DEQ says cyberattack made them not receive emails April 9-11. Here's what to know

PORTLAND, Ore. () — The Oregon Department of Environmental Quality says it didn't receive any emails sent to them from April 9 through April 11 due to a .
DEQ officials said that if anyone had sent an email to them during that time, they should go into their 'sent' folder and 're-send the same email to the same email address.'
VIDEO: Tula-Tu makes first outdoor public appearance
A number of DEQ projects and proposals have an active public comment period that may have been affected by the outage. Due to this, the below public comment periods were extended to April 25:
Sundown Sanitary District water quality permit, submit comments to: trinh.hansen@deq.oregon.gov
Terrebonne Sanitary District's proposed categorical exclusion, submit comments to: cristina.jones@deq.oregon.gov
The public hearing for the City of Molalla's water quality draft permit will be rescheduled. The hearing date and the preceding public comment period will be announced through GovDelivery as soon as possible.
Some Portland-area DEQ locations morning after the cyberattack shuttered its network operations, including vehicle inspection stations. DEQ officials said they to address the issue.
DEQ officials said only comments sent by email during the timeframe of April 9-April 11 need to be resubmitted. Comments sent via Your DEQ Online were received by DEQ and do not need to be resubmitted.
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Learn with AIFact CheckingText to SpeechAI Summary

Related Articles

Hamilton Spectator

14 hours ago

• Hamilton Spectator

Decoding your kid's report card: What it says and what it really means

Sarah Jane had just finished writing report cards for her Grade 7 students when she called her principal and declared she was done with teaching. 'It was the tipping point,' says the Niagara-area teacher who retired in 2021, marking the end of a 35-year career. 'I thought I just don't want to do another set of report cards and be all stressed out. It's so much work. 'I loved the kids, and I loved teaching. But I felt like report cards are too sugar-coated and sometimes even dishonest because we always have to say what the child does well … You want to find a child's strength, but we're always trying to phrase everything so positively that I think parents don't always know where their child is' academically. Jane is the creator of Ontario Report Card Comments , a Facebook group with nearly 15,000 members where educators share tips and support to get through one of the most nuanced, high-stakes and emotionally charged tasks facing teachers. Report card flashback: What teachers said to a future Nobel prize winner, a prolific author and a future premier The results of which are imminent: final report cards are about to land in the hands of students across the province. For families, it's a nerve-wracking moment that can bring great pride or crushing disappointment. Reviewing anyone's performance can be stressful and intimidating, says Brampton high school teacher Jason Bradshaw, but 'imagine speaking of somebody's child, that takes it to another level. People are going to be all the more emotionally invested. So teachers have a responsibility to be constructive and transparent.' But report cards don't always successfully reflect that. Vague, standardized language and a lack of personalization can leave families unsure of how their child is progressing. To help decode this familiar yet at times cryptic document, the Star spoke with educators who shared how challenging it is to capture a student's story in just a few chosen lines. That homework causing family tension every night? It doesn't count. While homework is important for reinforcing learning, Growing Success , Ontario's education policy on reporting student achievement, makes it clear assignments done at home shouldn't be factored into final marks. Still, skipping homework isn't without consequence — it can show up under learning skills, a key part of assessment for all students in grades 1 to 12. 'In the age of ChatGPT, a lot of educators are moving to the position where we simply do not evaluate work that isn't done in front of us,' says Bradshaw. 'We now have to build in time for students to complete that work entirely in class, to know it's authentic.' In high school, marks are given as percentages and accumulate over a semester. In grades 1 to 6, letters reflect progress since the last report — not from the start of the year. 'The kind of writing a student is doing in September isn't going to be the same as the writing they are doing in December,' says Angela Simone, a Grade 3 teacher with the York Catholic school board. 'It's not really fair to go back; you want to focus on their most recent work.' Teachers mark tests, presentations and assignments according a four-level rubric, which is translated into percentages or letter grades for report cards: Level 4 equals A- to A+ and 80-100 per cent; Level 3 is B- to B+ and 70-79; Level 2 is C- to C+ and 60-69; Level 1 is D- to D+ and 50-59 per cent. 'There's a lot of pressure to see those Level 4 or those As,' says Simone. 'But it's important that people recognize that a Level 3 means they're at the provincial expectations. So there's nothing wrong with a B.' Grades are based on numeric data. Learning skills rely on something else entirely — observation, interpretation and a fair amount of subjectivity. All children in Ontario grades 1 to 12 are evaluated on six competencies: responsibility, organization, independent work, collaboration, initiative and self-regulation. 'You really have to know the child and be able to back up anything you say with proof,' says Jane, who found evaluating these skills the most challenging and time-consuming part of assessment duties, likening it to having to write three separate essays on each student — one for every report card. Simone agrees it can be tedious. 'You don't want to be repetitive, and every child is their own and you want to speak to that child's individuality, but how many times can you say, 'Your desk is messy?' ' The subjectivity required also makes them possibly problematic. A 2018 study using Toronto District School Board data found that students with identical scores on standardized math tests may have different evaluations of their learning skills — differences that correlated with race and gender. Educators often discuss skill expectations with students, and in some cases, have them evaluate their strengths and weaknesses so, as Jane says, they 'take ownership for some of it.' Joanne Sallay, president of tutoring company Teachers on Call , notes that when students struggle, it's often not the curriculum — it's motivation: 'It's handing in work on time — organization, planning skills and how to study effectively. These are really important for the future of work — skills that as adults determine our success.' It's perhaps why on report cards, learning skills are given prime position. That doesn't stop students and parents from skipping over them to check out subject grades. 'We are hardwired to do that,' says Christopher DeLuca, a Queen's University professor of educational assessment . 'And yet, if we understand learning a little bit more deeply, we understand that how we learn impacts what we learn.' DeLuca adds that of all the skills measured on the report card, strong self-regulation is the most critical. The province's Growing Success policy states that all parents should receive 'standard, clear, detailed and straightforward information' about their child's progress based on the Ontario curriculum. That may explain why teacher comments can sound like they've been lifted from a jargon-filled curriculum manual — sometimes they are. 'It's hard when you have 30 students to write an authentic communication of each student's learning,' says Toronto public elementary teacher Andrew Delost. 'Sometimes it's going to sound robotic because a teacher might just be copying and pasting.' Delost recently developed Curricumate , an AI-based assistant to support Ontario educators as they navigate through 'pain points,' including writing report cards. Filling out a report card can take 20 minutes to four hours per student, plus months of tracking grades and recording observations. While professional development days are dedicated to the task, the work usually spills into evenings and weekends. Curricumate, which has 4,000 users, integrates the Ontario curriculum so teachers can select relevant comments and personalize them while maintaining student confidentiality. Teachers have relied on some form of comment banks for decades — whether self-made, shared by colleagues or provided by school boards. More recently, many have turned to tools like ChatGPT. Still, most agree: AI can support feedback, but it shouldn't replace it. Direct communication with parents, they say, remains the most effective way to support student growth. Even as generalized and vague as report comments might seem, clues lie within. 'Qualifiers are so important because that's going to give you a little hint,' says Simone. For example, if a comment on a science unit notes that 'Angela understands plants with a high degree of effectiveness,' she's at a Level 4; if with a considerable degree, she's at Level 3. (Level 2 would use some and limited for Level 1.) Simone says teachers rely on qualifiers particularly when measuring learning skills: If a teacher was to say, 'Sally usually listens well to lesson,' usually means she's not doing it all the time, that she could be chatty, says Simone. 'So even though it doesn't sound like there's an issue, the qualifier lets you know there might be one.' Growing Success advises teachers, when writing anecdotal comments, to 'focus on what students have learned, describe significant strengths, and identify next steps for improvement.' This asset-based reporting emphasizes positive attributes. 'It strengthens and bolsters student confidence,' says DeLuca. But some teachers call it a disservice. 'Only telling students what they're doing well gives them a false impression about what their strengths and weaknesses are, and unfortunately that can catch up to them,' says Bradshaw. 'I can understand how that might be frustrating for parents because we are essentially asking them to read between the lines.' Comments are limited by strict word counts, giving teachers little space to focus on more than one key message. This is especially challenging in math and language, where recent curriculum changes eliminated separate grades for individual strands. Instead of seeing distinct marks for oral communication, writing, reading and media literacy, for example, parents now get just one overall language grade. Check the attendance field. Teachers say missed classes and lateness are often overlooked by parents who may be unaware of their child's habits. Absences can explain why achievements are below expectations. Yes, but not easily. How failing grades are reported varies by board. (One board, for example, will round up a 46 per cent to 50 for a pass.) Up to Grade 8, a decision to hold back a child is made in consultation with parents; in high school, students who receive below 50 may repeat materials related only to expectations not achieved. But a failing mark should not come as a surprise to students or parents. 'Failures are used very judiciously, for a reason,' says DeLuca, 'A failure academically is not just about holding a student from progressing to the next grade, it has social consequences for life and career progression.' Assessment is important, says Bradshaw, but it shouldn't be the only priority. 'When we hyper-focus on marks and evaluations, it gives the impression that day-to-day learning doesn't matter.' Progress reports offer an early opportunity to flag concerns without assigning grades, but they come with their own challenges — especially since they come so early that some teachers, particularly itinerant ones, may have seen a student only a handful of times. More effort typically goes into the first provincial report card when there's still time for students to respond to feedback. Final report cards feel high-stakes, but by June, they should contain no surprises. That said, Sallay emphasizes even these reports should include clear next steps. 'I know that it seems final, but a report card shouldn't define your future success,' she says. 'Look at the recommendations and work on them; it doesn't mean you need to give up. 'It's the end of June, but next year is a whole new year.'

Yahoo

18 hours ago

• Yahoo

Juneteenth celebrated at Civic Plaza

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (KRQE) – The City of Albuquerque celebrated Juneteenth at Civic Plaza Saturday. The holiday is this Thursday and honors the day slavery ended in the United States when, in 1865, the slaves in Galveston, Texas, were freed. Saturday's event is called Rooted in Selience: Rising in Unity and features powerful performances and activities, vendors, and all uplifting Black culture. People who came out shared what Juneteenth means to them. PHOTOS: No Kings Rally at Mariposa Basin Park 'It means our freedom, that we fought for our freedom all these years. We still fight for them,' said an attendee. The Juneteenth celebration is free to attend and is scheduled to continue at Civic Plaza until 11:00 p.m. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

Yahoo

18 hours ago

• Yahoo

Where US troops in Mideast are most at risk of Iran strike

{beacon} Welcome to The Hill's Defense & NatSec newsletter {beacon} Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.