DATA MANAGEMENT ALERT

FY 2021 Special Education Year-End Data Checklist

This alert serves as a reminder to all PEAs that special education data should be reviewed for accuracy and edited if necessary, before the end of the fiscal year.

AzEDS is considered the system of record for the 2020-2021 school year and will close for current year data submissions at 5:00 PM on July 15, 2021. Data for all public education agencies (PEAs) must be complete and accurate in AzEDS for FY 2021. Data found to be inaccurate after the statewide data recalculation is subject to a data correction process (this may also meet the criteria of A.R.S. § 15-915) and must be corrected with the assistance of ADE School Finance personnel. ESS Data Management encourages our customers to strive for complete and accurate AzEDS data entry. Please see below for some helpful tips when submitting your data.

Reviewing AzEDS data:

Special education exit information must reside in AzEDS for all special education students: each student participating in your PEA's special education program must have both an exit date and exit reason in AzEDS, including students who stay in special education through the last scheduled day of school.

All students enrolled for membership must also have a year-end status or withdrawal code in AzEDS. Student records missing this information will fail AzEDS integrity processing. Students who are enrolled for membership through the last scheduled day of school must have a year-end status; students who withdraw before the last scheduled day of school must have a withdrawal code. Special education data coordinators may need to work with personnel at their PEA who submits membership information to AzEDS to ensure that the students' special education exit information and year-end or withdrawal status align.

Refer to the SPED Exit Validation Matrix to see which exit codes align with which withdrawal and year-end status codes.

Refer to the AzEDS SPED Codes document for a full description of all exit codes/reasons.

Review the SPED Participation Report (SPED72) for all schools in your PEA for Fiscal Year 2021 (July 1, 2020 – June 30, 2021).

Ensure that every student who participated in special education at your school(s) is listed on the report and that the students' data are accurate.  

Ensure that every student who participated in special education at a Non-Public Organization (approved private day school, residential treatment center, head start or other) with your PEA as the District of Residence (DOR) is listed on the report, and that the students' data are accurate.

Review the Student Data Integrity Report (INTEG15) to identify any student records failing State SPED integrity and FED SPED integrity. If possible, ensure that you have enough time to upload corrections to AzEDS and verify whether the uploaded data corrected the errors.  Troubleshooting documents to aid in resolving integrity errors can be found on our webpage under SPED Integrity Error Tools.

ESS Data Management encourages public education agencies (PEAs) to begin reviewing AzEDS data as soon as possible.

ESS Annual Data requirements:

The ESS Annual Data Collection (ADC) application extracts student exit data from AzEDS. Refer to the Exit instructions within the ADC application to ensure that all students' exit data are complete and accurate in AzEDS and aligns appropriately with withdrawal or yearend status by 5:00 PM on July 15, 2021 to ensure the data will be complete and accurate on the exit reports in ESS Annual Data.

Disciplinary data for all special education students must be submitted to the ESS Discipline Data Collection (DDC) application by 5:00 PM on July 15, 2021 for inclusion on the discipline reports in the ESS Annual Data application.

If you have any questions, please direct them to ESS Data Management.

DATA MANAGEMENT ALERT     

ESS Annual Data Collection application is now open.

We are pleased to announce the ESS Annual Data Collection (ADC) application is open and available to all public education agencies (PEAs). PEAs are expected to complete this data collection requirement electronically, utilizing ADEConnect to access the online application via the ESS Portal for FY 2021. 

Timelines:

The Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP) requires Annual SPED Data Collection information in order for Arizona to receive Part B IDEA funding. Therefore, failure to promptly submit your PEA’s data may cause an interruption of your federal funds and may also impact your PEA Determination. 

• Open Date: Monday, April 26, 2021 
• Exit & Discipline Data Submission Due Date: Thursday, July 15, 2021 by 5:00 PM 
• Data Certification Begins: Wednesday, July 21, 2021 
• ADC Due Date: Wednesday, August 4, 2021 

Training:

Training modules are intended to help PEAs and school personnel who are involved with special education data collection and reporting. Training modules relevant to this data collection are posted on the Training Videos webpage.

For questions pertaining to the ESS Annual Data Collection, please contact ESS Data Management at [email protected].

DATA MANAGEMENT ALERT

FY 2021 Annual Special Education Data Collection

GENERAL INFORMATION

On Monday, April 26, 2021 the Exceptional Student Services (ESS) Annual Special Education (SPED) Data Collection application for FY 2021 will be available to all public education agencies (PEAs). PEAs are expected to complete this data collection requirement electronically, utilizing ADEConnect to access the online application via the ESS Portal. 

Note: 

• If you belong to a cooperative, please do not ask your Cooperative Coordinator to submit your data. It is each PEA’s responsibility to submit individual data.
• If your PEA does not have data that qualifies for inclusion in this online application as determined by AzEDS, it is expected that you will click the “No Students Served” button on the home page to certify with signature. 

ADECONNECT

ADEConnect requires an email address and password, which is also used for other electronic data submissions to the Arizona Department of Education. You can access ADEConnect and support information at the following link: https://home.azed.gov/Portal/, however, PEAs are encouraged to access through their Student Information System (SIS). It is recommended that the SPED Director request access for all users.

The request will need to go through the PEA Local ADE Connect Entity Administrator. ESS Data Management will provide secondary approval.

TIMELINES

The Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP) requires Annual SPED Data Collection information in order for Arizona to receive Part B IDEA funding. Therefore, failure to promptly submit your PEA’s data may cause an interruption of your federal funds and may also impact your PEA Determination.

 Open Date: Monday, April 26, 2021

• Exit & Discipline Data Submission Due Date: Thursday, July 15, 2021 by 5:00 PM
• Data Certification Begins: Wednesday, July 21, 2021
• ADC Due Date: Wednesday, August 4, 2021

Updates for FY 2021 Annual SPED Data Collection Reporting

The Annual SPED Data Collection consists of the following sections: Exit and Discipline report required by all PEAs. Preschool Transition and Parentally Placed Private School Students reports are required by districts only (if applicable). 

There are minimal changes to the Annual SPED Data Collection this year; however, all data requirements are subject to change as federal guidance is received. The following updates will be incorporated in the online application:

• Instructions and FAQs posted on the home page will have changes outlined in bold. PLEASE READ!
• There are no changes to the Exit and Parentally Placed Private School Students reports.
• Modifications have been made to Preschool Transition to remove the COVID line item.

Exit Data Extract from AzEDS

Given that AzEDS is the system of record for FY 2021, the exit data report will be refreshed nightly. This data will be finalized after the FY 2021 Statewide Recalculation scheduled for July 15, 2021. 

Discipline Data Extract from DDC

ESS Discipline Data Collection (DDC) is available through ADEConnect via the ESS Portal. PEAs are expected to submit discipline data for special education students, either manually into the DDC application or by uploading data to DDC via an export from their SIS. The discipline report will be refreshed nightly, based on data extracted from DDC.

Discipline for Tuitioned-Out Students

As the district of residence (DOR), it is the PEA’s responsibility to manually enter the discipline data for tuitioned-out students. For purposes of this data collection, “tuitioned-out” refers to students who reside in your PEA and are tuitioned-out to one of the following: Approved Private Day Schools, Approved Private Residential Treatment Center, Head Start, Public Consortium, and Arizona School for the Deaf and Blind (ASDB).

ASDB STUDENTS

As the DOR, PEAs that voucher preschool students to ASDB are responsible for reporting preschool transition data for their students. The home district receives the referral from AzEIP and is ultimately responsible for the IEPs of its students. DORs will also be responsible for reporting discipline and exit data for voucher students to DDC and AzEDS. If your PEA has discipline data to report for voucher preschool students to ASDB this data must be manually entered under the school identified as “Tuitioned-out School” found on your PEA’s School list.

Data Certification

The data certification process will commence on Wednesday, July 21, 2021, and electronic signatures are due to ADE/ESS by Wednesday, August 4, 2021 by 5:00 PM. During this time period, PEAs will have the opportunity to complete any outstanding agency reports, review exit and discipline reports, proceed with the data certification process, make any required exit data corrections, complete Section E of the Discipline report for students without disabilities (if applicable), and submit the required electronic signature. Signatures will only be accepted from the SPED Director, business manager or superintendent/charter school administrator attesting to the accuracy and the validity of the data submitted.

TRAINING

Training modules are intended to provide assistance to PEA and school personnel who are involved with special education data collection and reporting. The following training modules relevant to this data collection are posted on the Training Videos webpage:  

1.  An Overview of the ESS Annual Data Collection reporting requirements;
2. Exit and Discipline School Reports;
3. Print Reports 101; 
4. Agency Reports, an overview of the Preschool Transition and Parentally Placed Student reports;
5. Discipline Data Collection, an overview of the data submission requirements for purposes of the Discipline report (note that this webinar was held on April 12th and a recording of this webinar will be available under its own section soon); and
6. Data Certification, an overview on the steps required to close out this data collection requirement.  

 The target audience of these training modules will be the novice user. However, these modules are also available to advanced users who wish to review a “refresher” on this data collection.

If you have any questions, please direct them to ESS Data Management.

DATA MANAGEMENT ALERT

FY22 Update: Integrity Rules Upgrading from Warning to Failure

Effective Fiscal Year 2022, two Integrity Rules will be upgrading from a warning to a failure.

Please be aware you can identify students receiving these warnings in FY21 to prepare for your reporting in FY22.  Please check your INTEG15 report in the AzEDS Portal to determine if your entity is failing any Integrity Rules. The INTEG15 report can filter by warnings only.

One-sheet Integrity Tools are available on our AzEDS SPED Reporting webpage for troubleshooting tips, these rules are included in our SPED Integrity Rules Reference document and FY 2021 ESS Data Reporting Updates document.

Integrity Rule -40077

When a student’s SPED Least Restrictive Environment (LRE) is reported a Resident School ID must be reported.

Integrity Rule -10131

Preschool students not receiving SPED services must be reported with Tuition Payer code 2 for each day of enrollment. Preschool students on an IEP and receiving SPED services should be reported with Tuition Payer code 1 (regular) or 7 (ASDB voucher) for each day of enrollment.

Please contact [email protected] with any questions regarding this FY22 update. 

 DATA MANAGEMENT ALERT 

New SPED Integrity Rule for FY21: -40085 

A new SPED integrity rule will be introduced into the integrity process for FY21 shortly. This new rule is a continuation of our effort to further validate Tuition Payer codes to ensure clean data for the state. A new one-sheet Integrity Tool is available on our AzEDS SPED Reporting webpage for troubleshooting tips, and the rule has been added to our SPED Integrity Rules Reference document. This rule has been updated from the upcoming section in the FY 2021 ESS Data Reporting Updates document. 

Integrity Rule -40085 

Parentally Placed students on an ISP reported with Least Restrictive Environment J (Private School Placement by Parents) are part of Proportionate Share funds and must be Tuition Payer Code 2 (Privately paid tuition, no tuition charged, or not eligible for state funding). 

Please contact [email protected] with any questions regarding this new rule.   

DATA MANAGEMENT ALERT 

New Integrity Rule for FY21: -10133 

 A new Average daily Membership (ADM) integrity rule will be introduced into the integrity process for FY21 shortly. This new rule is a continuation of our effort to further validate Tuition Payer codes to ensure clean data for the state. A new one-sheet Integrity Tool is available on our AzEDS SPED Reporting webpage for troubleshooting tips, and the rule has been added to our SPED Integrity Rules Reference document. This rule has been updated from the upcoming section in the FY 2021 ESS Data Reporting Updates document. 

 Integrity Rule -10133 

 Students reported with Tuition Payer Code 7 (Students funded through other state formula programs) must have a SPED Least Restrictive Environment (LRE) reported for all dates of the Tuition Payer Code 7. 

 Please contact [email protected] with any questions regarding this new rule.   

DATA MANAGEMENT ALERT     

ESS Discipline Data Collection application is now open.

We are pleased to announce the ESS Discipline Data Collection (DDC) application is now open for FY21 SPED discipline incident submissions.  All disciplinary incidents that result in the removal of a student receiving special education services are required to be submitted in the DDC application.  The application will only accept incidents for students reported as SPED in AzEDS on the date of incident.  More information about the ESS Discipline Data Collection is available on our Annual SPED Data Collection webpage.

The application allows for manual entry of incidents as well as bulk entry using the XML upload feature, introduced in FY20.  Please note the XML was updated in FY20 and Student Information System vendors were required to update their exports to the new XML schema.  There have been no changes to the XML Schema in FY21.  Systems updated to the new schema in FY20 are not required to update for FY21.

Please note:  XML file uploads will override all the discipline data for the current fiscal year only for sites included in your XML file.

The ESS Discipline Data Collection application will close on July 16, 2021.

For questions pertaining to the ESS Discipline Data Collection, please contact ESS Data Management at [email protected].

DATA MANAGEMENT ALERT

SPED Integrity Rule -40055

SPED integrity rule -40055 is defined as follows:  

If a student’s SPED Exit Reason does not match the student’s regular membership Year End or Withdrawal Membership status, then report the discrepancy as an error. This rule is triggered for all SPED data effective April 1st of the fiscal year to capture mismatches and relevant data elements not reported. (See the SPED Exit Validation Matrix)

1. If a student has all of the following four values, this rule will trigger anytime during the reporting year:
   • Withdrawal/Year-End exit value (Code/Reason)
   • Withdrawal/Year-End exit date
   • SPED Exit Code (Reason)
   • SPED Exit Date
2. If any of these elements are missing, then this rule will be triggered on April 1 and forward.

To further clarify:

Between July 1 and March 31 of each reporting year, this rule would apply only in cases where all 4 of the aforementioned values (a-d above) are present. Effective April 1, this rule would apply to all students even if one or more of the values is reported as “null” (not reported).

The intent of this rule is not only to ensure that the data is complete by the end of the fiscal reporting year with all 4 values, it is also intended to ensure that the exit dates/reasons align between SPED and ADM as appropriate.

If PEAs were not receiving this error previously and now have students failing, most likely one of the 4 values have not been reported.  To resolve integrity error -40055, replace the null values with the correct exit date(s) and/or exit reason(s) according to the SPED Exit Validation Matrix and resubmit to AzEDS. Please note that AzEDS will accept future dates.

Additionally, the SPED Integrity Error Tool for -40055 can be referenced to assist with troubleshooting.  

Post-integrity exit data is required to ensure that the federal exit reports within the Annual SPED Data Collection are accurate and valid. This exit data is also used to calculate the measurement for the graduation rate (Indicator 1) and dropout rate (Indicator 2) on the State Performance Plan / Annual Performance Report (SPP / APR).  

If you have any questions, please direct them to [email protected].

DATA MANAGEMENT ALERT

Integrity Rule -40055 – Update to SPED Exit Validation Matrix

An enhancement to Integrity Rule -40055 will be introduced into the integrity process on FY21 SPED data shortly. This update is a continuation of our effort to ensure clean data for the state. Updated one-sheet Integrity Tools are available on our AzEDS SPED Reporting webpage for troubleshooting tips.

Updates to the SPED Exit Validation Matrix will now be reflected in Integrity Rule -40055.

Most notably the SPED Exit Code SPED13 (End of School Year) may only be reported with an Enrollment Year End Code.  Updates to allowable SPED Exit Codes with Enrollment Year End Codes have also been addressed.

Please contact [email protected] with any questions regarding this update.

DATA MANAGEMENT ALERT 

NEW FY21 ESS Discipline Data Training Webinar  

ESS Data Management will be hosting a training webinar for the ESS Discipline Data Collection (DDC) on April 5, 2021, from 10am – 12pm. Please join us to learn about new updates and how to report your DDC data accurately and timely. If you’re unable to join us, we will be posting a recording of the webinar on our website.

Registration is required to attend: Register for the ESS Discipline Data webinar.  

The ESS DDC application opens March 15, 2021.

If you have any questions, please direct them to [email protected].