The Pennsylvania Department of Education’s Office of Child Development and Early Learning (OCDEL) has released an announcement regarding the 2020 Keystone Stars Performance Standards and 2020 Keystone STARS Program Manual. The newly updated standards and manual will replace the previous Keystone STARS Standards, which were released in 2018. OCDEL worked with many stakeholders to review the Keystone STARS quality indicators to inform changes to the standards, and is providing additional resources to help support programs on using them effectively.
Further, the announcement makes changes to the Program Quality Assessment (PQA) within Keystone STARS due to the COVID-19 pandemic. OCDEL will temporarily change the Keystone STARS requirement for PQA for all STAR 3 & 4 programs, or those seeking to more to a STAR 3 or 4 designation, to have an external PQA using either Environment Rating Scales (ERS) or CLASS and meet the minimum threshold scores for each STAR level. In its place, an internal assessment process will be required.
OCDEL will be releasing a recorded webinar with further information for providers next week, which will provide an overview of the 2020 Keystone STARS Performance Standards.