” Blog Series on Digital Equity Stories -  Digital Equity Champions for All Learners: Leaders Partner with Communities and Across Sectors to Advance Digital Inclusion Goals.

• State: Sharing the NH Public Education Bill Primer Working Draft and 2023 Education Bill Tracker developed by Granite State Progress.

 - Kathleen McClaskey

On December 14th, the Federal Communications Commission announced that it is seeking public comment on using its E-rate program to pay for school and library cybersecurity improvements. Public comment is open until February 13th. Refer to this K-12 Dive article where this is a link to comment to the FCC. - Kathleen McClaskey

Just a reminder, as a conference registrant, you can view the sessions that were recorded at CMTC (Christa McAuliffe Teaching Transforming Technology Conference) at nhcmtc.org. These should be available until at least April, 2023. Also, presenters have updated their sessions to include links and extensions to their sessions. The learning continues!!

NHSTE Advocacy Notes - March 2022

State Report:  On Tuesday, February 15, NH Education Commissioner Frank Edelblut and Representative Rick Ladd (R-Haverhill) introduced to the House Education Committee House Bill (HB) 1671, which would overhaul key elements of the state law that governs the content and requirements for a public education in New Hampshire.

The biggest change to the education laws would be that public schools would only be required to teach English Language Arts, math, science, and social studies. It would remove art, health and physical education, engineering, computer science, digital literacy, and world languages from the core academic domains. (Ref: Reaching Higher NH)

This bill would turn over the power of deciding the minimum standards of education directly to the legislature, with no prior input from education professionals or citizens.

Locate Legislative updates on (HB) 1671 at https://legiscan.com/NH/bill/HB1671/2022
Read March 6th Opinion Letter from Concord Monitor re: (HB) 1671 - https://www.concordmonitor.com/-45295743

NHSTE Advocacy Notes - January 2022

State: The House and Senate are meeting on Wednesday, January 5, to vote on outstanding bills from the 2021 session. The House will be voting on HB 607, the local school voucher bill, which the House Education Committee voted along party lines to recommend passing. The bill would undercut our public schools and communities, and divert taxpayer funds to pay for school vouchers totaling up to $41,000 per student, per year. (Source: NH Education Network)

January 2022 Updates to NHEON Partnerships

UNH Cooperative Extension &NHEdGIS Presents
Getting Started with Storymaps for K-12 Teachers

Virtual Workshop

January 12, 2022 or January 20, 2022

3:30-4:30pm

(with an optional hands-on lesson from 4:30-5pm)

Learn how to make your own interactive StoryMaps using easy to use tools.  Open to all. No experience necessary!  $50 gift cards for the first 40 NH teachers to attend (Just 18 remaining!!)

 

In one hour, we will walk you through how to make your own StoryMap and give you the resources to start using StoryMaps in your classroom.  If you used Story Maps in the past, we will be covering the new StoryMap template and the exciting  new tools that are now available.  StoryMaps are available for FREE to K-12 schools through the ArcGIS for Schools Bundle.

Contact NHEdGISPartnership@gmail.com if you need help setting up your account.

 

Why teach with StoryMaps?

• Provide an engaging, rich way to teach content.
• Foster technical skills: GIS, multimedia (media fluency), data.
• Foster critical and spatial thinking.
• Foster skills in organization, ethics, permissions.
• Foster communication skills - digital, written, and oral.
• Tools that support collaboration and culminating projects.
• Access to resources by authoritative sources! If something is happening in the world, there is a story map for it!

 

Additional help is available!  StoryMap Office Hours will be offered every other Thursday, starting January 27, 2022 at 3:30-4:30pm.  These open calls are available for you to check in with experts and get help with your projects and StoryMaps.

 

Students in grades 4-12 who complete a Storymap by May 11, 2022 are encouraged to enter their StoryMaps to the NH Student Map Competition!  

 

Register for the Workshop at: https://arcg.is/1uOvbq  by January 5, 2022

Congratulations to our 2021 NHSTE Award Winners!

2021 Pat Keyes Technology - Using Educator Award Winner

Dr. Rachael Ramsey

6th Grade Educator

McKelvie Intermediate School - Bedford, NH

2021 Susan Janosz Technology Impact Award Winner

Sandra Blanc

Technology Coordinator

Exeter High School - Exeter, NH

Please visit our full award winners page to read the biographies of these extraordinary award winners.