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SOUTH CAROLINA DEPARTMENT EDUCATION

2009 REVIEW OF ONLINE/CREDIT RECOVERY COURSES

TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN:

The South Carolina Department of Education (SCDE) is establishing a list of online/credit recovery courses that are aligned with South Carolina standards in the subject areas listed below. The SCDE is establishing this review process as a way to assist school districts in selecting quality courses that meet state standards. Districts may choose to offer courses that are not on the SCDE list. Placement on the list is not an endorsement by the SCDE. The online/credit recovery course list will be provided to high schools for school year 2009–10.

The SCDE will receive proposals for online/credit recovery courses to be used in South Carolina public schools on or before April 8, 2009. The SCDE will receive proposals through Office of Standards and Support, 1429 Senate Street, Columbia, SC 29201, Attention: Kriss Stewart, on or before April 8, 2009. No proposals will be accepted after the deadline. Proposals will be accepted for the following high school courses.

English Language Arts, Secondary

• English Language Arts 1, 2, 3, and 4

Mathematics, Secondary

• Algebra 1 and 2

• Mathematics for the Technologies 1 and 2

• Geometry

• Mathematics for the Technologies 3

Science, Secondary

• Physical Science

• Biology 1 and 2 (with or without lab)

• Biology for the Technologies (with or without lab)

• Chemistry (with or without lab)

• Chemistry for the Technologies (with or without lab)

• Physics (with or without lab)

• Physics for the Technologies (with or without lab)

Social Studies, Secondary

• Global Studies

• World History

• World Geography

• U. S. History and Constitution

• Economics

• Government

Submission Requirements

• Proposal

Proposals for online/credit recovery courses will be received by the South Carolina Department of Education (SCDE), through Office of Standards and Support, 1429 Senate Street, Columbia, SC 29201, Attention: Kriss Stewart, on or before April 8, 2009. Proposal forms must be submitted marked “2009 Online/Credit Recovery Review.” Rewritable CD(s) containing proposal data must be enclosed with the proposal or provided by e-mail on or before the deadline of April 8, 2009.

The 2009 course submission forms are available at under “What’s New.” All offerors are required to download and use the Access database or Excel worksheet located at under “What’s New” to submit their data. The data must be submitted on a rewritable CD in Access or Excel or provided via e-mail on or before the deadline of April 8, 2009.

• “Good Faith Deposit”

Each proposal shall include a "good faith deposit" in the form of a certified check or cashier's check made payable to the South Carolina Department of Education in the amount of $500.00 for each course. A “good faith deposit” cannot exceed in the aggregate of $5,000.00 from any particular offeror. Checks shall be deposited by the State Superintendent with the State Treasurer. In the event that any offeror submitting a proposal neglects, refuses, or omits to execute procedures as outlined, this "good faith deposit" shall be forfeited to the State of South Carolina. Upon completion of the process the "good faith deposit" shall be returned to each offeror.

• Registration of Publishers

All offerors who plan to submit courses for review in South Carolina must register with the SCDE, Office of Standards and Support, on or before April 8, 2009. Registration information shall include the names, addresses, and telephone numbers of all agents, employees, or persons currently representing the offeror in South Carolina.

Required Submissions to Review Panels and SCDE

The appropriate Review Panels and the SCDE must receive the following bulleted items on or before May 8, 2009. Required Excel spreadsheets to be use for standards alignment are available at under “What’s New.”

• Official SCDE Samples

Offerors are required to provide the SCDE with all software including plug ins and passwords/codes to access the course (demo disk, demo site, partial access are not acceptable), digital and/or print materials, alignment to standards, course syllabus, and the evaluation brief for each program. Deliver official samples to the SCDE, Office of Standards and Support, 1429 Senate Street Room 805, Columbia, SC 29201, Attention: Kriss Stewart (kstewart@ed.). (Deadline: May 8, 2009)

• Official Review Panel Samples

Appropriate Review Panels shall receive official samples consisting of all software including plug ins and passwords/codes to access the course (demo disk, demo site, partial access are not acceptable, digital and/or print materials, course software, alignment to standards, course syllabus, and related evaluation briefs. Companies should contact information for providing technical support to reviewers. The contact information for Review Panel members will be provided to bidders on April 27, 2009. (Sample Deadline: May 8, 2009)

• Alignment to Standards

Courses will be reviewed based on criteria contained in the South Carolina grade level academic standards. Offerors are required to align courses bid to the appropriate standards. On the Web, academic standards are available at . Deadline for panel members and the SCDE to receive alignments is May 8, 2009. Required Excel spreadsheets to be use indicating alignment will be available at under “What’s New.”

• Course Modifications

Courses placed on the SCDE list of online/credit recovery courses may undergo changes that do not alter content alignment. However, should modifications alter content of the course, the SCDE should be notified and provided with a list of changes and given access to the revised course. The SCDE will review to determine if modifications to the course affected the level of alignment to the South Carolina standards. The offeror will receive notification of course status.

• Review Panel Presentations

The Review Panels will June 8–June 12, 2009. The panel will include presentations by companies who have submitted courses for review. Offerors may contact Kriss Stewart, Program Coordinator, from March 14–24, 2009, to schedule presentation times. The length of the presentation will vary depending on the number of course submissions. Contact Mrs. Kriss Stewart by e-mail at kstewart@ed. or by phone at 803-734-8393.

Offerors will be permitted to have the laptops with pre-installed software available for the reviewers. Additional information about the delivery and retrieval of laptops will provided closer to the date of the meeting.

• Disposition of Instructional Material Samples

Offerors may retrieve samples at their own expense and provide shipping instructions with the samples to Review Panel members (i.e., mailing label with company’s FedEx account number and mailing instructions to each panel member). Offerors will notify the SCDE of its intent to reclaim or not to reclaim samples when proposals are submitted.

• Annual Report

Offerors should provide to the SCDE an annual report of data on course usage within the state. The report should include the list of courses with number of students, number of districts, number of schools using the each course, number of students completing the course, number of students successfully completing rate and indicate if the course is for initial credit or credit recovery. Offerors may include additional data collected on courses in the report. Deadline for submitting report to Mrs. Stewart is July 1, 2010.

Technology Requirements

1. All content adheres to current W3C guidelines.

2. Content is IMS Content Packaging Specification (at least 1.0) conformant.

3. Content is SCORM 1.2 conformant at a minimum

4. All content is 508 conformant.

5. All content follows the current Web Accessibility Guidelines (i.e., Web Content Accessibility Guidelines [WCAG] 1.0).

6. Content conforms to the National Instructional Materials Accessibility Standard (NIMAS).

7. Two-dimensional graphics conform to current Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) format.

8. Rich media are provided in the user’s choice of format, or the source code is provided to enable the user to convert the media to the format of choice.

9. Rich media are available in low and high bandwidths.

10. Copyrighted rich media and images are protected by technology that prevents them from being downloaded, saved or copied by students once they are placed in the course.

11. Multiple authentications are not required for users to access content through a secured Web site (Learning Management System, Content Management System, etc.).

12. Coding will not disable LMS features when the content is used.

13. Content does not contain code that limits full functionality in other delivery environments, such as cell phones and PDAs.

14. Content must be capable of being reorganized and replicated (within the legal terms of use) and remain fully functional.

15. Content components can be replicated or updated in their entirety or in their individual parts (e.g., test banks, topics/modules, discussions, etc.).

16. Content adopts a file naming convention that is unique, descriptive, meaningful and consistently applied as it relates to the organization of the content.

17. Test/question item banks are organized by the learning outcomes they are intended to assess.

18. Content maintains the privacy of users, security of information about users and security of users’ content.

19. Offeror provides the ability for the institution to archive user interactions, usage logs, record of work completed and performance.

20. At a minimum, technical support is provided for system technology administrators during standard business hours for the duration of the license.

21. Courses with technical difficulties that prevent reviewers from evaluating course content will be eliminated from the review process for the current review period. Offerors will receive notification of the documented technical difficulties.

Technology Requirements to Take a Class Online

The courses would need to be able to run in the environment described below

PC Requirements

Pentium II (233 MHz minimum, higher recommended)

Minimum of 3 gig free HDD space

128k Internet connection. A broadband connection is recommended.

Windows 2000, NT, XP

Microsoft Office

256 MB Ram

12x CD-ROM (CD/DVD Recommended)

Display setting 1024x768 resolution

Printer required

Internet Explorer (web browsing software) - version 6.0 or higher

Flash 9.0 player

Students need a method to save work to a removable disk (Floppy, Zip, CD)

Audio: Sound card with speakers, microphone or headset

America Online and KOL are not recommended

Macintosh Requirements

Power Mac G3

OSX

Microsoft Office

Students need a method to save work to a removable disk (Floppy, Zip, CD)

128 MB Ram

Minimum of 3 gig free HDD space

12x CD ROM (CD/DVD Recommended)

128k Internet connection. A broadband connection is recommended.

Display setting 1024x768 resolution

Printer required

Safari browser

Flash 9.0 player

Audio: Speakers and microphone or headset

America Online and KOL are not recommended

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