All teachers and professional staff must convert their Level I certificate to a permanent Level II certificate after they have met the following requirements, but BEFORE they have completed 6 years of teaching experience in Pennsylvania. 

If an educator does not complete the requirements for conversion from Level I to Level II within the six (6) years time frame, their certificate will “lapse” and become invalid for teaching. 

In order to be eligible to apply for your Level II certificate, you need to have met the following criteria:

  1. You have completed at least 3 full years of successful teaching experience in PA (or 6 semesters as documented by 6 satisfactory evaluations.)
  2. You have completed a PDE induction program through PV or another school district (though our district requires all teachers new to our district to participate in an induction program, even if you have completed a program in another district)
  3. You have completed 24 post-baccalaureate credits (6 of which must be associated with your area(s) of certification and/or must be designed to improve professional practice.)

Level II – Commonly Asked Questions

 
To apply for your Level II teaching certificate, log into your Teacher Information Management System (TIMS) account. You should be guided through the procedure when you apply, but here is a summary of the general process:
  1. Apply for your Level II certificate on TIMS (Application user guide)
  2. Contact your university and arrange for official transcripts showing your 24 credits to be sent directly to PDE (per their instructions).
  3. PDE will contact PVSD (and any other districts that you provide on your Level II application) and prompt us to complete the online verification of experience form to verify that you have received successful evaluations, completed an induction program, and are a person of good moral character. Karen Zucker completes the first round of verification, and the form is then routed to the Superintendent to give final approval. 
If you have questions, please read the following information from PDE, or contact Karen Zucker (kzucker@pvsd.org)