A Guide for Principals and Mentor Teachers

All teachers who are issued a conditional license must complete the Kansas Performance Assessment (KPA) to move to the five-year professional license. The novice teacher needs support in completing the KPA. As an experienced professional with some responsibility for the oversight of new teachers, a principal and/or mentor can provide assistance in the following ways:

  • Read the KPA document and the Policies and Procedures Handbook so that the new teacher can be helped to understand the process and the regulations.
  • Give encouragement and emotional support by helping the new teacher understand that personal growth and professional development are natural outcomes of the reflective process involved in doing the KPA.
  • Assist the new teacher in developing a timetable to complete and submit the KPA.
  • Be available for the new teacher to brainstorm ideas, to talk with as a fellow professional as he/she tries to work out ideas or to solve problems. Give feedback on ideas, and advice, based on your knowledge and experience, but remember that the newteacher, and not you, must do the work.
  • Provide access to unrestricted resources/data/reports that the new teacher might need to get demographic information about students.
  • Help the new teacher understand and know how to contribute to the QPA process in the building.
  • Encourage collaborative teaching in your building to facilitate the new teacher’s efforts to develop integrative skills and carry out integrative activities in the classroom.
  • Be conscious of the demands of time that the new teacher will have in the semester in which the KPA is done, and relieve, as much as possible, some of the extra-curricular responsibilities.

When the KPA has been completed the new teacher will need the principal or immediate supervisor to sign a statement of verification, located on the title page of the KPA, that the completed KPA is the work of the new teacher.

KPA Irregularities and Penalties Procedures

  1. Scores will not be given for submitted KPA’s in the following circumstances:
  2. The KPA was not done in an area of endorsement.
  3. It is determined, after investigation, that there was a violation of academic integrity.
  4. All sections of the KPA are not completed.
  1. Obtaining, or attempting to obtain, a professional license by falsification or misrepresentation of the KPA may result in the revocation of the teacher’s conditional license.

KPA Academic Integrity Guidelines

Academic integrity means engaging in scholarly activity that is conducted honestly and responsibly. It includes a commitment to not be involved in falsification, misrepresentation or deception in the preparation of the KPA. The KPA submitted must be the teacher’s own work and in the teacher’s own words. Teachers are expected to act with personal and professional integrity at all times.

Some Examples of Violation of Academic Integrity:

  • Plagiarism - this means copying work (such as words, phrases, sentences, paragraphs or ideas) from someone else’s writing and putting them into a KPA as if they were created by the teacher submitting the KPA.
  • Submitting a KPA, or parts of a KPA, that was prepared by a person other than the conditional license holder.
  • Submitting a KPA, or parts of a KPA, that was previously submitted to KSDE by someone else.
  • Submitting a KPA prepared by the conditional license holder in a setting other than that of the present employment – e.g. a KPA prepared in college.
  • Fabricating context, numerical or other data.
  • Extensive collaboration with others in preparing the KPA: Having someone else plan your teaching or write sections of your KPA are unacceptable.