Your renewal requirement states that you can either take a course in secondary education or content area reading. We've made a recent change that for Secondary teachers, the content area reading course does not need to be taken for college credit, although taking it through a college is still an option. The secondary education course will still need to be taken for college credit.
We now also have an ACSI checklist that can also be used to meet the content area reading requirement!
Below you will find some options on where to fulfill these hours.
We do have two universities that we recommend for teachers needing semester hours to renew. We recommend Fresno Pacific University and Grand Canyon University because they have reasonable rates for courses outside of a degree program. You can choose any regionally accredited university of your choice though.
Many teachers also use Learner’s Edge: www.learnersedgeinc.com or Advancement Courses: https://www.advancementcourses.com (For the secondary education course: if using Learner's Edge or Advancement Courses, you will need to pay for the graduate level credit option, not the non-credit option. For the content area reading course: if using Learner's Edge or Advancement courses, you can choose the non-credit option instead. We will also accept an appropriate reading course taken from Virtual Education Software, also not taken for graduate level credit: http://www.virtualeduc.com/courses.php)
For Secondary Education course:
Fresno Pacific University: https://www.fresno.edu/ (Fresno's pre-approved course list: https://ce.fresno.edu/media/3362/acsi-educational-studies-and-content-courses-acsi-reviewed-06012020.pdf ) -See green sections General Education and Secondary Content Area reading
Grand Canyon University: https://www.gcu.edu/individual-courses/continuing-education (Scroll down until you see the search engine, then search by course category) -Search under Secondary Education or Reading Program
For content area reading course:
• ACSI’s Content Area Reading Checklist: You can now complete this requirement by completing ACSI’s Content Area Reading Checklist! The fee to use this checklist is $25, which can be paid using the renewal application when you are ready to apply for your next certificate. You can find this checklist attached to this email.
• Learner’s Edge: applicable grade level and content area literacy courses (can be taken for credit or not)
• VESi Courses: applicable courses within the “Reading” tab (can be taken for graduate or PLU/CEU credit)
• PBS TeacherLine™: RDLA 340 – Teaching Reading in the Content Areas
• CE Credits Online™: applicable grade level and content area literacy courses (can be taken for credit or not)
• Advancement Courses™: applicable grade level and content area literacy courses (can be for credit or not)
• CERI (Center for Effective Reading Instruction): Passing score on the exam, or any tier of CERI Certification
• Content Area Reading courses counting toward Maryland State Department of Education credits
What we look for in the course description of this course is one of three things:
- methods in increasing student reading literacy
- methods in increasing student reading fluency
- methods in increasing student reading comprehension
It is recommended that you email the course title, description, and place you plan on taking it from to certification@acsi.org to gain pre-approval before spending money to take the course.
For the secondary Education course ONLY: ACSI will require an official transcript when you are ready to renew your certification. If using Learner's Edge or Advancement Courses, a letter of completion will not suffice. You will need to contact which university they partnered with to offer the course and get the official transcript from them. We are no longer accepting Final Grade Reports from Fresno as well.
(Make sure Content Area Reading checklist is attached to email.)