The State Department of Education announced Tuesday which districts have applied to become a pilot district to launch the state’s new pilot teacher evaluation system for the coming school year.

Thirty-five districts have applied, and the state department will announce Friday which districts will have the pilots.

The districts include Portland, Cromwell, New Hartford, Suffield, Windsor, Plainville, Berlin, Odyssey Charter School, Watertown, Region 6 school district, Capitol Region Education Council, Watertown, Torrington, Monroe, Bridgeport, Norwalk, Montville, Branford, Waterbury, Bethany, Orange, Woodbridge, Sterling, Waterford, Westbrook, Cheshire, Naugatuck, Columbia, Eastford, Hebron, Windham, Region 8 school district, Sprague, Colchester, Andover, Deep River, Chester, Region 4 school district, Essex, Norwich and Franklin.

An official from the state department said that the majority of the school boards have received approval from their local school board to participate, as required by state law. She added it hasn’t been an issue so far getting board approval and districts have until today to get their school board to approve.

Update: School boards in all 35 districts have approved their district participating in the pilot. The State Department of Education will inform eight to 10 districts Friday that they have been selected to pilot the new state evaluation model for the upcoming school year.

Jacqueline was CT Mirror’s Education and Housing Reporter, and an original member of the CT Mirror staff, joining shortly before our January 2010 launch. Her awards include the best-of-show Theodore A. Driscoll Investigative Award from the Connecticut Society of Professional Journalists in 2019 for reporting on inadequate inmate health care, first-place for investigative reporting from the New England Newspaper and Press Association in 2020 for reporting on housing segregation, and two first-place awards from the National Education Writers Association in 2012. She was selected for a prestigious, year-long Propublica Local Reporting Network grant in 2019, exploring a range of affordable and low-income housing issues. Before joining CT Mirror, Jacqueline was a reporter, online editor and website developer for The Washington Post Co.’s Maryland newspaper chains. Jacqueline received an undergraduate degree in journalism from Bowling Green State University and a master’s in public policy from Trinity College.

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