2024 Guidelines for Roster Verification
The information below outlines the Roster Verification Guidelines from the Ohio Department of Education and Workforce to inform the spring roster verification process and guide public schools and participating community schools in fully verifying instructional relationships among teachers, grades, subjects, and students.
These guidelines include:
- When the process occurs;
- Who will be involved;
- How to document instructional responsibility; and
- How to handle many special situations, so teachers can verify rosters using the most complete information available.
About Roster Verification
Roster verification is the process that facilitates validation of which teacher teaches what subject to which students in support of value-added student growth measures. Roster verification directly involves educators in the process that assigns instructional responsibility for the students they teach.
Roster verification allows educators to verify the following four pieces of information:
- The grades, classes, and subjects taught;
- The students who received instruction;
- The months during which students received instruction; and
- The percentage of instructional responsibility for each student during the months selected (verifying sole — or a percentage of — shared instructional responsibility).
Currently, the primary purpose of roster verification is to provide teacher-verified roster data that will be used to develop EVAAS value-added reports.
- To provide data to allow educators to make valid decisions or data driven decisions informing instruction and adapting instruction to meet student needs based on the gain from data analysis.
- For teachers implementing OTES 2.0, these reports will be used as a source of high-quality student data, when applicable.
Participating Individuals
- Statewide, all licensed/certified teachers planning and/or providing instruction for students in:
- Grades 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8 mathematics and English language arts;
- Grades 5 and 8 science;
- Algebra I for high school credit;
- American Government for high school credit;
- American History for high school credit;
- Biology for high school credit;
- English II for high school credit;
- Geometry for high school credit; and
- Integrated Mathematics I and II for high school credit.
- All rosters associated with the grades and subjects cited above must be verified. Teachers in team-teaching situations who are collaborating in student instruction for a course should participate in roster verification.
- Teachers employed outside of the local school district but contracted to provide instruction to students in the grades and subjects cited above should participate in roster verification through the district the students are attending.
- When a teacher’s roster for a high school course with a state end-of-course test includes students from multiple grade levels, all students in the class should be verified on the roster. Doing so will permit teachers to review their classes in their entirety.
- The following staff should not participate in roster verification:
- Student teachers;
- Substitute teachers who hold short- or long-term substitute positions;
- Teachers employed by developmental disabilities facilities and alternative education providers, such as the Positive Education Program, Educational Alternatives and the Marsh Foundation; and
- Tutoring program staff or instructional support staff who did not plan and/or provide instruction for students.
- The superintendent has the responsibility to affirm that verified data will be used in the value-added analysis at the teacher level.
- Community schools that want to receive teacher-level value-added reports must participate in roster verification.
2024 Roster Verification Process Timeframe
Intent to Participate
November/December
Superintendents confirm participation.
Data Loading
February/March
ITCs/Administrators work with MCOECN on data to pre-prepopulate BFK Link ®.
Learning Modules for Teachers and Principals
Any time after March 4
Teachers and principals can access online learning modules and user guides to support training and use of the Link system. Visit
ohio-k12.help/rosterv.
School Setup Period
March 19 – April 9
Principals and support teams can log in to Link to verify staff lists and staff assignments.
Teacher Linkage Period
April 10 – April 30
Teachers can log in to Link to:
- Verify classes and tests taken;
- Review their class rosters;
- Include student membership in their classes; and
- Assign the percentage of instruction they provided each student.
Principals/support teams should:
- Monitor teacher completion;
- Review submitted classes (instructional responsibility) and approve them; and
- Monitor alerts.
Principal Approval Period
May 1 – May 23
Principals should:
- Perform final review of classes; and
- Review staff instructional responsibilities and alerts before giving final approval.
Teacher Value-Added Reports
Fall 2024
Superintendents, principals and teachers can log in to
Ohio’s EVAAS website to access 2022 teacher value-added reports.
General Cases
Number of Full-Time Students
Teachers who are required to participate in roster verification (those teaching the subjects/courses described above) should complete the process regardless of the number of students they have taught during the school year. Ohio’s value- added provider will calculate minimum requirements for full-time students and sufficient test scores during the analysis phase of value-added report production.
Team-Teaching Assignments
Team teaching describes a situation where more than one teacher shares the responsibility for planning and/or delivering instruction. Teachers should claim a percentage that reflects their own instructional responsibility for each student they have taught. Each teacher on the team will individually verify a class roster.
Missing Students in Class Roster
Teachers shall add students missing from class rosters by doing a thorough search using the “Add Student” feature in Link, the web application that facilitates roster verification. If the teacher does not find the student after this search, he or she should contact the principal or a support team member who should contact the Management Council of the Ohio Education Computer Network to have the student added to the master database. They will need to provide the legal first, middle and last name, public school or participating community school student ID, state student ID (SSID), birth date and grade level of the student. Once the support team adds the student to the database, the teacher will be able to add the student to the appropriate class rosters.
If a student enrolls in a public school or participating community school after the spring administration of the state assessments, the student should not be added to the teacher’s roster.
Educator State ID Usage
A teacher’s Ohio Educator State ID is required for the roster verification process. If a teacher cannot be located in the Link application, a new staff account should be created with a valid Ohio Educator State ID. The Ohio Educator State ID is located in the upper left corner of the educator’s license, which the teacher or a licensure e-signer can search for in the ODE.CORE application within the OH|ID Portal. With a birth date and complete name, you also can search for the Ohio Educator State ID.
Student Data
The names of students used to populate the roster verification application will come from local data sources — typically, from the district’s student information system (SIS). To ensure a consistent name match between what is used in roster verification in the spring and value-added reports in the fall, we strongly recommend schools make regular updates to their records in the State Student Identifier System. Usually, the public school or participating community school staff member who handles Educational Management Information System (EMIS) data can make changes to the State Student Identifier System (SSID) file. If needed, information technology centers can assist districts with this activity.
Student Attendance
As long as a student is enrolled in a class and is on the roster, the teacher should account for that student in roster verification. Daily student attendance within a teacher’s individual class, however, should not be taken into consideration during roster verification. The Ohio Department of Education and Workforce will remove any student from the analysis who has a total of 45 days or more of excused or unexcused absences during the academic year based on data submitted in EMIS.
Enrollment
Students enrolled for a majority (more than half) of the instructional days available in a given month should be included in roster verification. Expelled students receiving instructional services for a majority of the days available in a given month from an institution outside of the district, community school, joint vocational school or career-technical center may be removed from a teacher’s roster for that specific time period.
The rosters of students receiving instructional services from a specialized and separate program within their home district should be verified by the teacher(s) responsible for planning and/or delivering their instruction for a majority of the instructional days available in each given month.
Content Alignment and Roster Verification
A teacher only should verify rosters for those classes that are aligned with state learning standards and state tests for the grades subjects/courses cited in the section titled “Participating Individuals” above. Classes not aligned to appropriate grade-level learning standards and state tests should not be verified.
Class Details
Principals and other roster verification support team members should carefully review the class details associated with each roster during the school setup period of roster verification. It is particularly important to make sure the correct academic term (such as Full Year (Aug/Sep - May/Jun), Fall Semester (Aug/Sep - Jan), Fall Semester (FYE/Block), Spring Semester (Jan - May/Jun) or Spring Semester (FYE/Block)) is chosen, as this affects data used in calculating value-added scores. Full Year Equivalent (FYE) classes will be shown in school setup with an icon labeled FYE. Teachers providing instruction to students for the entire academic term should claim all months shown.
Unique Cases
Teachers Assigned After the School Year Starts
Teachers who assumed responsibility for a class after the school year has started will verify their class rosters beginning the first month during which they taught a majority of the instructional days available in the month.
Teachers Who No Longer Are Employed
Teachers who are no longer employed as teachers in any Ohio public school — for whatever reason — are not included in roster verification. Principals should delete the rosters of these teachers during the school setup phase.
Teachers on Extended Leave
Teachers on extended leave in accordance with FMLA guidelines (for example, long-term illness or maternity leave) should claim instructional responsibility for those months during which they taught a majority of the instructional days available.
Schools have a few options for how to handle class rosters for teachers not present during the time of roster verification. If the teacher is expected to return during the review and approval period, the teacher can meet with the school administrator and provide the information for the administrator to verify and submit the roster. If school policy permits, teachers can verify rosters from a remote computer while on extended leave.
Please note: Teachers who plan and/or provide instruction only in the May/June time period are exempt from roster verification.
Intervention Specialists
The participation of intervention specialists in roster verification is governed by local school district policy and their roles in planning and/or providing instruction.
Substitutes
Substitute teachers, whether long-term or short-term, do not participate in roster verification, as they are not subject to the Ohio Teacher Evaluation System. Principals are responsible for ensuring substitute teachers do not verify rosters.
Contract status determines whether the teacher is a substitute or not.
Educational Service Center Rosters
Designated educational service center supervisors or directors may perform roster verification administrative functions — school setup, monitoring of teacher roster verification and the review and approval process — for all educational service center rosters composed of students from multiple districts. In cases where an educational service center roster is composed of students exclusively from one district, the building principal will perform these roster verification administrative functions.
Educational service centers have several options regarding the verification of rosters composed of students from multiple districts. Educational service centers with viable data sources (for example, a student information system with Ohio Educator IDs and state student identification numbers) may work with their information technology centers to use data extracts from those systems to populate the Link application. If such data sources do not exist, educational service center educators may make the decision to manually build rosters within Link. Educational service centers without viable data sources or the desire to manually create rosters in Link will have value-added scores derived from available Educational Management Information System (EMIS) data, absent roster verification.
Online Courses
Teachers who teach in an online environment can contribute to the growth of students, and this can be reflected through the roster verification process. What determines the amount of instructional responsibility is dependent on the teacher’s role in planning and/or providing instruction in the online course. Some online courses may not include any planning or provision of instruction, while others may include some or all of it. Roster Verification FAQs include scenarios that may assist in making this determination.
Verifying Mastery Learning/Time Variable Rosters
In cases where students advance through grades/subjects at highly variable rates, courses should be represented as being proportional to a yearlong course. This is particularly true for students in courses using a mastery learning or competency-based model where course time varies widely. In such cases, a teacher should claim instructional time equivalent to the proportion of the course taught, thus the teacher should claim all months shown within the roster verification application if the teacher taught the entire course.
Teachers of Language Arts
Language arts teachers should verify rosters if they are responsible for teaching content defined in Ohio’s Learning Standards for English Language Arts. In schools where language arts standards are taught in multiple classes (for example, separate reading and writing classes), the percentage of instructional responsibility claimed by each teacher is a local decision.
Courses Taken for High School Credit by Students Not Yet in High School
Students below ninth grade who are taking high school-level courses for high school credit are to take the state end-of- course tests that match the high school-level courses. The teachers who are planning and/or providing instruction should include such students on their rosters.
Middle School Students Taking English II Course for High School Credit
Students below ninth grade who are taking the English II high school course for high school credit are required to take the test that matches their overall grade, even if they have taken it in a prior year. As previously stated in this document under “Content Alignment and Roster Verification”, classes not aligned to appropriate grade-level learning standards and state tests should not be verified. It is a district decision to determine whether the teacher of the English II class(es) should link to the middle school students. However, if a teacher value-added report is generated, these reports will be used as a source of high-quality student data, when applicable.
Special Cases Not Described Here
Numerous special cases not described in these guidelines are detailed in a companion FAQ document.
Last Modified: 1/26/2024 1:43:54 PM