On February 22, 2019, Brian W. Campbell, PDE’s Director of the Bureau of Curriculum, Assessment, and Instruction released two memos providing guidance with regard to Act 158 of 2018 which, in conjunction with Act 6 of 2017, expands the options for students to demonstrate postsecondary readiness through five pathways that illustrate college, career, and community readiness. The statewide graduation requirement outlined in both Act 6 and Act 158 takes effect for the graduating class of 2022.

As part of the implementation of these graduation pathways, PDE will transition the Project Based Assessments (PBA) from web-based assessments to local resource documents, and PBAs submitted to the http://pba.pdesas.org/ website prior to March 31, 2019 will be evaluated by PDE. Projects completed after the March 31, 2019 deadline will not be reviewed or scored by PDE. Projects should be evaluated at the local level, at the LEA’s discretion. The PBA website will be taken off-line on June 30, 2019.

As required, the Department of Education (PDE) has released a Guidance FAQ document to provide an overview of changes to the statewide graduation requirement as a result of Act 158. More information about the new statewide graduation requirement is available on the PDE website. Questions may be directed to [email protected].